The Stuff I think I need

So I spent a bit of last weekend cleaning out the spot where I’m Making my office. I’ll be honest with you, The room was being used as a semi storage semi play area for my kids so it took some serious re-arraigning of what was in the room. I have cleared out my corner of the room and I’m now starting with the planning of “my space”. I should probably mention that because it’s just me it won’t be anywhere near as spacious as the picture above.

I am working on getting a proper desk but for the moment I’m planning on getting a temporary desk for now. if I’m honest because I don’t need a great deal of room for papers and whatnot I don’t need a terribly large surface for everything I have. For me, the trick is going to be figuring out what I need. I have a short list of everything so now it’s just a matter of purchasing the following;

1) Keyboard – There are so many options available nowadays that knowing what you need can be a bit tricky. I had a minor incident with my laptop over the Christmas holidays. I was working on some blog posts and my B button stopped working reliably. It was really annoying but I was able to fix the problem by putting on a keyboard cover. I’m going to be buying a separate keyboard for my office if for no other reason than I want to be able to use a keyboard that was designed to take more of a regular pounding than the keyboard my Mac has. Mac is great, but heavy usage requires something a bit more robust. to that end, I’m looking at getting a wired mechanical keyboard.

Specifically, I’ve been looking at a wired Mechanical keyboard from a gaming accessories company called Razor. This was based on a recommendation of my brother in law who is a massive gamer and computer programmer. He recommended Razor because their products are fairly easy to maintain and they are designed for excessive usage and repetitive keystrokes. For the gamers, it’s because most computer games use your W, A, S, and D buttons for moving your character about. For those of us who write, it’s because we write a lot and we need something that’s going to be able to handle the amount of work we put into it.

2) Mouse – as many options as there is for keyboards there are equal amounts for Mouses. for the purposes of this project, I am also going to pick up a wired mouse. The reasoning being fairly simple. if I’m going to be using an external keyboard it’s quite tricky to be using the trackpad from my MacBook Pro. Frankly, it’s a lot easier to use both in conjunction with each other than it is to use simply one or the other.

3) Docking Hub – The reason for the docking hub is simple. With the MacBook Pro, there are only four external ports. Your computer may have more or less, but in either case, for me, I need to have the ability to use more than just the USB-C ports I need more ports and more different ports than I have and having a docking port allows me to do that.

4) Monitor – While I’m working on my MacBook alone, It’s fairly simple to use all the built-in tools. As I’m going to be using both a Keyboard and mouse that is external it only makes sense to have an external monitor. The reason I want to get one is that, like with the keyboard and mouse, when you scale up one of them you should really scale up all of them. Also, it gives the added advantage of acting as two monitors; one which is the external monitor, one which is the laptop itself. This can be configured through the settings on your computer but typically if you simply connect the two you will be able to use both.

5) Actual Desk – The office where I work is undergoing a bit of a furniture change and so I was fortunate enough to have a chat with the lady that my company has put in charge. She has helped me sort out a desk. Sadly for me, it will take a few weeks and so I’m going to have to set up something temporary.

Most of this stuff I’m planning on buying online, but if you want to go into a store and physically handle your equipment (like your keyboard and mouse to see if you like the feel of it) then there are likely stores in your area where you can get that sorted. I will be reporting back on what I’m calling “configuration 1.0” once It’s complete.

Have you got any idea of what you would put in your office? Do you have any suggestions for me?

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