Putting Together a New Giant Computer Desk

[Ryuzaki]

Continuing my fun office / computer-related adventures starting with:

• Ascended Nerdonometry: How I Interface With My Computer
• Bought a New Monitor... 38" Ultrawide at 3840 x 1600 resolution, 60 Hz, LG 38UC99
• My Mid 2020 Gaming Computer Build is Complete!

I now bring to you the new computer desk I'm putting together. Thought you guys might enjoy.

I'm not calling it a build because I decided my philosophy was going to be "Do as little as possible while getting the result I want" and I stuck by it.

That meant I wasn't going to buy boards and join them and plane them and all that crap. So the first mission was to source a pre-made desktop. Ultimately I decided I didn't want to pay someone to do all that, so I went with a pre-made slab of butcher block.

I also decided not to buy an unfinished block, so I paid extra to have it pre-finished in terms of stain. But it wasn't polyurethaned and it needs to be if you don't want to have to oil it constantly to fight off cupping and sagging and all that.

The prerequisite was I wanted 8 feet in length and 3 feet in depth. I have a lot of professional audio gear from a past life that I use on my desk so I wanted 36" depth instead of 30" to reclaim some space and to get the cat off my area. He can lay off to the side.

My current desk is 6 feet wide but only 5 feet of that is really usable, maybe closer to 4 feet. That's because it has a built in curve.

Anyways, I wasn't thinking of making this thread so I don't have pictures of hauling the block home on the trailer, but I do have some from in the store when I was trying to keep track of my options and prices. Let me get to it:

On the right is the 8 x 3 block I chose, pre-stained in Espresso. It's Acacia wood. To the left was a 8 x 25" I really considered (and still may) buying two of to make another L-shape off the side and then use the other to build a shelf for the monitor and speakers, etc. I was going back and forth a ton about it, so I decided to just get the main desk put together first and see if the decision becomes clearer then.

This is what I ended up getting. You may be wondering why it's $360 instead of $1000 or more, and that's because I went to a salvage store. This store carries all of the "this has some quality issue and we can't sell it in the main production line, but someone can have it at a discount" which is why I got it much cheaper, perhaps at 1/3rd the price.

I just recently moved into a new house and now that I have a work area I'm collecting some of the tools I need to have around. This was another reason I didn't want to get into much beyond sanding, staining, and clear coating. I don't have easy access to clamps and jointers and planers any more.

I ran out the day before and picked up a new brush, the poly, some badass sawhorses, among other things. And I brought the block home on the trailer and slapped it up on the sawhorses.

You can see in the image above some of the imperfections that allowed me to have this so cheaply. Mainly, you can see burn marks from the planer, about 5 of them. They're becoming less noticeable now that I'm on my 3rd coat of polyurethane, but they popped out worse on the first coat below:

More details include that I got a 1.5" thick butcher block which should really help reduce any sagging. The legs will be 1 foot in from each side, leaving a 6 foot unsupported span, which shouldn't sag at all. I'm pretty sure the wood was quarter sawn and the grain directions alternate as best as possible with quarter sawn wood. It should remain stiff forever.

Here's one more picture from tonight with the 3rd coat drying on the top and sides. You can see the richness coming out. I'm using a satin finish. I wanted a matte finish but couldn't find it in an oil-based finish so I'll end up with a little gloss which is fine. I just don't like high gloss.

I'm going to see what 3 coats looks and feels like, which is where I typically stop, but I may run up to 4 or 5 this time.

My next entry in this little journal will be when I get the legs in. I'm having them custom welded and shipped across the country. It's going to take longer because after they're made they're taking a stop at another company that's going to powder coat them black.

So in about a month I'll have picks of the legs being attached and the hardware being installed. Then after that the final entry will be me getting all my computer crap on it arranged and semi-decorated.

Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoy the whole "look at other people's battlestations" as much as I do!

 

[Potatoe]

Nice, thanks for sharing!

A buddy of mine got some legs for his custom desk off of AliExpress and it was a bit of a nightmare, so I'm glad to hear you went with something custom. When his desk legs showed up they were uneven and wobbly, the metal was pretty thin, and the whole thing was about 2 inches shorter so he had to buy a new chair lol.

Can't wait to see the finished product, looking forward to updates.

 

[eliquid]

I was thinking last week I wanted to make my own butcher block desk, except I was going to join, plane, stain mine myself.

However, seeing your price you paid wants me to just buy one.

You're not too far from me ( regionally ) and I make trips your way sometimes.. mind sharing the store in a DM?

 

[bernard]

Real nice.

Dark, solid wood all the way.

 

[LiamGallagher]

Gorgeous color, and it looks very stable. Are you gonna pick the standing desk route?

 

[Ryuzaki]

Gorgeous color, and it looks very stable. Are you gonna pick the standing desk route?

I’m going seated without the option to lift the height. Just a regular seated desk.

I agonized about the height. My current desk is 29” and it’s a wee bit too high because my keyboard is a little elevated. The current desk is 1.25” thick.

With the new one being 1.5” thick I wanted to be careful about going much lower because I lose space between the desk and my thighs.

I ended up opting for 27” legs for a total height of 28.5”. I’d have liked lower but I split the difference to be careful.

I’m 6’1” but I’ve felt chairs don’t sit high enough. I have the Herman Miller Embody and at the max height it feels a bit too low. You’d think I’d need a taller desk.

I wonder if my torso is shorter or arms longer or something. I just needed it shorter to attain the proper ergonomic 90 degrees at my elbows. I’ll fix the rest with a change in chairs if I have to rather than getting too crazy with the desk height.

I just got the final 4th coat of polyurethane on the bottom! Sides and top in the morning then I’ll let it all cure till the legs come in.

 

[zelch]

I agonized about the height.

I tried a lot of heights also. But in the end, I got the biggest Bekant I could, and found that by frequently adjusting height, and alternating between standing/sitting, the variety of movement and positions really works well. https://www.ikea.com/us/en/cat/bekant-office-desks-18962/

 

[Ryuzaki]

Where the story left off last time is, while the last coat of polyurethane was drying on the top, the temperature dropped drastically for a few nights. I couldn't get help moving it inside until the next day so the last top coat dried a little funky. But it did end up curing fine. There's a few imperfections that nobody will ever see unless I point them out. So it's all good.

And then the legs came in. I had em cut and welded at one location, who sent them to another for the black powder coating. Then they shipped them in boxes by just wrapping them in freaking saran wrap *face palm*. So there's a couple of chunks in the powder coating from them being banged around, but fortunately it'll be in places that are hidden.

Here's the pics for fun:

The boxes and the desk again inside curing on the saw horses on Christmas quilts that I have no idea how I collected over time.

How pathetically they shipped these. All I did was cut 4 pieces of tape and unravel the box.

Here's the hardware I paid too much for, for the convenience of not having to deal with it. The washers are insanely too thick, so I'll be going out and replacing those, spray painting them black, and buying a drill bit to recess the threaded inserts into the bottom of the desk top.

Here's a close up of the powder coating. It looks really nice and should be extremely durable once they're not being tossed around the back of a truck across the nation.

And here's what they'll look like, in the upright orientation. The bottoms have leveling feet that I can use to adjust the height a bit too, which is nice.

So, whenever I can finish playing catch up from Thanksgiving, I'll take a trip down to the hardware store for the right size drill bit and get those inserts wood glue'd in. I'll let those dry and cure for a day and it'll be ready to move up the stairs and into the office.

That'll be the next phase. And then the final will be to get all my stuff off of this current desk and onto the new one.

After some use, I'll know whether or not I want to add a shelf to it to stack the speakers and monitor on, among other lil trinkets and tools.

 

[Ryuzaki]

More adventures:

Some of the stuff used to install the hardware. Various weird bits, a drill taped off for the right depth, wood glue, etc.

Drilled in the first hole. Was scary. No going back.

Wood glued up the threaded inserts that you screw into the bottom of the desk top to receive the bolts and create more surface area for them to bind to. Makes it possible to remove the legs as many times as needed without eventually ruining the holes.

Turned out the threaded inserts flare out at the top so there was no perfect drill bit size to use. If i went wider to prevent this chipping, the bottom would be too loose.

To fix it I saved the chips and cut them to size and glued them back down, then put one coat of polyurethane over them to make sure there's no weird humidity issues or that these chips don't come off later. They're hidden under the legs so it doesn't matter.

You can see I had this chipping issue all along this side but less so on the other. This was one leg ready to go.

Here I dry fitted the leg to make sure everything was going to pan out, and it did.

I ended up putting them 1 foot in on either side to reduce the unsupported span to 6 feet instead of 8 feet, which should prevent sagging for a block of wood this thick and wide.

I repeated the process for the other leg and asked a friend to come over and help me get the desk top up the stairs.

And here I got both legs on, flipped it over, and got all the equipment off the other desk and got the old desk moved. Then I moved the new one into place and got the equipment back on it.

So now I'm about to order some cable management channels and figure out where that rack of equipment will go, among other things, before everything gets settled into it's final spots and the cables managed.

My next set of pics will be the set up mostly complete, minus any trinkets and plants and crap I add over time later.

I don't think I'll add a monitor shelf simply because it'd be so huge with my ultrawide 38" screen and two giant speakers. So I'm guessing the desk itself is done. Just gotta get organized now.

It's fun to share, so thanks for viewing and stay tuned!

 

[bernard]

Very nice!

Solid dark wood and black metal, classic executive business feel if you ask me.

A+ would work at.

What are you going to do for a chair @Ryuzaki?

With such a classic table, you almost have to have a leather chair.

 

[mj22]

looks awesome bro, im looking forward to seeing the set up complete.

 

[Ryuzaki]

What are you going to do for a chair @Ryuzaki?

I'm definitely going to get a new chair. The Embody has been great but I don't know what I was thinking with the colors. Also I broke a lumbar support by sitting in it like a dummy. I may end up with a new black Embody, not sure. Probably will go for something cheaper and start replacing them more frequently. Buying the Embody made me feel like I needed to hang onto it for longer than I wanted to, because of the price.

So the next step in the adventure was, before I get everything into place on the desk and the desk in the right place in the room, I wanted to get some cable management stuff together. Because I'll have to take all the cables apart from the equipment, I figured I'd wait to get things situated on the desk in the right place until I can also do the cable management at the same time (so I'm not messing with cables twice).

I ended up getting two of these Ikea Signum cable racks. Server cable channels and other options were much prettier but the downside is with those every time you want to change one cable you have to create a mess by taking the lid off, all the cables fall out, etc. With these you can access the cables from the front and back with no issue, and can easily do what you need without causing an extra big mess.

If my desk was in the middle of the room I'd have gotten a different style since people would see them. But since the desk will be very close to a wall, these will do since they won't be visible at all.

​

This was me getting them into the office and snapping a pic to show a friend. But this can help you get an idea for how big they are. They're 27.5 inches in length.

​

I spray-painted them in a textured black to match the powder coating on the legs. It worked perfectly.

​

And here's the final result. I just got done mounting them and am about to embark on scooting the desk into position and starting to run cables where I want them. I'm getting closer to sharing the complete desk from on top, but I'm waiting on a few things in the mail for the time being.

Next, I'll share the results of the cable management compared to the picture just above. Thanks for reading.

 

[mj22]

any updates on this bro?

 

[Ryuzaki]

@mj22, yes, thanks for bumping. I had totally forgotten about this thread.

Above I posted the pre-cable management picture, which I'll repeat right here:

Before Cable Management

After Cable Management

I do have a couple lose cables on the left because I put the gaming computer on the rack for now before I move it to the living room and didn't bother dealing with those cables since they're temporary.

These little Ikea Signum things worked great. One think to take note is, while you may want to push them further back on the underside of your desk, be careful if you intend to have any desk mount monitor arms that clamp onto the back. Make sure to save room for those.

So here's how it turned out (if you can ignore the gaming computer and mess on the side. I had to play through Resident Evil 8 during the Christmas break.

And a bit more of a close up so you can envision being in the cockpit.

I'm happy to answer any questions about any gear you all see on the desk if anyone's curious.

So the remaining question was "Do I want to create a left side desk and make an L shape?" I wanted to get this desk in place and see first. And I don't feel like I need to, so I'll likely close off the "build the desk" chapter.

The one thing that sucked was when I was putting on the final coat of polyurethane it out of the blew dropped like 20 degrees that night and it didn't cure as good as the others. So that final coat is easy to scratch, but it's no big deal. I'm not going to redo it. I'll live with it for a solid 5-10 years and then redo it eventually.

The next chapters in the story of the new home office, now that the desk is done, is to get some acoustic treatment panels up on the wall tastefully, since I still mess with recording and mixing when I can, and then start bringing in some decorations and get it all finished off. Then I can check this room off completely.

Anyways, since I don't have anyone else that really cares, I'll share some more pics of this office room with you guys. I've had fun with this thread and appreciate you guys that have commented.

So what's going on here is you walk up the stairs and immediately on your right before you go down a hallway is a big open "2nd living room / bonus room" which I think was intended to be another bedroom but they chose not to. I'll show you why I think that in a second.

Here's from the opposite end of the room from behind the desk:

And then again but from behind that couch there:

You see that section on the back wall there? That appears to be where a clothes closet was going to be. That's why I'm assuming this was meant to be a bedroom.

The green panels are acoustic treatment I built long ago. My plan is to wrap them in some solid color and use some of it and make more bigger ones. Probably won't use all the little ones.

I want to stuff two back in that divot and get a big cube storage bookshelf centered back there to replace all the desk drawers I lost and to get everything organized and displayed nicely. Probably a couple small side tables to put the printer on and some plants, etc.

If anyone has any ideas I'd be glad to hear them because I've been wracking my brain about how to use that space in a way that makes sense but also looks good. I don't want to build a giant built-in bookshelf.

There's the saga of "new house, time to build a new desk". Twas fun!

 

[thisishatred]

I'm happy to answer any questions about any gear you all see on the desk if anyone's curious.

What sort of sound system do you have setup in picture 4; I can't quite make out the brand of the speakers.

 

[bernard]

Put up a huge aquarium in that space?

Get some big brain flowerhorn cichlids:

They're pretty cool, I learned about them from living in Asia. Sometimes the markings on the side resemble chinese characters and those fetch an additional price.

 

[WinMore]

What is the black thing on the left side, under your desk?
The room looks amazing. And I find it cool that you did so many things yourself.

In the nook I would either put a sofa (but that doesn't make a ton of sense with the other sofa in the room) or a/some cabinet(s) like this:

And I would hang something motivating/inspirational or some awesome art above it.
Obviously, you don't have to go for Ikea. I mainly mean the height. I do believe having drawers is way more convenient than the doors the cooler-looking ones tend to have.

 

[Ryuzaki]

What sort of sound system do you have setup in picture 4; I can't quite make out the brand of the speakers.

The old Adam Audio A7 monitors and the Adam Sub8 subwoofer. They're still around under the A7X models (you can get smaller or larger woofers too, like the A5X, etc.)

Put up a huge aquarium in that space?

I've just never been into it. My mom had an aquarium for years and years and it was such a nightmare for her to keep up with. I've known other people with them where they start leaking slowly and insidiously and cause damage to the flooring and all that. But mainly, I'm just not into fish.

What is the black thing on the left side, under your desk?

This is a rack of signal processing equipment mainly for music production, mixing, mastering, etc. I've got a couple power conditionors, a four drive RAID for file storage (which died so I now have one on the desk on the right side), an audio interface that I use as the computer's sound card, some preamplifiers, compressors, a patch bay. I don't use it all that much these days but I do a lot of pre-processing on the microphone you see on the desk and I use that when I take calls or get on video. I need to add an equalizer to finish it off.