When we were designing our kitchen, we knew we wanted our laptop and printer to be located somewhere in the kitchen. We are wireless, so dealing with the placement of a modem was not an issue (the modem and router are both located in the basement). We use the computer on a daily basis for bill paying, Internet surfing, checking email for both home and work, as well as my obsession with forums such as this.

What our designer came up with has worked extremely well for us. Our laptop is located on a raised peninsula. The end cabinet in the peninsula houses my DHs junk drawer, a file cabinet, and our printer.

We have our computer station in our kitchen- a cabinet for the whole system that closes up and hides away. With a small child we wanted to be able to monitor what she was doing if ever on the internet. We enjoy the convenience of it but would likely opt for just a laptop situation next time. You can see pics in the finished kitchens slideshow under arc1017 here:

Here is a link that might be useful: finished kitchens slidehow

I created a little drop-down desk area using a horizontal cabinet and door. The door rests on the counter and creates an overhang -- I can sit on a stool under the door overhang. The electrical and phone outlets are inside the cabinet and I can put mail, laptop , and other junk inside and close the door. It has a powerstrip/surge protector so that all the cell phones and the laptop can charge.

I have limited space so we use a wireless laptop on the kitchen table when needed. We use it to look up new recipes, info or google something just to prove somebody else wrong. lol. We have 4 laptops in the house so that everyone can be on when and where they need to.

i have a laptop i use all the time. never go near my keyboard/monitor/cpu setup anymore. we're having a built-in hutch/desk made and doors will open to give access to power, printer/scanner and other necessities. i'll mostly use that space and my laptop for accessing recipes online (as well as those on my hard drive). i don't think i'd have a computer just for the kitchen, but my laptop is on the expensive side. i use it for professional desktop publishing and design, so it's a bit "pimped"! thinking about it, i'll probably use that space as a home base so the laptop may as well sleep there...

New construction - open plan. We are creating a 6-7' counter area with 2' cabinets on ends and open area for bar stool, printer in one cabinet, other is drawers. DH will create roll-out for keyboard, counter can be used for entertaining. I use mine for DH construction business, web surfing, genealogy files, email. Outlets above, below, and inside printer cabinet.

Try a netbook - very small, inexpensive with keyboard and mouse attached. It's more than enough for recipes, internet browsing. They are actually portable with weights If you are a windows-head, it makes an adequate access device for remote desktop to a larger computer stashed elsewhere.

Here is a link that might be useful: Not a specific recommendation - just a sample

The other function to think of is if you want a tv in your kitchen you can do a 2 for 1 deal to save space. Our cable is hooked right into the PC so we can use it either as a computer or a television. Works great for us.

I made the perfect spot when I removed the dining room wall - great place to sit and work, check recipes, check on gardenweb postings... even work.

I print out recipes (I type mine up and keep them in the computer) in the living room, where the computer resides in an armoire desk. The recipes then go in a basket until they die or are given away. I spend way too much time working on a computer to allow it in my kitchen!! (The laptop might try to get into the new space, but the only thing it can talk to on wi-fi is the hi-fi (no internet) so it's going to be really disappointed and go back to its fan base. Unless it can convince the new kitchen TV to sign up for a cable modem that is, but I'm going to do my best to keep the stereo and TV from talking to each other. The laptop and ipod are already in cahoots, and are fighting the GPS for control of the car. Now the iphone wants to talk to the stereo (though it doesn't want to go to the doctor to get stereo controls properly installed), and things are really getting out of hand. You have to be careful with these digital children and remind them who's boss or they'll take over your whole world.)

We have one in ours. I've got a built in desk with bookcases above next to our pantry cabinet. The tower, printer, and other cords and stuff live in one side of the pantry cab with holes drilled in the sides to run the cords behind the desk drawers through a hole in the counter to the monitor and keyboard on the desktop. My monitor is also a tv and we can have picture in picture with the computer as main screen and tv PIP while we work. The kids use it for the internet and DH and I both use it as our main computer. I love having it there! The monitor/tv is 17".

My kitchen was (and will be) a working kitchen--no space for homework or surfing unless one wants to stand. I do drag in the laptop for recipes as I usually try one before I print it. I find it useful to move the thing around so I wouldn't want a non-portable one unless it doubled as a TV like Lisa's.

We don't have a good place in our small home for computers so we got rid of our desktops. The printer is in a bookcase and the modem and router in another. The computers are wherever.

I like the idea of a netbook for a kitchen computer. If I could use one as a dummy terminal I'd be tempted to reassemble my old desktop!

I'm in my early thirties and we are very techie so we have had at least one computer in the house per person for years. We have a regular computer that we use as a server in the office (outside of the kitchen area) that has the printer, etc attached to it. The laptops/phones/pda's can connect with the wireless to use all those devices from anywhere in the house.

Then when we designed the kitchen I put an extra outlet on each side of the kitchen INSIDE the lower part of a cabinet/shelf. That let's someone plug in/charge without taking up counterspace where something could be spilled or knocked off. I also live in a pretty poor area of town so having a place where the devices aren't visible from the windows is important to me. 90% of what I'd be doing in the kitchen is using the mouse, the rest is a little awkward unless the laptop/keyboard is pulled down. They make plenty of wireless keyboards and mice though so they can come down on their own.

I expect computers to continue to get smaller as screens continue getting larger so I feel safe saying that there's room in each of those cabinets for a laptop now and a seperate computer/monitor set up later.

We are planning the to get the HP touchscreen desktop computer for our kitchen. It will 'live' at the end of a long counter run over the Dog nook, so if the dog is not using his nook someone theoretically could pull up a chair and have leg room. It will mbe used for recipes and other cooking related items. It is also not our 'main' computer. I have been using one of our laptops and it gets very messy, so we hope the touchscreen will be easier to clean bc there is no keyboard, etc.

I'm mounting a 24" imac on the wall on a reticulating arm. It will be a little too close to the sink for comfort, but it was the only wall space available.

I decided against a touchscreen because of the greasy finger factor.

I usually have my laptop sitting at the end of our island. The printer and a desktop pc (laptop is setup on a wireless network) are in the mudroom in a little desk area. Sometimes my laptop makes it in there, but it generally stays at the end of the island. I like having it in the middle of the house, although we all probably waste more time messing around on it than we would if it was in a less convenient location.

Plllog: That was funny. I laughed out loud!

I appriciate all the feedback, and especailly the photos. I look forward to additional responses.

I have looked at the HP or Dell touch screen, but am wondering about the messy finger issue. For the two of us we have a home base computer and three laptops, so the kitchen computer willbe meant for recipe reading, music streaming, and a TV monitor.

I am considering the lower shelf of an open corner wall cabinet, but the opening may not be wide enough.

I LOL too Plllog :-)

I find it interesting that so many of you use laptops. I totally get the advantage of wireless and portability, but I hate the small keyboards and screens. I just canÂt see myself using oneÂ.

We currently have half of our kitchen as the "office" with 2 computers that the family shares. We will probably get a third one  maybe follow MorgneÂs lead and set up a server in our new home - and our current plan is to repurpose the dining room (that would not be used otherwise) as the family computer room.

I am slightly concerned about the touchscreen re grease, etc. However, my Iphone has seemed to be okay when I've had messy fingers. I guess we will see!

Pllogg you are hysterical!

Jeri,

FWIW laptops are becoming considerably larger to acommodate the larger screens and they have normal sized keyboards to go right along with them.

Many of us who have laptops rarely transport them any distance so get the bigger ones on the market. They go up to 17" of screen size now and keep on moving up.

We're not there yet but the plan is a monitor on a swing arm which can be used for TV or computer. We're installing a home automation system (I get the kitchen, DH gets the automation system. Funny story, when DH went shopping for one the salesman said his biggest competitor is not other electronics stores but kitchen appliances:) DH has to implement my plan but the thought is to have one of those indestructible keyboards and mouse so I can bet my grimy hands on it and not worry about anything. They will be stored in a drawer when not in use. Everything will be wireless. And we will probably have the digital children problems that plllog describes. We already have 2 computers in our office (one for the kids and one for me) plus a laptop for my husband. We will get another server to control the house.

Loved pillog's post!

My home office ended up right beside the kitchen but separated by a half-wall. As our house isn't very large, it's only 8 steps (I just counted, LOL) from my desktop PC (mine is the server for our wired/wireless network) to the range. Works out great. We were exploring the idea of designing a home a while back, and I wanted to keep a setup just like this in the layout.

I have a netbook - specifically the Asus 901 which I love - but would never take it into the kitchen. I've always got messy fingers, that's why I have a levered faucet so I can bump it with a wrist to wash my food-smeared fingers!

Now, voice activation....that would get used!

I recycled my old Mac Powerbook laptop by putting it in the deep corner of our kitchen, where two cabinet runs meet. The PB sits on a very sturdy aluminum mStand that gets it up off the counter, yet there's enough room for it to sit open under the upper cabinets. I also recycled a Soundsticks speaker system that sits behind & alongside the Mac so I can play "my" music (using iTunes) or web stream a radio program. The computer can even be used as a TV with an Elgato accessory.

I use a recipe program called MacGourmet, which can display recipes in Chef View, which is ultra large type, perfect for viewing in the kitchen. We have wireless net access, so I can also look things up.

Jeri...I felt the same way initially. When I joined a company that gave us all laptops rather than desktops, I initially resisted and would either hook my laptop to a traditional keyboard & monitor or I would do all my work on the Gov't-provided desktop & copy all my updated files to my laptop later.

However, when I moved to a contract where they did not provide a desktop, it forced me to use my laptop more...and I eventually got used to it. At first I at least hooked my keyboard from home to it, but as time went on I gradually used it less & less. It did help that I had a Sony Vaio w/a large screen.

I just got new laptop (Dell) w/a much smaller screen & lower resolutions and I'm having a tough time of it since I usually have 2 or 3 documents/files open at once and move among them constantly...I'm lobbying for a larger screen w/hopefully, finer resolution!

In reality, desktops are becoming a thing of the past as laptops take over; and a laptop can be located any where (you don't even need a plug b/c most also have long-life batteries now). With wireless networks in more and more homes, even the printer can be located in one place and accessed from any where.

For us, putting the desktop in the kitchen would have taken up too much valuable cabinet & counter space. We have a small office/library (9'x13') that houses our desktop computer, printer, modems, & router. To be honest, I'd like to reclaim the room taken up by the computer & its peripherals for book space, but right now there's no where else to put them.

gizmonike, thank you so much for letting us know about MacGourmet!! It is perfect for organizing all of those recipes I have saved on my computer. It will take me some time to get them all imported but it will be so worth it.