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A practical set-up for working from home
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items Remote work is so prevalent these days and it's more important than ever make sure your gear enables you to be productive. Whether you've been working from home for many years or a few days, there's always a way to improve your set-up without breakin...
Sections
5
Desk & Chair
Screens & Lights
Audio
Accessories
Wildcards
Desk & Chair
It all starts with what's touching the floor
If you do nothing else, get yourself a standing desk. Having the option to change your stance without killing productivity was an unlock for me. It paid for itself by reducing my back pain.
Standing desk
The gamers know what they're doing. Forget those leather “executive” chairs. Pass over anything with cheap foam. Get something which supports your back and is reasonably sturdy. Good chair helps with posture.
Gaming chair
Whether you have carpet or hard floor, protect your floor. The chair moves around much more than you realize. Much cheaper to buy a plastic mat than pay for floor repairs.
Chair mat
Screens & Lights
Where and how you look
Nothing fancy. A reliable monitor with reasonably good specs. The important part here is doubling your digital workspace and allowing yourself to look straight ahead when working (i.e., not looking down and hunching over your laptop screen).
Large desk monitor
Believe it or not, your laptop's integrated webcam isn't that great, mostly because of its location. Webcams are still relevant and allow you to be intentional about the angle from which others see you.
Webcam
For all those video calls. Unless you have amazingly perfect natural light, you need a ring light. Nothing crazy. Just something to make it seem like you don't work in a dungeon. Believe me, people notice when your lighting is bad.
Ring light
This acts as both my third monitor and my travel monitor. You just plug it in and go. Really nice to have the option of expanding your digital workspace without having a large, clunky third desktop monitor.
Portable monitor
Audio
Move beyond the traditional headset
Look, I have large ears. On-ear headphones hurt after hours of use. These SHOKZ headphones changed the game simply by reducing the pain. Sure, you lose the noise cancellation, but I find my focus hasn't suffered, even during meetings.
SHOKZ open-ear headphones
I love my AirPods and I absolutely use them for work. These are in my ears whenever I'm in deep work. Perfect for simple noise cancellation (i.e., silence) or for audio quality if I'm listening to music.
AirPods Pro
Accessories
Bringing it all together
I didn't realize how much my wrist hurt until I got this vertical mouse and my wrist pain vanished. Once you get used to it, I think you'll have a hard time going back to standard mouses. I've used this exact mouse for 3+ years with 0 regrets.
Vertical mouse
Again, look to the gamers for inspiration. Nothing more annoying than a mousepad which is so small that you have to pick up the mouse and recenter it every few seconds. Even this pad being ~2x the average size was an amazing change for me.
Gaming mousepad
Yes, this is an Apple product. Yes, I've used it with both a Macbook and a PC for extended periods of time. Worked just fine for both. Plus, the compact size and sleek design make for quick typing, at least for me.
Magic keyboard
A must if you're using a modern laptop, especially a Mac. I have a few and use them constantly.
USB to USB-C adapter
Also a must with many laptop makes, like a Mac. You need this for your monitor to work.
HDMI to USB-C adapter
Wildcards
Look, even with daily use, my equipment gets dusty. Having this compressed air can to blast my gear every few weeks is such a no-brainer.
Air duster
I'm not afraid to say I'm getting older and that sometimes things just ache. Have a heating pad within reaching distance so you can take the edge off if you “slept wrong” last night.
Heating pad