Are there any solutions to reduce the number of cables I have in my WFH setup?

hamcaster

Looking for some advice from the tech experts here! I work from home and have the work laptop set up in my spare room alongside my personal laptop. I got a USB switch so I can use the same keyboard/mouse and save extra clutter, but the number of cables is doing my head in. 

At the moment I have the following cables:

• HP E202 monitor with power cable plugged into wall
• HP Probook laptop (work one) with charging cable plugged into wall
• HP Pavillion laptop (personal one) with charging cable plugged into wall
• DisplayPort cable from work laptop to monitor
• HDMI cable from personal laptop to monitor
• USB cable from USB switch to work laptop
• USB cable from USB switch to personal laptop

The keyboard and mouse are wireless so the USB receiver is plugged into the USB switch, but no cables there. 

Ideally I'm looking for a dock which would power both laptops and the monitor, as well as act as a KVM switch. Does anything like that exist? 

IvanOpinion

That sounds like cable heaven to me. I have 2 desktops and a laptop linked to a KVM switch that links all computers to all 3 of my monitors. Include camera, speakers, microphone, scanner, inkjet printer, laser printer, USB C hub for laptop, 3 external disk drives, a 10 port USB3 hub, a 4 port USB2 hub. I hate it when one of my dogs gets in under my desk and manages to unplug something, can take me ages to figure it out.

What you could try are some cable conduits attached to the modesty board (or elsewhere) of your desk. force all cables in there keeping only the minimum length required for connection visible. A KVM switch would also help allowing you to attach both monitors to both computers using a single mouse, keyboard, speakers, microphone etc.

macy08

Have a look at some of the Reddit groups dedicated to this, very helpful suggestions there

victor2

hamcaster said:

Looking for some advice from the tech experts here! I work from home and have the work laptop set up in my spare room alongside my personal laptop. I got a USB switch so I can use the same keyboard/mouse and save extra clutter, but the number of cables is doing my head in. 

At the moment I have the following cables:

• HP E202 monitor with power cable plugged into wall
• HP Probook laptop (work one) with charging cable plugged into wall
• HP Pavillion laptop (personal one) with charging cable plugged into wall
• DisplayPort cable from work laptop to monitor
• HDMI cable from personal laptop to monitor
• USB cable from USB switch to work laptop
• USB cable from USB switch to personal laptop

The keyboard and mouse are wireless so the USB receiver is plugged into the USB switch, but no cables there. 

Ideally I'm looking for a dock which would power both laptops and the monitor, as well as act as a KVM switch. Does anything like that exist? 

Unless you can get by with just one laptop, that's a pretty minimal setup cable-wise, and some sort of cable tidy might be the best you can do.
If all your personal stuff is cloud based, could you use the work laptop to access it? Possibly not a practical solution though. 

Vitor

If both laptops have USB-C ports which can power the laptop and also run USB-C DisplayPort Alternate Mode, then you can buy a dock which should just mean swapping the USB-C cable when flipping between laptops. The laptop power, video cable, USB wireless receivers etc, will all go into the dock.

I've never seen a display of any size which will run off USB-C, only those secondary 12" panels which are only meant as a second screen.

Newcad

For the power cables I would fix a 4-gang extension lead on the back of the desk, so there is then only one cable to the wall and everything else plugs into the extension with the cables hidden behind the desk.

If/when you want to unplug the laptops then a couple of self adhesive cable tidies will keep the laptop charging, monitor and USB connectors from falling down the back.
Something like these: https://www.amazon.co.uk/URAQT-Organiser-Silicone-Adhesive-Management/dp/B0B3T5Z815/

In fact that's how I have my old Win98 desktop setup, with the PC, monitor, and printer all plugged into the extension fixed to the backboard, all power and other cables tucked hidden behind the desk, and a couple of USB cables from the back of the tower to self adhesive clips at the front of the desk.

redped

If you're happy to leave your own laptop on when using the work laptop, you could ditch the USB switch and use https://symless.com/synergy to control both laptops with the same keyboard and mouse.  You install it on both laptops and configure it so that moving off the screen on one laptop automatically starts to control the other, and vice versa (it's actually easier to use than it sounds).

I've used it a lot in the past, when running a work laptop and work desktop side-by-side, each with their own monitor.  It used to be free, but looks like it's now $29 (although there's a 14-day free trial available).

DullGreyGuy

Never seen a dock that can power a monitor but you can get monitors with a built in doc that can power a laptop.

Presumably your laptops can be powered over USBC/Thunderbolt? If so why are you using two chargers rather than a USBC one? If they can't then you're not going to be able to seriously reduce the number of cables unless HP make a dock that works for both (most personal laptops dont have an old style dock connector).

I've an old monitor that works fine so dont want to replace it. Everything connects to a Thunderbolt dock and so switching machines is a single thunderbolt/USBC cable to be unplugged & plugged into the next laptop.  

ciderboy2009

I have dual Viewsonic VG2456 monitors.  These have the built in dock mentioned by DullGreyGuy.

I have a single USB-C lead that comes from the first monitor to my windows laptop - this powers the laptop and also handles all of the USB & video data.

There is a second "daisy chain" lead that goes from the first monitor to the second one.

Both monitors obviously plug into power points.

The receiver for my keyboard and mouse and my webcam are plugged into the USB ports on the side of the first monitor leaving me the ones on the second monitor for anything else I want to plug in.

When I want to use my Macbook I currently just switch the USB lead from my windows laptop (whenever I've looked for a USB-C switch that includes power delivery then they've been stupidly expensive).