My Work From Home Setup

My Work From Home Setup

Working from home (WFH) has suddenly seen a surge in popularity for various reasons. I’ve seen all kinds of cool and creative setups, from converting a wine shelf, to creating a make-shift standing desk by way of a laundry basket on top of a counter.

I always thought it would be nice to have a dedicated room for a home-office since most of my time is spent on a computer. While my setup may not be as creative as some of the other setups out there, I do find it comfortable, and good for my productivity. I thought I would share my setup for those of you looking to create a dedicated home office of your own. The following lists everything I use, with product links where available.

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Desk

My desk is an Autonomous SmartDesk 2 Business Edition (which appears to have been replaced by the Premium edition). When I was in the market for a desk I kept seeing ads for Autonomous. I have to admit, at first they seemed too good to be true. I have a different brand standing desk at work, but the size I needed to fit my space was only available from Autonomous. They offered a 30 day trial, so I figured I’d give it a shot. I assembled it mid-2019 and so far it’s been great! The operation is smooth, and I like the programmable memory buttons.

Desk Accessories

I think accessories and a little customization are a must to get the space just right. Here are the products I used to make a nice, clean setup.

• Cable Tray: The cable tray is available as an add-on from Autonomous. I use it to hold a surge protector and stow away any extra cable length. It keeps the desk looking neat.
  
• Vertical Cable Manager: For height-adjustable / standing desks, you can’t go wrong with this Vertical Cable Manager. I have one on this desk, and also my work desk. You can add/remove segments to it as needed to adjust the overall length, and it neatly folds / unfolds as you change your desk’s height.
  
• Under Desk Pencil Drawer: One thing Autonomous doesn’t offer for their desks is underneath storage. I found this storage tray to be the perfect size for this desk (the way the frame mounts to the desktop leaves little room for a drawer, but this one fits perfectly).
  

Computer

My previous computer was about 7 years old, so I used some guidance from Steve Smith’s (aka Ardalis) Ultimate Developer Rig post to build my own workstation.

Parts Breakdown

• Motherboard: Gigabyte Z390 AORUS Master
• CPU: Intel I9-9900K
• Cooling: Corsair Hydro Series H100i PRO RGB AIO Liquid CPU Cooler
• RAM: G.SKILL 32GB (2 x 16GB) Ripjaws V Series DDR4 PC4-25600 3200MHz Model F4-3200C14D-32GVK CAS 14
• SSD: Samsung (MZ-V7E1T0BW) 970 EVO SSD 1TB – M.2 NVMe
• Power Supply: CORSAIR SF Series, SF750, 750 Watt, SFX, 80+ Platinum Certified
• Graphics Card: EVGA GeForce RTX 2080 Super Black Gaming
• Additional Cooling: Noctua NF-A12x15 PWM, Premium Quiet Slim Fan. I mounted two of these at the top of the case to help force out some of that hot air
• Monitors: Dell Ultrasharp U2415 24 Inch LED Monitor or here for a refurbished one. Being more of a developer and not a gamer, I love the additional vertical screen space. These monitors are 1920×1200 (16:10 ratio) instead of the typical Full HD 1920×1080 (16:9).
• Keyboard: The keyboard pictured is a Logitech K520, though at work I have a Logitech G915 Clicky wireless mechanical keyboard, which I love a whole lot more
• Mouse: Logitech MX Master Wireless Mouse. In my opinion, you can’t go wrong with this mouse, or the newer Logitech MX Master 3
• Webcam (not pictured): Logitech C920S HD Pro With Privacy Shutter
• UPS: APC UPS, 1500VA UPS Battery Backup & Surge Protector with AVR. I’ve got this great PC, now I have to protect it with a great UPS.
• Scanner: EPSON Workforce ES-II Color Duplex Document Scanner. This scanner is a fast alternative to the one that is built into my MFP.

Other Things

File Storage

I don’t have a ton of files, but needed some filing storage. I found these cool decorative hanging file boxes that work really well

WiFi

I’ve been a huge fan of Ubiquiti products for a long time. I’ll save the review for another post, but recently upgraded with the UniFi In Wall HD paired with a UniFi CloudKey Gen2 Plus