By Jason Snell
December 28, 2023 11:39 AM PT
End-of-year check-in: Where I’m working
Every so often, people express an interest in my tech set-up. I suppose it’s a natural interest among tech fans to compare gear? Whatever the reason, here’s an update in what stuff I’m using to get my work done as 2023 comes to an end.
In the garage
My primary office is in my garage, as it’s been for… oh, nearly a decade now! Good grief. The garage is attached to the house and there’s a door so that I don’t have to go outside to get to the rest of it. There’s no heating out here so I have an oil heater that I use in the winter, though these days I control it via an infrared blaster tied into HomeKit via HomeBridge. It’s nice out here. There’s carpet on the floor and a bunch of curtains to separate me from the storage shelves. It’s cozy.
My desk is a 60×30 Uplift V2 with a reclaimed fir desktop. An Apple Studio Display floats above the desk, attached to a RightAngle 2 VESA arm. The Studio Display is attached to an M1 Max Mac Studio (32GB RAM, 10 CPU cores, 24 GPU cores, 2TB SSD).
Attached to the Mac Studio are:
- A cheap Amazon USB-A hub
- A Magic Trackpad (permanently attached via USB)
- A Keychron Q1 keyboard made for me by Myke Hurley with Kiwi switches and “Severance”-style keycaps
- An Elgato Stream Deck
- A deconstructed Touch ID sensor using this case
- A USBPre2 audio interface. Connected to it: a Shure SM7B microphone, a Rolls MS111 mute switch, and ADV M5 custom-fit in-ear monitors. The microphone is mounted on an Elgato Wave LP low-profile boom arm.
- An Opal C1 webcam; I’ve had a lot of problems with this product and the company recently sent me a replacement. It’s more convenient than setting up Continuity Camera every time I do a video podcast (which is weekly these days).
- A 2TB Samsung T5 USB drive, which serves as a regular Carbon Copy Cloner target.
Enter… Studio B
Earlier this year I decided that now that my oldest has graduated from college and not returned home, I could set up a second office space in her room. Even with that oil heater, after a cold winter morning working in the garage I often found myself shivering and having to stand under the shower for a long time to heat back up. We have forced-air heating in the house and an entirely unused room… so maybe I could solve this problem with a second workspace?
Cobbling together older office equipment that was still kicking around and a bunch of stuff I use when I travel, I’ve managed to assemble a pretty nice heated redoubt in the back bedroom. It starts with the very desk I started out with in 2013, a VertDesk that has since been used by my wife as a COVID work-from-home desk, as a book holder at our local library, and as a gaming monitor perch for my son when he was home last summer.
After a search for something better, I ended up biting the bullet and buying a refurbished Apple Studio Display—my second!—for Studio B. I don’t love how much I paid for it, but I have no complaints about the display itself. It’s great, and since I have one in both workspaces, it makes me feel at home in either space.
I have an M2 MacBook Air that I use when I travel, so it has now also become my designated Studio B computer—attached by a single Thunderbolt cable. I bought a TwelveSouth Curve Riser to bring the Studio Display to a more comfortable elevation, and that riser includes a shelf that’s the perfect place to slide a closed and docked laptop.
Attached to the Studio Display (and by extension, to any laptop that chooses to dock there, so my wife now has a desk workspace if she’s working at home) are:
- A Magic Keyboard
- My former go-to keyboard, the Vortex Race 3 with blue-and-white Drop MT3 Camilo keycaps and Cherry Brown switches.
- An Anker USB-C hub
- Another Elgato Stream Deck
- My travel microphone, a Shure MV7, mounted on my old Heil PL2T boom arm.
Working elsewhere
I used to write for a few hours every week at a local Starbucks, though the pandemic basically ended that practice. Still, I do work around the house throughout the day and also travel from time to time.
My faithful computing companion is my M1 12.9-inch iPad Pro, which is the first device I check in the morning, the last one I check before going to sleep, and generally with me whenever I’m sitting on the couch. In the summer months, I’ll snap a Magic Keyboard on it and write in my backyard, and in the winter when I’m needing that go-to-the-café break, I’ll put it in a stand and write at the bar in my kitchen. (Current stand of choice: the TwelveSouth Duo. Keyboard of choice: the Keychron K6.)
When I travel, it’s the iPad Pro, the MacBook Air, and that Stream Deck and MV7 microphone from Studio B. (Sorry, Studio B, I need that stuff!)
We’ll see what 2024 brings in terms of my working life. I doubt I will convert my daughter’s room to an office and abandon the garage, but it’s not impossible. In the meantime, it’s been educational to switch frequently between two computers again. And has prompted me to turn iCloud Desktop and Document syncing on! But that’s a story for another year.
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