LCD Monitor Table

[edswoods.1]

As incentive to clean out and repaint my dark, dingy 10'x10' computer room with its two giant cigarette-stained CRT monitors, I decided to use a laptop and LCD monitor-desktop instead. This created the need, or opened up the opportunity, to design and build a compact table for the monitor, keyboard, and mouse. There's a lot of design possibility for this. I had just completed a project using walnut and bubinga woods, so there were some scraps laying around. There were only enough scraps, though, to make some kind of wall-mount piece, which I decided against because of the mobility factor. So I made a free-standing table out of some 1x12 pine boards that a customer had let me rip out of an old shoe store he was remodeling, and I don't know whether or not it looks that great (maybe if it was a birthday present for your grandmother who lives in a tiny condo) but I'll let you pass judgement if you like. It's at:

[Edwin Pawlowski]

clutter up around it with the mail, bills, etc. While it looks small compared to a full desk, functionally, it is the same, especially since the LDC is so narrow. I have about 16" of space between the back of my monitor to the wall. My old CRT had about 1" of space.

[edswoods.1]

Thanks for the compliment. It's an interesting project. Say a woodworking teacher was having a class on style, assigning students to build something a la Duncan Phyfe or Art Deco or Shaker. When designating the type of furniture to be designed, the teacher would say, "and I want it to be a computer table."

[Lee DeRaud]

As a woodworking project, it looks like you did some nice work.

Design-wise:

1. Looks like either (a) the monitor will be way too close if the keyboard is at a comfortable distance or (b) the keyboard will be too far away if the monitor is at a comfortable distance.
2. I'm getting bruises on my ankles just looking at that lower shelf. (See 1(a) above.)
3. It's way too pretty a piece of furniture to have all those cables hanging off of it and that doorstop of a CPU sitting next to it.

I'd be looking for a new teacher. That makes just about as much sense as asking for a "Louis XIV miter saw station". Conjures up flashbacks of David Marks' cherry-with-book-matched-koa-doors shop cabinet, but at least the design of that was (mostly) functional.

Guess I've seen way too many "furniture-styled" computer desks where the design was grossly compromised to fit the intended function...and the function didn't work worth a damn either.

Lee

[edswoods.1]

Design-wise:

1. Looks like either (a) the monitor will be way too close if the keyboard is at a comfortable distance or (b) the keyboard will be too far away if the monitor is at a comfortable distance.

1. I'm getting bruises on my ankles just looking at that lower shelf. (See 1(a) above.) >A critique I'll keep in mind, but you'd be accessing your bag of Oreos constantly?

2. It's way too pretty a piece of furniture to have all those cables hanging off of it and that doorstop of a CPU sitting next to it. > Use your imagination and picture a vase of flowers on a slim pedestal next to the table instead.

That makes just about as much sense as asking for a "Louis XIV miter saw station". Conjures up flashbacks of David Marks' cherry-with-book-matched-koa-doors shop cabinet, but at least the design of that was (mostly) functional. >I'm not trying to be counter-critical, because I want to profit from what other people have to say - and believe I have from your comments. But - if you had Louis XIV furniture in a room, where you also wanted a computer, would you want to put it on something from Office Max? The miter box is a bad parallel, maybe I'm better off not knowing who David Marks is, and I'd never make a bookmatched door shop cabinet. Obviously, with furniture in living quarters you care about style. Or do you feel that the furniture style is dictated by the computer no matter where it is placed? A miter box would look OK temporarily in a Louis XIV room if you were repairing something but the computer is there quasi-permanently. If the miter box was there over a period of time I think you'd want to make it as unobtrusive as possible. With a Louis XIV miter box stand, of course.

[Lee DeRaud]

No, I'd see if one of those Louis XIV tables had a drawer big enough to hold a laptop when it wasn't in use. Bottom line, if I wanted that look of furniture, I wouldn't keep a computer in view in the same room

24/7.

It depends somewhat on which tail is wagging which dog. The problem with trying to combine computer desk functionality with a style of furniture from a radically different era is that both function *and* style get rather badly compromised as a result. If the computer is only used a couple hours a week to pay bills etc, maybe you can afford to skew that compromise toward the style side. I make my living with one (well, several), so yeah, I'm going to skew the other direction. But I try to avoid that problem by not keeping my "tools" in rooms where (an incompatible) style is important to me.

Lee

[Edwin Pawlowski]

I think the view looks a bit skewed. It looks very narrow compared to a standar desk, but tha tis because the LCD monitor is rather slim and no much space is needed behind it. My monitor is 24" from my eyes and only 14" from the desk front. Keyboard sits so that the back is almost on top of the monitor base.

Sitting at my normal sized desk, my knees are only about 8" under the desk ront. My ankles are well below where he has the shelf so that is not a question.

I think it just looks "different" than our preconceived notions of what a computer desk should look like. If it works, that is what counts. Just my opinion.

[Lee DeRaud]

[comments you're replying to were actually mine]

That "8 inches under the desk front" looks like it will get to the front of that shelf: as you say, this desk is *much* narrower than standard. And not everyone tucks their feet back under the chair when sitting at a desk.

Um, ok, do you have the same answer if I change "ankles" to "shins"?

Absolutely. My question was (and is): "*Does* it work?"

Lee

[J. Clarke]

I think that the problem is not so much style as it is trying to turn something that wasn't designed to hold a computer into a computer table. The right way to do it would be to say "Now what would Louis XIV's computer table have looked like if Louis XVI had had a computer?". That's a much more difficult task though--I certainly don't have the historical knowledge to do anything like that but it seems to me that it could be done.

[Lee DeRaud]

Probably route the monitor cables through the inkwell hole. :-)

Seriously, using the word "historical" to describe this thing defines the problem: if you care about the historical period "look" of the room, why smack it between the eyes with such a glaring anachronism?

Lee

[edswoods.1]

Lee DeRaud May 7, 3:45 pm

Seriously, using the word "historical" to describe this thing defines the problem: if you care about the historical period "look" of the room, why smack it between the eyes with such a glaring anachronism?

right. The student given the assignment of making the "period" piece of furniture could make it, at best, fit beautifully into a room but with a candelabra instead of a computer on top. A more realistic assignment would be to assess the overall style of a contemporary room that's in practical use and design a computer table that blends well.

[J. Clarke]

Because one wants to sit in one's nice expensive room full of good furniture instead of in a room full of Staples crap of a vintage contemporary with that of the computer?

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Maybe. Putting my toe to the wall leaves about 6 or 7 inches of space to my shins, depending on just how I sit. I don' tknow hte dimension of the shelf.

The OP will have to tell us. My desk site below a window so I have plenty of room plus and outdoor view if I look up. Sitting that close to a wall may take some getting used to even if it does work ergonomically.

[Lee DeRaud]

Well, yeah, that too.

Ergonomic: a French word that translates roughly as "uncomfortable".

Lee

[Lee DeRaud]

One *might* consider putting one's computer in another room better suited to the task. Or use my previous suggestion of keeping the bloody thing out of sight when not in use. Or do as I do: use one's nice expensive room full of good furniture of a vintage and style compatible with that of the computer.

Or you could just assume that everything that doesn't look centuries old must be Staples crap.

Lee

[Patriarch]

"Edwin Pawlowski" wrote in news:Xxffe.2830$ [e-mail]:

When I work at the system for any time at all, I find that I need room for the mouse to roam, and support for the forearm of my 'mousing arm'. And I sit further back from the screen than this setup allows.

But I need to get out in the shop more, anyhow.

Patriarch

[J. Clarke]

Well, if it's compatible with the style of the computer it is--they certainly are not known for superior fit or finish.

Personally I'm of the opinion that anybody who is that concerned about style needs a life.

[edswoods.1]

J. Clarke May 15, 7:45 pm show options Newsgroups: rec.woodworking From: "J. Clarke" - Find messages by this author Date: Sun, 15 May 2005 19:45:20 -0400 Local: Sun,May 15 2005 7:45 pm Subject: Re: LCD Monitor Table Reply | Reply to Author | Forward | Print | Individual Message | Show original | Report Abuse

- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text - Lee DeRaud wrote:

Well, if it's compatible with the style of the computer it is--they certainly are not known for superior fit or finish.

Personally I'm of the opinion that anybody who is that concerned about style needs a life.

I'm sure Ted Kluzinsky feels the same way.

[Lee DeRaud]

Personally I'm of the opinion that anybody who posts an inane response to a thread that died nearly a month ago needs a life.

Lee