subject: Using a Monitor Arm for Safety and Convenience [print this page] Using a Monitor Arm for Safety and Convenience
The modern working environment usually contains a lot of monitors. Most companies have at least some rooms where computers and associated VDU equipment form the basis of a working day and a lot of companies have their employees exclusively working with monitors. As such, health and safety and ease of storage and use are prime considerations. In smaller or awkwardly shaped spaces, a monitor arm can be a perfect solution.
The arm is designed to take the monitor away from a desk space, storing it on a wall bracket instead. The arm can be extended, raised and lowered to ensure the perfect positioning for the monitor no matter what the situation of the chair or the seating position of the worker.
Health and safety is a big issue in the area of VDU use. It's not always easy to position a monitor in a way that allows its user to have his or her neck at the proper angle and to have his or her arms held in the right position to safely use a keyboard. When you install a monitor arm, the number of possible positions for your monitors immediately goes up. That means a far greater likelihood of finding the right arrangement of keyboard and monitor for the height and reach of the person using it.
A monitor arm is also very useful in situations where multiple monitors are required in a small space. Typical examples of this include any form of stock or investment work, where users need to see multiple screens hosting different bits of information at the same time. You will also find that people or businesses that work with large spreadsheets often prefer to use two monitors to split the information normally found on a single screen. A monitor arm or an arrangement of monitor arms can be used to construct a dual screen, or bank of screens, that are all within easy reach and still mounted at a safety conscious angle.
Not all monitors are attached to computers that people use. Plenty, as is the case with (for example) the departure screens at train stations and airports are there to give out information that is stored on a central system. Use of monitor arms in these situations allows banks of screens to be arranged at convenient and visible locations around a station or airport. The monitor arm keeps the screens hanging firmly in place.
Libraries and other information stations will find the monitor arm a useful piece of equipment for hosting user terminals. You can get monitor arms with keyboard trays, which swing out from wall mounted locations to allow users to search inventories, or to take part in interactive displays (like, for example, the displays found in museums).
A desk mounted monitor arm can make the best use of a larger desk area, allowing a monitor to be bolted or clamped to the back of the desk on an extendable arm, which can also be raised. This allows users to have the screen the right distance away from the face no matter where it is anchored.
