If there is something positive that the Covid pandemic caused, it should be the change of companies’ policies about remote working. Now, many more companies are allowing their employees to work from home. While not having to spend our precious time in traffic already improves the quality of our working experience, it also allows us the create the ultimate workspace of our dreams.
So let’s have a look at some of the things you should consider when you decide to improve your workspace.
What should I use? PC or laptop?
While this is a question with many possible answers because of tons of variables, I will try to give you a couple of new ideas. As far as I see from the non-tech-savvy people around me (they mostly ask me before buying any gadget), they tend to buy a very powerful laptop for all the things they want to do. They simply see those machines as “One laptop to rule them all”. From gaming to working, and sometimes, watching Netflix/Amazon Prime, they are thinking of buying a high-end machine.
But if you are not thinking of going to a cafe every day and working from there, it can be a completely unnecessary investment. You can as well invest in a powerful rig that offers way more flexibility, comfort, and the ability to change parts when it gets old, instead of completely throwing away the whole system.
On the other hand, you can also invest in both a PC and a laptop by clipping the features that you will need on them, such as GPU on the laptop.
Let’s have a closer look at those options.
Desktop PC as a workstation
Desktop workstations offer the maximum flexibility, performance, and comfort for the user, as long as they don’t need or want to go out to work, play games, or watch Netflix. If you are mostly staying at home, even outside of work hours, a desktop PC is the way to go.
One of the advantages of going for a desktop PC is that you don’t need to buy it as a whole. You can easily buy a desktop PC without the GPU as a fully work-focused rig, and later attach a GPU to transform it into a gaming rig as well.
Since desktop PCs can access an infinite amount of power and has much bigger space for bigger parts and better cooling, their performance is much higher than their laptop counterparts. For example, a desktop RTX 3080 will perform way better than an RTX 3080 in a laptop; and it will stay much quieter under heavy load.
If you decide to buy a desktop PC as a workstation, always check the latest generation components in the market, especially CPUs and GPUs. As I am writing this article, Intel has the Core 13 series and AMD has Ryzen 7000 series as their latest CPUs. Looking at the GPU side, Nvidia has just released RTX 4000 series and AMD is just about to launch its Radeon RX 7000 series.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| ✔ Great hardware flexibility | ✘ Moving around is a problem, even to the next room |
| ✔ High performance | ✘ Takes bigger space |
| ✔ Silent | ✘ Cables can become a mess |
| ✔ Upgradeable |
Laptop PC as a workstation
Laptops are currently the ultimate portable devices that can handle both work-related tasks and gaming. You can always put your laptop in a bag to go on your work or game outside of the home. This is a huge advantage for those who travel a lot, especially digital nomads, as well as Starbucks lovers.
A decent laptop will allow you to do anything you can do on a PC, with a little bit lower performance, but a decent laptop with a decent GPU will enable GPU-accelerated features in some professional software, and also allow you to play 3D games. But if your job-related software does not require GPU horsepower and you don’t like playing games, you don’t need to pay the extra premium for GPU while buying a laptop. Just go for integrated graphics of the CPUs.
One of the most important but overlooked things you should check while buying a laptop is the screen. Cheap laptops mostly attach very old screens that are incapable of showing the colors accurately. After deciding on the resolution, check the color coverage of the laptop screen. Aim for sRGB 90%+ or DCI-P3 80%+ for color space coverage for your screen. Additionally, check the brightness value for better visibility in a sunny environment. Try not to go below 350 nits in brightness.
As I said for desktop PCs, always try to buy laptop models with the newest generation hardware. SSD and RAM are generally the only upgradable parts in laptops, however, some models, especially the thin ones have their SSDs and RAMs soldered onto the motherboard; which means you will not be able to upgrade them.
Depending on the workspace you desire, you might want to buy a USB Type-C hub for your desk that you will use your laptop on. You can connect almost anything to a high-quality hub and they will be connected with only one cable. Monitor, keyboard, mouse, webcam, headphones, ethernet cable, and even power can be connected through one single USB hub to your laptop. While it provides ease of connecting everything to the laptop, it also lowers the risk of damaging the ports of your device.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| ✔ Ultimate portability | ✘ Higher-end models can be noisy |
| ✔ Works even without the electricity | ✘ Upgradability is almost non-existent |
| ✔ Delivers enough performance for most of the work-related tasks | ✘ Hard to identify hardware problems |
Laptop + desktop PC solution
In other words, “Why not both?”. This is actually the path I personally follow and I am pretty happy with it. If your work-related tasks do not require heavy 3D renderings and you rarely want to go outside to work, buy a high-quality laptop with just enough hardware for your work, then put the remaining budget to build a great workstation/entertainment center PC. This way, you can get the best of those two options at once.
In this idea, the desktop PC is the centerpiece of both working and entertainment. A decent gaming PC will be able to handle almost any work-related tasks without an issue. And your laptop will grant you the mobility you want, just to take care of your daily tasks and kill non-working time with movies or series on Netflix. In this combination, you really don’t need much horsepower on your laptop since your desktop PC is already a beast.
Congratulations! By choosing this path, you have gained access to the “Pros” of both options. However, this option also has its own downsides. First of all, you will need to get used to and take care of two systems at once, instead of just one. You will also have completely different screen sizes, and files in the storage, and this might sometimes confuse you. Also, you are most likely will not able to work on the laptop as fast as you do on the desktop due to the smaller screen, smaller keyboard, lower performance, etc.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| ✔ Ultimate performance | ✘ Switching between the systems might be confusing |
| ✔ Ultimate mobility | ✘ You now have to care of two systems instead of one |
| ✔ Ultimate flexibility |
Peripherals for a remote working environment
Monitor
The monitor is the optional but recommended piece to invest in if you chose to go for a single laptop path, but you have to buy a monitor for a desktop PC.
While Full HD (1920 x 1080) is still the most common resolution on monitors, I strongly recommend going beyond that. If your work requires involving mostly texts, excel sheets, 1440p could be the way to go if you don’t decide to buy a monitor bigger than 27″. 4K is unnecessary for that size unless you mostly work on editing visuals; but if you go beyond 27″, 4K becomes a viable option anyways.
Being able to see two windows at once without requiring to Alt+Tab is a blessing. If you are rapidly switching between two or more software during your work hours, you should definitely go for a double-monitor setup or a single ultrawide monitor.
If your job requires visual editing with accurate colors, you should check the color coverage and accuracy of the monitor you think of buying. DisplaySpecifications is a great website that offers detailed information about monitors, including color coverage.
If you are going to use your monitor with a laptop, you might as well check for HDMI or USB Type-C inputs on the product. In addition, USB Power Delivery on a Type-C connection will charge your laptop as well. Just to remind you, this is also achievable by buying a high-quality Type-C hub; you can consider a hub as an alternative option.
Headset and webcam
If your job involves online meetings, you definitely need a headset, and maybe a webcam. If we think only about online meetings, the most important things on a headset are the microphone and the headset’s look on your head, if it is a video meeting. You don’t want to sound or look funny in meetings, do you?
Sadly, most of the headset microphones sound bad, and finding good ones is a bit tricky. After deciding by their looks, you can check their very detailed specifications and reviews in Rtings for their microphone quality.
You might also want to go for a wireless headset, however, never end up buying a Bluetooth-only headset. Sadly, Bluetooth audio can bring much latency and problems in Windows systems. Consider buying the ones that come with their own wireless dongles, using non-Bluetooth technology.
For the webcam, you can simply look for a reputable brand’s (like Logitech) mid-tier product. Most webcams can only deliver mediocre video quality. What will make the real difference in video meetings is the lighting of the room. You should invest some in lighting products that will deliver extra light to your face during meetings. Checking streaming accessories to find such lights can be a good start.
Keyboard and mouse
We are building the workspace of our dreams, aren’t we? So let’s get rid of at least some of the cables on our system(s). Wireless mice are widely used on laptops but people still hesitate to move on to wireless on desktop PCs, especially gamers.
However, some companies like Logitech do a great job with their wireless products, labeled as “Lightspeed” for this specific company, especially in terms of latency and power efficiency. They are as fast as cable-connected models and their batteries last for months. However, try to avoid the ones with their own rechargeable batteries; buy the ones that use AA or AAA batteries and use your own rechargeable batteries. Interestingly, Logitech’s rechargeable mice last only for a few days.
For the ultimate writing comfort, you might want to go for a mechanical keyboard, which delivers higher-quality switches. However, they generally tend to be noisy depending on the switches they use which also affects the pressing experience. A non-mechanical gaming keyboard would be a nice choice too.
TV and gamepad
If you have followed until here, you should now have a great PC or laptop, or both to work on and maybe, play games. While gaming on a PC with a keyboard and mouse looks like the best way to do it, sometimes, after long work hours, you might want to play your games while sitting in a more comfortable position, or at least you change your position which you have been on the whole day already.
You can grab a 4K TV together with a gamepad to play at least some of your games with more comfort, such as racing, sports, platform, or third-person games. For the TV, the sky is the limit depending on your budget and the size of your room. Since you will connect your TV to your PC, you most likely will not use any of the “smart” features on it; the capability to run Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Disney+ might be enough for you.
For the gamepad, I strongly recommend the latest generation of Xbox Gamepads since they connect and work very smoothly in Windows 10 and 11. You will require a Bluetooth dongle to connect a single gamepad to your system. If you want to connect multiple gamepads, you will need an Xbox Wireless Adapter.
The importance of the chair
You will almost never buy a comfortable chair for your office but this is your home and you are building your dream workspace. You’ll spend many hours on this chair, just don’t cheap it out.
Cheap office chairs and most non-office/gaming chairs are not designed to be sat on for several hours. They tend to cause pain in your back after a few hours, which means they are bad for your health. Even low/mid-tier gaming chairs will grant you enough comfort to sit and work for more than a few hours.
You might want to have a look at the gaming chairs we would recommend before buying one.
Buying the right desk
While the desk is not as important as the chair since it has less effect on health, buying the right desk will grant you additional comfort while working or gaming. Depending on the space in your room, you can go for big ones to be able to put everything you want on, especially if you are going to use a monitor and a keyboard.
Height adjustability, cable management, and the edges of the surface area where you put your arms on the most important things to consider when buying a desk.
You might want to have a look at the gaming desks we would recommend before buying one.