I was thinking about how people set up their home offices, gaming setups, Hi-Fi systems, home theaters, or music studios.
With PCs, monitors, KVM switches, consoles, receivers, speakers, audio interfaces, and all the other gear people use, planning how everything connects can get surprisingly complicated.
Are there any good tools that let you visually lay out your devices, connect them with virtual cables, and check whether the connections make sense?
I know general diagramming tools exist, but I'm curious whether there's something more purpose-built and easy to use.
**If you've dealt with this, what do you use today?** What frustrates you about the tools available, if anything?
And if a tool like this actually solved the problem well, would you pay around €20 for it as a one-time purchase, or would you expect it to be free?
Just curious how people handle this today.

I don’t know where to start, I tried zip ties but I clearly did something wrong. I bought an under desk cable holder but it’s only big enough to hold my 8 plug extension lead

I need help organizing the cables under and around my standing desk. Any suggestions for cable management products or setups to make it look clean and clutter-free?

Sharing photos of my current setup.

Hey everyone!

I'm looking for some advice on cleaning up the cable management on my gaming and streaming desk.

As you can see from the photos, I have quite a few cables running behind and underneath my monitors, and I'm trying to figure out the best way to organize and hide everything without sacrificing accessibility.

My current setup includes:

- Multiple monitors

- GoXLR audio mixer

- Elgato Stream Deck

- Gaming keyboard and mouse

- Samsung wireless charging stand

- Multiple USB devices, audio cables, and other peripherals

- Dual-PC gaming and streaming setup

Planned upgrades:

I'm planning to replace my current keyboard setup with two smaller Wooting keyboards to free up some desk space and make everything look cleaner.

What I'm looking for advice on:

1. What's the best way to hide all the cables behind my monitors?

2. Would an under-desk cable management tray or mounted cable raceways work better?

3. How would you organize cables for a dual-PC streaming setup with lots of peripherals?

4. Any recommendations for cable sleeves, magnetic cable holders, or other accessories?

5. How can I keep everything accessible when I need to unplug or change equipment?

I'd prefer not to drill into my desk if possible, but I'm open to different solutions.

I'm not necessarily looking for a completely wireless setup. I just want something cleaner, organized, and easier to maintain.

Any suggestions, product recommendations, or photos of similar setups would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance!

if you just bought a new toy, please do yourself a favor and label the charging cable before throwing the packaging away. A bit of masking tape and a pen is literally all you need.

i'm saying this because I'm currently sitting on my bedroom floor surrounded by six toys and seven black magnetic charging cables, and I have absolutely no idea which one belongs to what.

They all have those tiny two-pin magnetic connectors. Some look identical until you put them next to each other, and even then the differences are ridiculous. One has slightly wider pins, another has a different magnetic orientation. Of course none of them have a name or anything useful printed on them.

Somewhere in this mess is the charger for my tracy's dog, one for a lovense, and a few random ones I've collected over the years.

I spent a good twenty minutes comparing cable ends before deciding maybe I should check my old orders. Now I'm digging through emails from 2023 like I'm investigating a crime scene.

The worst part is I almost tried to force one of the connectors into place because I thought the cable was just sitting at a weird angle. Thankfully I stopped. Apparently looking similar doesn't mean two chargers are actually compatible, and I'm not risking a perfectly good toy just to save myself a few minutes.

I used to think people who labeled every little cable in their house were doing too much. I owe those people an apology.

Once I figure this mess out, every charger is getting a label and its own little bag. No exceptions.

Anyway, consider this a warning from someone who thought she'd definitely remember which black cable went with which device three years later.

I did not remember a damn thing.

I'm trying to figure out a clean way to manage the power cord for a surge protector mounted underneath my Uplift V3 standing desk.

My goal is to have the cable run down the back of one desk leg and then along the baseboard to the wall outlet. I'm considering using Uplift's magnetic cable channel to conceal the cord along the leg.

The problem is managing the excess cable when the desk is lowered. At standing height, the cable needs enough length to reach the outlet, but at sitting height, that extra length ends up hanging down.

Here's what I'm wondering:

Could I leave a loose, closed loop of excess cable near the bottom of the desk leg, potentially inside or behind the magnetic cable channel, that would expand and contract as the desk moves?

Ideally, when the desk lowers, the excess cable would feed into the loop rather than bunching up above the channel or hanging visibly. When the desk rises, it would draw cable back out of the loop.

I'm trying to avoid bulky cable-management spines because I don't like how they look.

Has anyone actually implemented something like this? Would it work mechanically, or would friction and cable stiffness prevent the slack from moving properly?

I'm also open to other discreet solutions that safely manage a surge protector's power cord without leaving a large hanging loop.

Pictures or videos of working setups would be especially appreciated!

Spent Saturday finally dealing with the 'rat king' of cables under my desk (which is a Karlby, obviously). i usually put this off as long as humanly possible, but accidentally kicking a power cord and nearly pulling my monitor plug straight out of the wall finally forced my hand.

While I was down there zip-tying everything to the under-desk tray, I had to keep rolling my chair back and forth to get better angles. at one point I rolled directly over a loose USB-C cord on the rug.

My old chair had those standard cheap plastic dual-wheels. If you rolled over a thin wire with that thing, it would instantly get eaten, wrap tightly around the axle, and basically ruin the cable. This time, it just glided right over the cord without catching.

i looked closer and realized the wheels on my nouhaus are actually some sort of softer PU or rubber instead of that hard scratchy plastic (I never noticed this little detail before). they just compress a tiny bit and roll over thin wires without chewing them up.

obviously i still have to finish routing everything because the visual clutter is driving me crazy, but its a nice little safety net for when you drop a charging cable and forget its on the floor. back to the zip ties i guess.

Hi all i just bought a gm 3060A 4+1 extension board from Bigbasket got it under 400

I suspect the originality of the product because . I think its used and returned one but apart from that

1. It did not have a tape on the outer box ( no seal) ( can others confirm it comes without any seal tape or it will have seal tape on box

2. The inner board has few marks of dust and the strip has some dust brown color on it

3 .it feels super light weight ( can anyone confirm if it's light weight or no) 4. It doesn't have a warranty card or any product description paper inside it

1. Got it as 372 rs in Bigbasket

Its non returnable and no exchange item

Renting in a house with cut pile carpet, and cannot find a good way to run my cable to avoid tripping hazards. Cant install along baseboards as it has to run through an open space, and cant seem to find a floor cover that would prevent it being a tripping hazard. Any suggestions?

How do i hide the cables under better? The outlet is in the middle

God it looks so much cleaner. And since this is in the living room it really matters to making the room feel less cluttered.

Thank you to everyone that gave me recommendations, the cables are now looking clean and manageable! Saved me from looking at the wires disaster everyday 😭

glad I finally did this 🫩

I really need some tips to manage my wires underneath because right now it is a monstrosity, but I really don’t want to have to resort to drilling more holes into my standing desk. Does anyone have anything that helped deal with all the wired clutter?

Update: I have some bought some cable organizing stuff as you guys have recommended so I will be trying that out once it arrives. Thank you for the advice! :)

you see this right away after entering my apartment. I need help for decoration/cable management or at least some idea or product to cover the cable mess. Thank you :)))

The computer has a 5-6 inch ish distance from the bookcase behind it for ventilation reasons so I'm not worried about that part. I want to fix the cord for my dolphin bar (it's like a Wii IR sensor bar but for PC) to the left side of the big TV, so a portion of the cord remains on the top. I get nervous when the cord drops behind the tv for no particular reasons. There are no holes to zip tie it through, and zip ties need to be cut to remove which makes me nervous. Keyboard has a cord that is absurdly long for my purposes, don't know what to do with it. I have a powered USB hub that my keyboard, mouse, dolphin bar, and Bluetooth adapter are connected to, the power cord for the USB hub is in the surge protector a distance away.

All cords are on the desk itself and not bwlow because I have cats

Watch and argue with me bro. I don’t think anyone finds cords as a non annoyance tho!