I spent 2 years refinishing this room. I'm a great procastinator! The job started by ripping out the carpet, and of course (this is Arizona) there were termites. So then we had to treat the house (goodbye, $1000) and wait to make sure the little buggers didn't come back.
Now, that that doesn't explain why it took another year for me to paint the room. Or weeks after that to get around to putting in the floor. Or months after that to finish putting in the molding. Like I said, I'm very good at procastinating.
The floor is what I call "landlord laminate," similar to Pergo, but judging by what what people say, a little cheaper. It's holding up fine so far, looks great, and doesn't make my nose stuffy like carpet does. If I'm careful with it, it may last longer than what a landlord would expect.
The server rack is an $80 food-service-quality stainless steel rack I got from Costco. An absolute bargain. It's far sturdier and stronger than anything that costs $80 has a right to be, comes with great big casters, and goes together (and adjusts after it's together) with no tools. An engineering marvel.
My next project is to put doors on the closet. Lightly-stained wood doors with fixed louvers wouild look great.
Here's where having the server rack on wheels is great. I can just roll it out of the way to work with the wiring, sweep underneath it, or whatever. The AC outlet is a dedicated 20 amp circuit — never again will the vacuum cleaner trip the breaker that the servers are on. The network plate on the right has 4 CAT5 connections that go to the other side of the room, the DSL, and a backup phone line for those awful days when I actually have to use a modem.
Getting the network drops from the closet to the outside wall where the workstations are was something of a problem. That wall contains horizontal members, so you can't just drill a hole in the top plate and drop a string down to pull the cable through. I didn't want to rip open the wall, and didn't want any conduit on the inside. Finally, I realized that since I spend most of my time inside, it's alright to put a little bit of ugly on the outside. So I got this great plastic conduit from Home Depot. It's actually made for AC wiring, but being PVC makes it very easy to work with -- it's basically the same stuff as irrigation pipe, so you just hacksaw it, deburr the end, swipe some glue on it, and stick it together. Very nice.
It's a little ugy, but hopefully it'll take paint (assuming I ever get around to painting the house, that is). It's not the main curb-appeal wall anyhow.
The cat thinks he has to be in every picture... He's right, of course.
Are you looking at me?
