Being someone who plays games, it’s hard to find furniture or accessories that have features built into them that benefit your hobby, but that doesn’t also look like obnoxious “LOOK AT ME I’M A GAMER” billboards. I’m not entirely hating on “gamer” styled things, I love me some RGBs, but it can get silly to the point where it feels like some of the things you see have to be parody. That’s why I was pleasantly surprised to put together NTENSE’s Extreme Riser Gaming Desk to find it’s actually the perfect in-between of style, with a touch of RGB for the gamers.
NTENSE Gaming Desk – NTENSE Extreme Riser Gaming Desk
Price: $299 (NTENSE)
MonsterVine was supplied with the NTENSE Extreme Riser Gaming Desk for review
Right off the bat, this thing is heavy so you’re probably going to want to get a few beers and a friend to put this together. Don’t be like me who decided to cirque du soleil this desk together, awkwardly holding leg pieces up as I screwed them into table boards. Regardless, it’s not a long build taking me close to an hour maybe with frequent breaks. It’s not the simplest build, however, as there are quite a few pieces to have to put together compared to most gaming desks being very minimal in terms of parts to put together. NTENSE’s Extreme Riser Desk asks you to glue parts, and even nail them in which is something I haven’t had to do with a piece of furniture in years, but it honestly ended up feeling like a sturdier product because of it. I’ve built a few desks recently that were purely screws, and after a while of minimal usage I’d notice the screws start to loosen, which I doubt will be the case here as the build also features cam lock screws which I feel hold up better than normal ones.
NTENSE Extreme Riser Gaming Desk Specs & Features:
- Dimensions: 23.7″D x 53.6″W x 34.1″H
- Desk top made of medium density fiberboard
- RGB lighting along underside of riser
- Two built-in USB ports
- Cup holder and headphone hook
- Hidden cable management shelf behind desk
The desk itself is made of a medium density fiberboard and feels pretty sturdy. It also mixes in some metal in the legs, giving it this sort of professional minimalist look? I don’t know the right word for it, but I do like it a lot. The desk also measures in at a whopping 53”, which is plenty of space to litter with whatever your money burning hobby is (gunplay). The desk itself can hold up to 80lbs, and the shelf riser can hold 30lbs, which by the way I love the riser. I’m the kind of guy who doesn’t like having their keyboard and monitor on the same surface. This is why I’ve normally stayed away from most “gamer” desks, as they’re just a single table without any place to house the keyboard. I like having my desk cleared out because I’ll sometimes do work and don’t want to have to finagle with a keyboard and whatnot, and NTENSE’s desk is a great alternative. While it doesn’t feature a keyboard tray that slides under the desk, it instead has a platform at the back of the desk that raises your monitor up a level. I actually think I like this more than a traditional keyboard tray because sometimes you might get a desk with a poorly constructed tray that’s a bit finicky, one bad move and it breaks off its railing causing your $100 keyboard/mouse to drop to the floor. Here, I can simply push my keyboard underneath the riser when it’s not in use and pull it back out when I need it. Am I a fan of seeing a cable jutting down the middle of my desk? Not one bit, I almost kind of wish there was a cable management hole in the middle for that, but it’s the smallest of nitpicks honestly.
Speaking of, I’m surprised at the complete lack of cable management holes on this desk. It does feature a nifty hidden cubby on the backside of the desk where you can easily put the power strip all your stuff is plugged into, so that way the only cable coming out from the desk is the one for the strip. It’s a clever way to hide cables I hadn’t seen before. In terms of additional features the desk has, you’ve got your typical headphone holder (an absolute must at this point for desks), a cupholder (that I wish would swivel back under the desk), and it even has two USB ports built into the desk which is handy for those (like me) who always have a phone charger cord plugged somewhere. And because it’s not a gamer desk without some RGBs, it comes with a strip of LEDs (controlled by remote control) to put underneath the riser, to add a tasteful amount of light to your setup. Being just your standard LED strip, don’t expect any crazy patterns or anything you’d find on pricier gaming desks, which I’m okay with. I like a bit of RGB in my setup, but I tend to draw the line when your setup looks less like a workstation and more like an EDM show.
I’ve built a few of these desks the past few years and something I do wish “gamer” desks started to do was include a built-in in drawer. This isn’t a knock against this particular desk, just gaming desks as a whole, as it’d be neat to have a desk that the elements I like from gaming desks, but also featured some productivity benefits as well.
The Good Clean, minimalist look Affordable Love the riser
The Bad Could use more cable management options Build has a lot of pieces
The Final Word
NTENSE’s Xtreme Riser Gaming Desk is definitely one of my favorite desks that I’ve put together, due in part to its minimalist style. It’s affordable, and won’t make your room look like a twitch streamer vomited RGBs all over it, what more could you want?
Source: https://monstervine.com/2021/12/ntense-extreme-riser-gaming-desk-review/
