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Hit the jump for the full review.

Quality (100%):
Features (100%):
Value (80%):
Overall (93%):

We review this whopper-of-a-beast-of-a-dual-monitor-arm… and are mighty impressed indeed.

A monitor arm such as the Ergotron LX lets you adjust a monitor, up to 24-inches (or a pair of them, in this case) with your fingertips alone. Pushing forward, pulling towards you, moving up or down, even angling the screen. No problem.

Desk space is freed up, too – and if you’re like me, that finally means you can put the center speaker of a 5.1 setup in the frigging middle, underneath your monitor – leaving enough room for a keyboard, a mouse and goodness knows what other crap you insist on putting on your desk.

Sandwiches, laser-pens, popcorn and the like.

But without further adieu, incessant rambling and un-needed extended rhetorical commentary (that comes later)… let me introduce to you the Ergotron LX Side-By-Side Desk Mounted Dual-Monitor Arm.

The name couldn’t be any longer, let’s face it.

Part 01: Packaging & Delivery

First contact with the alien species (sod it – I’m rubbish at the theatrics… first contact with Ergotron): July 8th

Product shipped after finalizing arrangements with the friendly aliens from Ergotron (If you’re joining us for the first time as a new reader – please don’t be alarmed – we’re almost always this bonkers): July 10th

Product arrived on the doorstep in the biggest most badass cardboard box the postman had apparently ever had the displeasure of lugging from his van to the door (our glee at his displeasure must have been off-putting): July 13th

And given that the beautifully constructed SOB was shipped all the way from the Netherlands, I was and remain pretty frigging impressed, if not a little worried at the extreme efficiency of the company.

A few short days later, a company brochure arrived separately via courier, too.

Initial thoughts…

Part 02: The Unboxing & Making

I wouldn’t usually write about the taking of a product out of it’s box, which I know a lot of my tech-community-review peers seem to find the highlight of their days, as I tend to find it rather pathetic and frivolous, but the sheer weight of the Ergotron LX Dual-Arm whatever-the-mabob-we-decided-to-refer-to-it-as warrants a writeup.

The parts individually don’t seem to be too weighty (the stand constructs by slotting into place – super easy and no help from strong persons was required… See: Parental Figure).

Once constructed though (I did this on the floor, before realizing how heavy the completed structure was) I had quite a job lugging it onto the desk.

After making and weighing 6.9 kilograms of awkwardly shaped metal, I proceeded to try and lift it onto the desk. After poking myself in the eye rather forcefully with the blunt-end of a rather sexy looking spike (the other end would have had no qualms with blinding me), I successfully managed to haul the load onto the desk.

Part 03: Mounting The Gizmo

Mounting however, couldn’t be easier. For such a sturdy beast, the Ergotron LX Dual-Arm mounts like an eloquent Russian dancer – not that I’d know of such a thing, being an Mancunian boy.

Two options. Grommet mount, or desk clamp. To avoid mutilating a perfectly brilliant and at least temporarily unscathed brand new IKEA desk, the latter option was chosen.

We, for one appreciate £38 pigmented epoxy/polyester powder coated particle-board, made to look like expensive real wood. Then again, we’re cheap-ass businessmen.

Or more precisely, one teen in a pseudo-bedroom-office which fails to be either very well – despite the plethora of expensive gadgets and lack of bedtime story books. Back to the Ergotron anyhow.

You grab the desk mount base, you twist it. You keep twisting.

You keep twisting until it’s really tight and you have red marks on your fingers and you’re screaming that the damn thing won’t work, then you realise you already mounted it five minutes ago.

To make sure, we unmounted, then didn’t overdo it. Turned out it fixed into place in about thirty seconds. Our bad. Super-easy installation of the heaviest damn thing to grace my desk since the Antec P193 chassis nearly buckled the old one.

Part 04: Mounting The Monitor & Adjusting The Viewing Angle

The new Samsung monitors we intended to use for testing were delayed in delivery initially, but when arrived a week-or-two after expected, were in tip-top condition. Mounting was surprisingly easy. By unscrewing the screws with a standard cross-head screw driver, which held the mount to the monitors as they came pre-assembled, the screens were left with their VESA mounting area exposed.

All that was left was to simply screw the Ergotron LX  arm into the monitor (not as scary as it seems – you’re not having to drill through your LCD or anything nutty… pretty much 99% of monitors come with VESA-holes as standard. This was hella easy, and then lifting up the monitor + arm and then slotting it onto the base unit’s sticky-outty prongs proved no trouble at all, even for an athletically challenged geeklete such as myself.

The arm itself swings left-to-right (pretty much all the way around…), a secondary-joint (a bit like one’s elbow, really) can then tilt the viewing-prong up and down. Attached to this is a horizontal-angler which lets monitors be tilted and a final vertical-angler allows for people of different heights to get the monitor adjusted to their… uh… stature as the need may arise.

Part 05.1: Worth Mentioning – Price

The retail price of the product is almost £189 in the UK – yet only $215 in the US. If you’re in a business environment or you take your gaming really very seriously, the price is a premium worth paying. If you’re just a casual net browser, the price really isn’t justifiable. Unless you’re casual web-browsing lasts… say… all day. It’s been known to happen.

Then again, if you fall into any of them categories, yet aren’t a gamer, business-person or need to showcase your screen in such a way, then the Ergotron LX arm isn’t really aimed at you, anyhow.

Part 05.2: Worth Mentioning – Colour

The product also comes in a variety of colours. Precisely speaking, just two, actually. A mini-variety. Black and silver. The silver one arrived on our door – though I have to say the black looks mighty sleek, too.

Part 05.3: Worth Mentioning – Ergotron Vs. Wannabe Competition

To address the biggest concern re: the Ergotron LX-series arm… “But they’re so expensive – the cheaper alternatives are just as good.”

I call “HEFTY BS” on that one. Having used the Ergotron Side-By-Side for a serious amount of time, in a seriously competitive business and seriously outrageous gaming environment (okay, so no serious Arma II or serious Forex trading – but serious teeth-gnashing & n00b-pwning on COD4 and super-serious internet marketing certainly qualifies) has proven that… cliché alert… the price is worth paying.

The sturdiness of the arm is incomprehensible. If you get chance to meet one of these arms in a real-life environment before buying, you’ll know what I’m talking about.

If you get to lift one up and get poked in the eye, you’ll also get my gist.

The fact that the arm supports up to two 24″ monitors, neither exactly featherweight, and the fact they remain responsive to fingertip control alone is mightily impressive.

Part 05.4: Worth Mentioning – The Ergonomic Advantages

A huge number of computer users suffer from back and neck pain, and sadly… I’m not exempt.

After trying various chairs, ranging from big beefy leather ones to tiny-weeny office ones (which actually proved better), I came to the conclusion a few weeks back that the only way to save myself the pain would be to splurge a few hundred pounds on a Herman Miller Aeron chair.

However, I thought it’d be worth giving the Ergotron arm a go in the meantime.

WOAH boy. The monitor stand didn’t allow for much moving of the screen at all, but the Ergotron arm changed that completely. On their site, they have a useful ergonomic calculator. You plug in your height… they tell you exactly what height to position your monitor. Frgging ingenius, to say the very least.

Another tip in the hat for Ergotron. My posture isn’t slouched any longer, but I’m finding it comfy to sit upright, having adjusted my workspace to my needs in line with their helpful advice.

Part 6: Conclusion

The Ergotron LX Dual Side-By-Side Arm receives the Wilki.me Extreme Performer award, along with a resounding five out of five Overall Score (human translation scoring: LIFE-SAVER as opposed to BACK-BREAKER). The company just won themselves a lifetime fan.

Rating:  

Check out the Ergotron website for a full view of their product lineup.

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