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There are many theoretical benefits to standing desks. For me, more than anything, I wanted flexibility. Being stuck standing at a desk is only slightly better than being stuck sitting. That’s where an adjustable-height desk like the SmartDesk 2 from Autonomous comes in.
The SmartDesk 2 offers high-end features at a stellar price. Upgrade your setup today!
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What's going on, everybody? Ian here for Cult of Mac
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And up until very recently, I had never given a lot of thought to the desk or space that I was
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working in. If there was enough room for me and my laptop, I was willing to go with it
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But now that I spent a lot of time working from home and taking meetings from home, I'm starting to notice when those spaces that I was working in weren't the most comfortable
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Laying on the couch, standing at the bar, or sitting at the kitchen table are all fine
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for short amounts of time every once in a while. But when you're doing them day in and day out
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it's way less productive. And a lot of that has to do with the fact that none of them are really set up to be a desk
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That's why when the folks over Autonomous reached out and asked if I wanted to check out their smart desk too
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I thought it would be a great opportunity to see if having an adjustable standing desk was really worth all the hype it's cracked up to be
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There are a lot of theoretical health benefits of a standing desk, but I really don't want to get into those
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For me, it was all about the flexibility. because being stuck standing all day is only slightly better than being stuck sitting all day
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And that's where an adjustable standing desk like the smart desk too really comes in. Being able to move from sitting to standing to sitting on a stool and up and down as much as I need throughout the day
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without having to move from room to room or part of the house to part of the house is a huge convenience
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Best of all with the smart desk too from autonomous, you get all that convenience and all those features at a very affordable price
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Just starting at just the Smart Desk 2 offers a motorized frame and a 53 inch by 29 inch top Now you can get upgraded materials for the top a larger size for the top or even their premium frame which gives you even more height adjustment but at you can get in the door
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on an adjustable standing desk packed with features. Now, setting up the desk was actually really straightforward
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although it did take an extra week for the top to get here once the base had arrived
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but once everything was here, it only took about 25 minutes to put the whole thing together
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I use the directions that came in the box, but they do have a great kind of how-to video
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on their YouTube as well. well if you need the extra help. Now from an aesthetics perspective, I think the desk looks really
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really good. I went with the white base with the white oak top because I think the white oak top
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really gives it a little bit of character and a little bit of visual appeal while still maintaining
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a very clean white look. In addition, on the top of the actual desk itself, there are little
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cable drops in either corner, meaning you can run your cables from your monitor or your computer
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down through the desktop so they're not getting pinched behind the wall. They're running off the side
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And then also in the box were a bunch of these little cable ties that stuck underneath the desk
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which are super handy at helping keep all the cables underneath organized
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so you don't end up with a huge rat's nest of cables underneath. Now, from an adjustability perspective, the smart desk too is fully motorized
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but you can manually set the height on it just using up and down arrows, as well as set it to any of the four user programmable presets
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meaning you could have one for sitting and one for standing, and then your spouse or partner could have one for sitting or standing
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or you could have it set for different chairs depending on how you like to work
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Now the controller for the desk to actually adjust the height is also pretty simple It fairly compact which means you not going to bump it when you working at the desk or anything like that And there are LEDs on it between all of the actual numbers which I think look really nice Now unfortunately those LEDs don actually light up
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the numbers on the controller, meaning it's still kind of hard to see in the dark, but ultimately it wasn't a big issue for me
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because I'm rarely working in complete darkness. Now, my only actually real complaint about the controller
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is there's no lockout function or way to switch it off. And as a parent of a toddler, I'm always concerned
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that when my daughter's down here playing, she might accidentally hit a button and either get her finger pinched in the actual risers
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or have the desk drop down in a bunker on the head. Another thing that people tend to look for
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in an adjustable desk like this is how quickly it can move up and down and what that experience is like
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According to Autonomous, the Smart Desk 2 can move at about 2.3 inches per second
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but in my testing it was actually a little bit slower than that, but ultimately the 10 or so seconds it took to move
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about 14 inches was more than quick enough. And when it comes to actually raising lowering the desk
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The action is fairly smooth. It takes off fairly calmly. When it gets to the end, there's a slight bump right as it locks into place
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but it's not enough to really shake the desk or move things that are on it, which is a big deal because I don't want my monitor or any of the things that I have sitting on my desk
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to tip over when it stops or finishes moving. In top of that, there's also the sound to consider when you're adjusting the desk
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And from my experience, it's very quiet. You can still hear it, but it's not noisy by any means
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It does get a little bit louder when you throw some weight on top of the desk but even in my testing when I was sitting on top of the desk and making the adjustments it was barely more than a dull hum And the weight capacity is also another really impressive thing about the smart desk too
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According to Autonomous, it can hold about 300 pounds. The desktop itself is about 40 pounds, so that leaves conservatively, let's say
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250 pounds of actual additional lifting capacity. Now, I was able to lift me sitting on top of the desk with no issue
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so I assume that your dual monitor visa arm setup thing is probably going to be
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be fine. And all I know, everybody has different needs for their desk and their workspace
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The SmartSest 2 from Autonomous is actually a really great all-around option. With different sizes and styles, they have an option that should fit just about any style
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of room. On top of that, the motorized controls for the SmartDest are actually really, really good as well
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They have plenty of power, plenty of flexibility, plenty of height adjustment range
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And on top of that, it all comes in at a really great price. The Smart Desk 2 is available from Autonomous for just $3.79
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and it's definitely worth considering if you're in the market for a new home or I guess work desk
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Let me what you guys think in the comments down below. While you're down there, be sure to give a video a thumbs up
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Subscribe to the channel if you're not already. Hit the notification bell so you get notified whenever we post new videos
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Until next time, I'm being for Cultive Mac. I'll catch you in the next one
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