For a very long time, I’ve been using Middle Atlantic recording studio furniture in my home office. A large Edit Center Desk (ELUR) with 8U of rack space built in and a large overbridge with adjustable speaker platforms. I’ve had the desk for so long that I can’t remember what I paid for it. Today it’s about $3,800 street price (yikes!). The rack space has been used for audio gear and a pair of power distribution units with pull-out lights since day 1. I also have three MDV-R12 rack units, which are about $480 street price today. I’ve been using those for a rack mount UPS, ethernet switches, power protection and a lot of Middle Atlantic TD drawers (which are very expensive these days). I would estimate I’ve got over $8,000 worth of functional furniture for my home office. I didn’t pay that, but that’s what it would cost today.
However… I’ve never liked the look of it for my home. It is highly functional, but it’s intended for professional work space. It’s laminated MDF, black. It’s not something I want in the den of my current home. And my sweetie doesn’t want it in there either. But the den will be my office space soonish. I need new office furniture, preferably all real hardwood (and maybe metal and marble or marble-look porcelain). As much as I appreciate the recycled nature of MDF, I don’t like it for furniture. Even with a quality real wood veneer, it’s just not the same as solid hardwood.
The thing is… I still need it to be functional. I need rack space, it’s not optional. And outside of Etsy, I haven’t seen furniture with rack rails that I’d consider in the den. And no one makes exactly the cabinets and shelves I need.
Fortunately, I’m reasonably handy. And I’ve built racks before. And I have more than 30U of Middle Atlantic TD drawers (which I really like). So…
First up is some bookshelf cabinets that happen to be 19.125″ wide on the inside and hence can accept Middle Atlantic rack rails. They’re 52″ tall, 16″ deep. Drilled for 5mm shelf pins, about 15.675″ deep inside, solid red oak sides, bottom, top and shelves. The back is 1/4″ oak plywood fitted into slots in the sides, top and bottom. I want two more of these, but I’m thinking those might be shallower (around 12″). The advantage of the 15.675″ inside depth on this first bookshelf cabinet: it’s just enough to allow Middle Atlantic TD drawers on rack rails, if desired. The intent of these is that they’ll sit on a base cabinet (more on that later), starting at about desk height (30″). So the top will be at about 82″.
Here’s a picture of a test assembly.
Here’s another picture from when I was applying sanding sealer. The gap in the rear panel is to allow AC power or other cables to enter the area where I intend to put the rack rails for a Furman PL-8C, Behringer Composer PRO-XL, Behringer Ultragraph 2-channel 15-band equalizer, UMC404HD (for me) and UMC204HD for my sweetie. I’m still debating if I need more than 6U of rack space. It would not be terrible to have a 4U drawer in here to stash headphones, though given how much I’ve been working from home during the pandemic, my headphones get heavy use. Hence the current plan is to have enough space at the bottom of this cabinet to hang two pairs of headphones (with microphones).
Second up is similar size-wise (19.125″ wide inside and 16″ deep), but will be a rolling cabinet just for Middle Atlantic TD drawers and my main laser printer. There will be 21U of rack space. Probably three 4U and three 3U drawers, but we’ll see. It might not be a terrible idea to have a PDU in the front (with pull-out lights) and room for an ethernet switch (and my Raspberry Pi rack?) in the back. But I want a clean look here. Sort of industrial (the drawers), but in a solid hardwood cabinet. I bought 3″ casters, all swivel but two with no lock and two with total locking. A hardwood skirt will conceal the casters, floating the cabinet about 1/2″ off the floor. Why casters? Well, the older I get, the more I wish all my furniture could be easily moved (when cleaning, when needing to get to a hidden AC outlet, or data port, etc.).
The base cabinet I mentioned… I’m still in the ideas phase. Equipment-wise, I need to house UPS, PDU, ethernet switches and cooling. Today I’m doing that in a Middle Atlantic MDV-R12 to which I added rear rails for patch panels and fans. I don’t want this stuff facing the french doors to the foyer. The racks need to face north and south. I’m picturing a double-ended cabinet, and it needs to be about 66″ long (to support three of the bookshelf units). I’m imagining it being about 24″ wide, 20.5″ of that dictated by rack width. I’ll need 6 or 8 casters for this one; it will potentially be holding up a lot of weight.
This could also be two cabinets, that could be latched together or just have a bridged top. The advantage here is simply the building process; it’s much easier for me to move smaller pieces. I suppose modularity is also an advantage, but I don’t anticipate reconfiguring this stuff once it’s in place.
Desk space is also still in the idea stage. I’d really like space for the two of us to work comfortably. The hard part is not consuming the whole room with desk. Right now, I have a big ugly desktop computer. I’ve been wanting to ditch it for years, but I’m waiting on Apple for a beefier Mac Mini with Apple silicon. I can’t ditch my monitor (I need the 38″ screen), nor my keyboard, trackpad and wrist rest. My monitor is currently on an arm on the ELUR overbridge, and it’d probably be a good idea to have overbridge(s) on new desk(s); space to hide keyboard and cables (and Mac Mini?), etc. It’s also often the ideal height for speakers.