The working from home thread: tips and advice

One of ours was saying that for ages. He then caught covid and almost died. Doesn't say it anymore.

after 5 months of renovating/redecorating the entire house my room at our new place is finally ready to start moving stuff into. will be few months at least until garden office is ready so this is my "indoors" setup built into my pax wardrobes from ikea.

took a while but finally got a chance to unbox the lg dualup. running on a single hdmi cable while i get things setup but you can connect a second cable from your graphics card and have it run the two outputs as separate monitors using pbp so they behave like dual screens rather than a single long one which is my preferred way of working.

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have also got a mount to hang one of my elgato key lights from the underside of the top shelf for daylight lighting through the winter and video calls.

haven't boxed any of the stuff going on the shelves at the old place yet but my "video call" backdrop will look something like this..

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Started a new job recently, which is mostly remote, and have been told I have £500 to spend on home office kit as I wish. I already have an ok desk and a 24" monitor, so I guess priorities are decent office chair, laptop docking station, second monitor (24" is fine), and (if budget permits) a better keyboard. What are the best options within my budget? It looks like second-hand USB-C Dell docking stations are £60-ish on eBay, and unless there are better suggestions was going to go with an IKEA office chair, which probably leaves ~£250 for monitor and keyboard?

I generally think that this budget is best spent in two ways:

1. Your tactile surfaces (things your body touches or you interface with): chair, keyboard, mouse, mouse pad.
   
2. Things that make you more effective remotely, which means better audio visual equipment... I prioritise (in this order) a decent microphone, some lighting, a better webcam, some headphones / speakers.
   
   

I typically think any monitor is good enough, and that a cheap USB-C dongle means you can avoid a full docking station for a while.

the physical health of working from home is my #1 preference to get right... and then it's just "most of my stuff is good enough, but how do I make this effective remotely?" which is the A/V stuff.

£500 on a second hand chair I'd say

Yeah, I have a decent mic & webcam with ring light already; will aim to get a budget monitor and spend most of my budget on chair and keyboard.

Is it audited, do you need to provide receipts?

Buy £500 of beer / sweets / handbags.

Where is your ring light setup? is webcam above monitor and the ring light to the side?

It's a Razer Kiyo webcam that I was given for a previous freelance gig. It has a built-in ring light that works pretty well - the whole thing sits just above the monitor.

interesting - wonder if they work by plugging into a monitor which is connected to my laptop via usb-c (monitor also delivers power via usb-c to laptop)

Think I've already asked a few years ago but hoping something new may have come along with the rise of home offices.

Looking for a desk chair with adjustable height/back and lumbar support that isn't a full height office chair/looks less office chairy. Anything out there?

I have a Logitech C615 1080p webcam with a privacy cover spare if anyone wants it for £12 posted?

I typically think any monitor is good enough

really? Monitor would be in my top 3 alongside chair and mouse.

more a reflection that there used to be a wild variance in the quality of monitors, and nowadays most monitors at nearly all price points are pretty good.

so I no longer prioritise it as high as things where the variance in quality and experience remain high, and so the impact is greater for a change

I'm with Velocio on this. I got a 27" Lenovo QHD IPS screen for £180. Matches my laptop screen and is a real leap forward from my old screen.

Our new offices have some new massive 4k curved screens. Obvs nicer to use, but I couldn't fit something that big anyway and it's not really that much better.

Maybe I got lucky, but it's hard to see that any extra £ would be worth it (unless you have a professional need for special refresh rates or colour accuracy).

I'm not too fussed by monitors in terms of refresh rates and colour reproduction but decent resolution and size and connectivity is important to me.

I far prefer working at home on 34" widescreen than 2x20" at the office and decent connectivity makes the desk much neater.

just checked, I'm 8 years into owning my current monitor. a 27" NEC... it wasn't the very best at the time, just a mid-range, and yet... it's still going strong.

I looked around for a replacement from the perspective of "8 years huh, today's must be phenomenally better", but truth is... they're really not that much better, mostly they're cheaper and even the cheap monitors are pretty damn good.

sure 5k and 8k monitors would be cool, OLED (if you can avoid the burn-in), USB-C / TB4 single connectors, etc... but none of those are required, they're all nice to have, and what it costs to achieve them is a hell of a lot of cash that can be better spent on other things.

monitors, to me, feels like "should I buy Dura-Ace?" and the real answer is "Ultegra is good enough, save your money"

Get a retina monitor, there's no going back

Apple panels are made by other manufacturers (Samsung make most of the 6k XDR panels)... and that's the rub, there are only a few panel companies and there's enough 5k 27" monitors on the market... but they're all still £1-6k... and that's a hell of a lot of money when a £200-300 monitor can get you 4k and is definitely "good enough".

I see no reason to create more e-waste when my 8y old monitor remains good enough and I can't begin to truly justify the stretch features.

^ this, 4k is more than sufficient for 99% of people.

I got a 2nd hand Knoll Generation chair for cheap which i'd recommend if you don't want to go full Herman Miller - it's still corporate looking, and not small, but you can bend the back of it down (I'm a bad fidget) which makes it feel less office-y.

https://www.knoll.com/product/generation-by-knoll

Here's one on office resale for £245: https://www.officeresale.co.uk/refurbished-furniture/free-shipping-products/swivel-chairs-free-shipping-products/knoll-generation-task-chair-with-lumbar-support-3d-arms-in-onyx/

What is the go-to sub £100 external mic?

Cheers. That does look less officey and looks like there is a bit of a range in colours. Definitely a possible.

Does the back stay folded down or does it flip back up?

I see no reason to create more e-waste when my 8y old monitor remains good enough and I can't begin to truly justify the stretch features.

hugs