The mouse pad came from Amazon Japan. That detail, almost buried near the end of a long desk tour by Marques Brownlee, says more about the whole setup than almost anything else. When you find something that works, you import it. Twice.
The desk that outlasted the company name
The surface everything sits on is a Next Desk Air Pro, now sold under the name Xesk after the company rebranded. Brownlee bought his nearly a decade ago, and the little controller panel still reads ‘Next Desk,’ which he treats as a badge of seniority. The top surface runs 96 inches wide by 38 inches deep, roughly eight feet by three feet, machined from a quarter-inch-thick sheet of aluminum. Under a full load of monitors, computers, speakers, and accessories, it does not bend or rock. His only real complaint is that raising or lowering the height requires holding the button down rather than tapping a preset. He scores it nine out of ten and calls it his forever desk.
The chair next to it is a Herman Miller Embody, rated ten out of ten with no reservations. Brownlee notes he owned one in college and expects to keep one indefinitely. At this point he no longer adjusts any of the settings because the chair has, in his words, molded around his back.
The computer is a different story. The M2 Ultra Mac Pro tower cost somewhere between twelve and thirteen thousand dollars when Brownlee bought it, roughly six years ago by his count. It arrived as Apple’s most powerful machine, carrying 24 CPU cores, a 76-core GPU, 192 gigabytes of RAM, and 8 terabytes of storage. Since then, Apple has released M3, M4, and M5 chip generations without updating the Mac Pro line. The machine still runs. Brownlee keeps it because an OWC PCI card inside handles live backups to a 64-terabyte SSD. But he rates it four out of ten and says it will probably be replaced by an M5 Ultra Mac Studio when one becomes available.
Seven thousand dollars per monitor and one webcam he will not review
Flanking the Mac Pro are two Apple Pro Display XDR screens. Each one, with its stand and nanoexture finish, comes to roughly seven thousand dollars. Brownlee acknowledges the price is difficult to justify for anything outside professional color work, and notes that everyone in his studio uses the same display so that color comparisons stay consistent. In a room with a full wall of windows, the nanoexture coating genuinely cuts glare. The trade-off is that the coating is nearly impossible to clean once touched. He rates them eight out of ten, with the main wish being a higher refresh rate than 60 Hz.
Attached to one of the monitor’s rear ports is an Opal C1 webcam. Brownlee declines to rate it because he has invested in the company.
Audio runs through a pair of Yamaha HS8 active studio monitors, which he rates nine out of ten. The eight-inch woofer reaches down to roughly 40 Hz, so no subwoofer sits in the setup. He has noticed that RF interference from a phone placed too close will occasionally produce a faint buzz through the speakers, sometimes just before a call or text arrives. His headphones are Sennheiser HD 650s, open-back and wired, rated eight out of ten. The open-back design means people in the studio can speak to him without him removing the headphones. Wireless capability would be convenient, he admits, but would add battery weight and reduce comfort, so he leaves the configuration alone.
The audio interface connecting speakers and headphones to the Mac Pro is an external Thunderbolt unit that also functions as a large volume knob. Brownlee rates it four out of ten, citing buggy software, frequent resets, and firmware that occasionally forgets its own configuration after updates.
Keyboards on the desk include a Rainy 75, a wireless mechanical board that Brownlee describes as rock solid and heavy. He credits a colleague named Andrew with steering him toward mechanical keyboards over the years. A custom Artisan MKBHD keycap sits in one corner. He runs the backlight at zero to extend battery life, which lasts a couple of weeks between charges. Rating: eight out of ten.
The mouse is a Logitech MX Master 4, engraved with his name after Logitech brought prototypes to the studio before the product launched. Haptic feedback was added in this generation. Brownlee rates it nine out of ten, noting the new finish should hold up far better than the rubbery coating on older MX Master models. Alongside the mouse sits an Apple Magic Trackpad, used simultaneously for timeline scrolling and pinch-to-zoom in Final Cut Pro. He acknowledges the combination is unusual but says a decade of editing has wired his hands that way.
Charging stations include a Belkin 3-in-1 unit handling an Apple Watch Ultra and two phones wirelessly, rated six out of ten for modest speed, and a fast wireless charger originally made by OPPO under the Airvuk brand, paired with a OnePlus cable, rated eight out of ten.
The mouse pad that had to be imported
Two Artisan Ninja FX mouse pads live on the desk. One sits under the mouse on the right side. The other covers a section of the aluminum surface on the left, functioning as a soft landing zone for phones under review, car keys from test vehicles, a Ridge wallet, hand sanitizer, and a table tennis paddle from someone named Adam Barro. When the original pads wore out, Brownlee searched online and found them nearly impossible to source domestically. He ordered replacements from Amazon Japan for around seventy-five dollars each. They last roughly two years before wearing in enough to replace. Rating: nine out of ten.
A wooden Groveade shelf sits on the desk surface, holding cables, SIM card removal tools, pens, flash drives, and a Sharpie. Brownlee rates it ten out of ten for doing exactly what a shelf should do, while noting that cheaper alternatives would achieve the same result since neither of the heavy displays ended up mounted on it.
That mouse pad from Amazon Japan is still on the desk. The desk controller still says Next Desk. Both are exactly where Brownlee left them, which is probably the point.
Source: Watch original
This article was reported in June 2026.
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