Liquid Crystal Displays (LCD) are a great leap forward in making desktop and laptop computers more complementary to their human users. In the old days of personal computers there was only the massive cathode ray tube (CRT) monitor to help us interface with the main computer system. The CRT has a laser gun (really) built inside that rapidly scans a beam of electrons over a screen lined with phosphorous material. Computer manufacturers have done a great job to make the images on the front of the screen come out in brilliant colors and in fine resolution, but the basic design only allow for a very large and hot box that dominates the prime real estate on your work space. Even a computer monitor with a small screen (14 inches let's say) takes up a quite a sizable volume, and it's pretty heavy. If you wanted to size up much larger you'd need a crew of dock workers to help you hoist it up on your desk top. The older CRT displays also come with a load of toxic lead and phosphorous that you can't dispose of very easily. You'll probably get fined by the city if you just dump your old, busted CRT in the rubbish bin, but then a recycling company will charge you a fee anyway.

Thankfully the technology that was applied so well to laptop computers has become feasible to build full-sized LCD monitors for desktops. You can easily and cheaply buy a 17-inch flat screen, 2-inch thick panel, and you won't have to ask for any favors to help set it up. LCDs take advantage of the reaction of liquid crystal material to electrical impulses. The panel operates from a grid of thin wiring, so the old ways of manufacturing and controlling the hardware are outmoded. Unlike the older CRTs, where the actual viewable area of the screen was a bit smaller than the glass face, now the full surface area of the screen is employed. Now there's a huge difference between a 17-inch LCD and CRT monitor, in tens of pounds and many tens of square inches of viewable screen area. The properties of the charged liquid crystal also give a much sharper and brighter appearance since the light is being emitted directly rather than being the mushy side-effect of photon scattering through phosphorous. The most endearing property of one of the flat panel monitors is that they take up so much less of the desktop space. Now you can have a huge viewing area, and a huge area to place your own personal clutter around your workspace.