Reorganizing Part One

Over the last few weeks I have been on the fence about making the jump to only use my laptop as my main everyday computer. I use it a lot more than my desktop and lately due to the shear size of the PC case under my desk it has been getting in the way she trying to do work at home.

So I ordered a nice laptop stand, a USB 3.0 hub and an adapter to use one of my two 24" monitors as a second screen for my laptop. This set up will let me still use a keyboard and mouse on the slide out tray so I can still be somewhat ergonomic and not be slouched over my desk top killing my back. The USB Hub is for plugging in all my external drives for making backups of the pictures I take along with my Keyboard and iPhone/iPod.

I don't always use the laptop screen. When I do it's usually so I can have YouTube/Netflix playing in the background while doing work on the larger screen. It's pretty easy to to take off the stand and go sit on the couch with the laptop as well when Andrea sit together and do house searches.

Here is the desk now:

To my right there is now writing room and a place for my feet as well (next to the black laptop lap cushion under the desk). Which is really nice to have when studying items for work or photography and writing notes on it.

In addition I have my email, contacts and calendars all synchronized and forwarding into one place (iCloud) as well for better management. The iCloud interface is not as nice as Hotmail or Gmail but until Hotmail and Outlook for Mac match what you get from Outlook on the PC then it's just easier to forward my Hotmail account for now.

So far it's been nice to use this setup and not have to worry about synchronizing things across my Skydrive account between machines. Also nice have Lightroom and Photoshop Elements available to use anytime I want instead of being on my PC and having to switch to my laptop. The only draw back so far is giving up my Logitech wireless headset as they do not have drivers for it. I do have a nice corded headset that works great for when I need it.

Now if I can just get organized and find about another 40 hours in a week to catch up on project work I'd be all set!

Thanks for reading.
Jason