My desk cable pile got so bad I tripped on it last Tuesday

I finally decided to tackle the rat's nest behind my desk after I almost took a header into my monitor last week. The mess has been building for like three years since I work from home and keep adding stuff. I've got a laptop charger, two monitor cables, a printer USB, and speaker wires all tangled together with dust bunnies. Spent about two hours on Tuesday trying to sort it out with zip ties but it still looks rough. Does anyone have a go-to method for keeping multiple cables from knotting up behind a desk?

2 comments

2 Comments

noahclark5d ago

Leave it alone honestly. You put in two hours and it still looks rough because that's just how cables work when you have more than three of them in one spot. Zip ties are a trap, they just make a stiff blob that still gets messy when you unplug something. Dust bunnies are harmless, they're not going to short anything out or start a fire. And honestly if it didn't bother you for three years it's not actually a problem, you only tripped once.

john4305d ago

Minor thing but dust bunnies actually can cause problems in certain situations. If they get thick enough around a power supply or a hot component they can trap heat and make things run warmer than they should. I've seen some pretty crusty looking power supplies that had dust buildup and the fan was struggling. It's probably not going to start a fire or anything dramatic but it's not completely harmless either.