This Geek’s Office

Every once in awhile, someone will ask me about my setup.  They want to know what equipment I use (and thus endorse), and the more inquisitive people like to know how it is set up.  I must admit that I am quite spoiled in both the equipment that I use, and in how I have it set up.  In fact, I would give almost anything to have a similar setup at work…but that will NEVER happen…

I figure that the best way to answer this question is to show what equipment I use, talk a little bit about it, and show how it is set up.

 

Once you walk into my office, the first thing that you are likely to notice is my main desk.  It is an L-shaped desk, and over the years, I have become accustomed to the versatility and desk space that an L-shaped desk affords.  I have had this desk for a long time, and I will probably cry when the time comes for a new one.

 

In this photo, you can see my UPS along the wall on the left.  My router shares a shelf with a RAIDGear NAS box that houses 4 1TB drives.  On the shelf below that, you will find two Mediasonic USB 3.0 drive enclosures that each house 4 2TB drives.  On the top right shelf, are two “ruggedized” external hard drives that are each 500GB.  On the shelf below, is an unused D-Link Gigabit switch, and some basic office supplies.

 

This shot shows how the left wing of my desk is laid out.  I will detail the equipment in the next shot.

 

In this shot, you will see my Logitech speakers (the old, good ones) that I have had as long as I have had the desk practically.  You will notice the charging station for my Logitech Revolution MX mouse (favorite mouse ever) next in line.  Sitting next to that is my Samsung Epic 4G which is a good phone, but Android is severely lacking in my opinion.  Sitting on the monitor base is a Seagate FreeAgent 500GB laptop drive.  One of my Zune HD’s (this one is the 32GB version, but I also have a 16GB and a Zune 80) is sitting in its dock next to it.  The next thing you will notice is the Wacom Intuous 4 tablet that I am woefully inadequate at using still.  There is a bluetooth receiver, and some cool USB hubs (there are 14 ports! – all filled – lol), and my Logitech Clearchat wireless headset that I use for dictating hanging from the monitor.  The monitor is a Samsung 22″ that I love due to its long neck that allows me to keep everything below.

 

In the corner you will notice regular office supplies, a Thermaltake Black X2 with 2 2TB Western Digital Green drives.  I have had mixed luck with the Thermaltake enclosures, but the idea is great.  The center channel speaker is hidden behind my other phone, the Palm Pre.  You can see another Thermaltake enclosure in the background on the right side that houses a single 2 TB drive.  The monitor is an Acer 23″ that is good for what I use it for, and the 1920 resolution is very handy.  What you can’t see is the Western Digital 2TB external drive behind the center channel speaker.

 

This is the view from where I sit.  You can see my favorite keyboard of all time, the Microsoft Ergo 4000 (of which I have 3 spares), and my Logitech mouse.  In front of me is an HP 27″ monitor that I love!  I do all of my photo and design work on it, and I do take the time to calibrate it if you are curious.  You can also see the 4th monitor on the desk, an AOC 23″ panel that I use for Twitter clients.  On top of that monitor is a Microsoft HD webcam, and I forgot to mention that the Acer monitor has a Logitech webcam on it as well.

 

You can see the rest of the desk in this shot.  Along the right, on the media cart is a Brother laser printer and a Western Digital 1TB external hard drive.  You also can see my killer paper puncher.

This is my secondary desk.  On the bottom left, the Cooler Master Wavemaster case houses an Exchange 2010 server that I run for some unknown reason.  I know that I will be going to Office 365 as soon as it is available.  The next case houses a home built Windows Home Server 2011 box with 12TB of internal storage.  The PC next to it is both my Linux Mint machine, and the machine that I use to run iTunes.  I would NEVER run iTunes on my main PC.  You can also see my Epson Artisan 830 printer on my file cart.  Behine the printer are 2 Seagate 1TB external drives, and a Maxtor 1TB external drive (which really sucks – btw).

The glass top of the desk shows the myriad office supplies that I use.  The ’off ‘ monitor is used to manage the Exchange server, as a secondary monitor for Windows 7 and for Linux Mint.  It is a 19″ monitor from Balance – a company I never heard of, but I needed a monitor at the time.  The main monitor on this desk is a Samsung 22″.  In between those two monitors, is a Wacom Bamboo tablet.  You can also see my Plantronics bluetooth charging near the right corner of the monitor.  The laptop stand houses my main laptop – an Acer Timeline – that I really like.  Underneath it is an Acer Aspire One netbook that runs Backtrack.  You can see the iPad on its stand on the right side of the desk.  Front and center is my Toshiba netbook that I use mainly as a remote (as in remote control) server for the iPad so that I can use the iPad to wirelessly control my camera. Yes, I am a dork.

 

All those classes on Geek University?  Well, this is where they begin.  I use my whiteboard a TON - for the classes on Geek University, for college projects, and for mind mapping programs and design ideas.  Yes, I know I need to clean it.  I do every week.  Seriously.

It’s a room right?  It has 4 walls.  I figured I would show you the 4th wall.  It is just decorative, with a tall media organizer housing some games and a few movies.  You can also catch a glimpse of the closet on the left that houses even more technology madness.  The keen-eyed will notice the autographed set piece from Hak 5′s Darren Kitchen (@hak5darren) and Shannon Morse (@snubsie). 

All that, and I realize that I didn’t talk about my PC!  The people that ask about my equipment are either those that are geeks themselves, or they don’t understand technology very well.  The geeks always want to know the details of your computer, so here goes:

I have a Cooler Master Cosmos case.  A good case is one of the best investments you can ever make when building a PC, and I live this case.  In it, is a Gigabyte motherboard (the ONLY motherboards I use), and Intel Q9450, and a Sapphire Radeon 4850X2.  I don’t play games on the computer AT ALL, so the 4 DVI’s on the card are way more horsepower than I need.  I use an OCZ Vertex 2 160GB SSD as my main drive, and an OCZ Agility 60GB drive as a scratch drive for Photoshop.  These two SSD’s are mounted in one drive cage, and the other 5 drive cages house 5 2TB drives.  I use a BFG ES-800 power supply.

A brief bit about how I use it:  on my main desk, the monitor on the left always has Outlook open so that I can keep track of appointments, deadlines, tasks, email, and contacts.  The main and secondary monitors are used for all of my main computing tasks.  The monitor on the left always has Zune running, and is where I put whatever I am researching.  The monitor in front of me is the production monitor where I create the content.  The monitor on the right is used for all instances of Explorer and for my Twitter client (which can either be Tweetdeck or MetroTwit).

There you have it.  I think that is all of the prudent technology in my office.  I must admit that it is a pretty sweet setup for what I use it for.  I think that is the key.  Each of us has different needs, and it is important to create an environment that suits that.  Set it up best for you, keep it clean and organized, and you are well on your way to becoming a happy Geek!