Components to my home office

After some consideration, my wife and I have decided it is about time ... to upgrade our home office.

Our current situation is composed of laptops used on the living room couch or dining room table, which can be very uncomfortable. So, I've been researching the components needed for a home office. Here are the things I will get in the order in which I'd get them. 

Step 1. Desk

We are thinking of getting an Elfa setup from the Container Store. For us, the key features are its dimensions - narrow (to fit in a small space) and tall (to effectively use all of the space).

Another consideration, which didn't quite make the cut was getting a desk that supports sitting and standing. I gave on the idea, due to cost and the amount of space it would take up.

After we have a desk, one of us can at least use the desk instead of the couch or dining room table. 

Step 2. Monitors

I bought two 24" Dell Ultrasharp monitors (U2410). We bought them refurbished from Dell, and they are a few years old. For these reasons, we ended up paying just under $200 each for them, which is a lot less than the full price.

Shopping for monitors is difficult. How much do you want to spend? What level of performance do I need for what I do in my apt ... ?  Rather than rehash the technical info, I'll boil it down to these reasons for picking these monitors.

• These monitors are supposed to be good for office work and programming, which is our primary use case.
• They are from Dell, and Dell has a good reputation for monitors.
• While these are still widescreen monitors, they are slightly taller and less wide than a standard HD television, which is better for us (1920x1200 as compared to 1920x1080, if that means something to you).  

As an aside, I really wanted a PLP (portrait-landscape-portrait) 3 monitor setup, but I couldn't make it work for me (not enough desk space).

Step 3. External Keyboard and Mouse

I got the Microsoft Wired Keyboard 600 and a Logitech M100 USB Optical Wired Mouse. These are just about the simplest and cheapest options you can find. So far, the mouse has worked with my Macbook air without any problems, but the keyboard hasn't worked so well. I can't seem to map over the ctrl, alt, and other modifier keys to things that the Mac likes.

Step 4. USB Hub

In order to connect my laptop to the monitors I got two Anker USB 3.0 to HDMI / DVI Adapters and this Anker USB 3.0 7-Port Hub. I'm already using 5 of the ports (2 for 2 monitors, 1 for a mouse, 1 for a keyboard and 1 for a cell phone charger). The best thing about a hub is that I can easily swap out my wife's laptop with my laptop by switching one plug. The usb to dvi adapters depend on software from DisplayLink. So far, this has been a bit buggy. With my Macbook Air, only one of the 2 external monitors work at a time. Things work better with my wife's windows laptop. However, we still haven't figured out how to make things work seamlessly when connecting to our work computers over Citrix.

Step 5. Computer

Since we have laptops already, getting another computer for a home office isn't necessary. If we feel that the constant plugging and unplugging of laptops is difficult, maybe we'll get a standalone computer. Getting a computer opens up another can of worms, so I'll just put it off for now and let my future self think about it.

The end or the start.
So far, the home office is nice to have. I think spurs me on to work more. The worst part about it, other than the cost, is setting up multiple monitors. The current level of hardware/software feels a bit hacky.