How Bill Gates Works

Posted on April 4, 2006

CNN has an article by Bill Gates about how he works and what kinds of hardware and software he uses. In this excerpt, Gates explains why three screens are better than one.

If you look at this office, there isn't much paper in it. On my desk I have three screens, synchronized to form a single desktop. I can drag items from one screen to the next. Once you have that large display area, you'll never go back, because it has a direct impact on productivity.
The screen on the left has my list of e-mails. On the center screen is usually the specific e-mail I'm reading and responding to. And my browser is on the right-hand screen. This setup gives me the ability to glance and see what new has come in while I'm working on something, and to bring up a link that's related to an e-mail and look at it while the e-mail is still in front of me.

Ok, we're sold on the three screens. That sounds very handy. Here is a list of the tech gadgets and software Gates uses.

Hardware:

Dell Desktop and Motion PC running Windows XP

3 NEC 21-inch monitors

Microsoft wireless mouse

Logitech camera for videoconferencing

Software:

Outlook

Sharepoint

OneNote

Communicator

There are a fair amount of Microsoft products on the list as one would expect.

BILL GATES