1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to computer workstations, and more particularly to adjustable workstations designed to promote an ergonomically advantageous work environment involving extended interaction with a computer system and screens, and still more particularly to an ergonomic workstation having an adjustable chair, monitor, input device support, and work tray providing coordinated and harmonized movement of a head rest, back rest, seat, leg rest, arm rests, monitor support, input device support, and work tray, through a variety of configurations, including standing, sitting, and reclining.
2. Background Discussion
Increasingly both vocations and avocations involve spending extended periods of time interacting directly with a computer (and, indirectly, with computers connected through networks) through input devices and a video display typically while sitting at some kind of desk or computer supporting workstation. Hours upon hours are spent in an upright sitting posture, remaining relatively static and perhaps occasionally shifting positions in small and incidental ways, all while staring at a screen and making small repetitive motions of the hands and fingers with the arms and hands and the back and neck held in positions of varying degrees of discomfort and stress. The end result is a growing epidemic of repetitive motion and overuse injuries originating in the workplace. The cost to business in productivity and money is socially and economically significant.
Human factors specialists have been working for the past few decades to develop ergonomic office and residential furniture that reduces or eliminates user fatigue and injury by adapting the workspace to the particular physical dimensions and preferences of the users and the jobs. Aside from injury prevention, it is also hoped that worker productivity and morale will increase. In the residential and recreational setting, it is hoped that comfort, gaming versatility, and gaming performance will be enhanced.
To address the foregoing concerns, several ergonomic workstations and workstation components have been designed. Among them:
U.S. Pat. No. 7,322,653, to Dragusin, teaches a chair suitable for a video gaming and computer workstation that includes a vertically adjustable undercarriage; a tiltable seat; and tiltable backrest that can be moved independently of the seat, wherein when the backrest is tilted backward, the seat is moved forward and a back end of the seat is tilts down one distance and a front end of the seat tilts down a second distance, and vice versa when the backrest is tilted forward. Tilting mechanisms are also provided for peripheral devices on a support assembly, but no coordinated movement of the seat and support assembly is provided.
U.S. Pat. Appl. No. 2007/0278834, by Kielland, discloses a workstation having a base, a working platform and a supporting member between the base and the working platform for use with an ergonomically adjustable chair. The workstation includes a pair of leg rests adjustably fixed to the supporting member such that the user can fully extend and support their legs in a comfortable manner. The angle and position of the working platform and leg rests are adjusted in concert with adjustments to the chair's height and seating angle to optimize the user's posture while operating a computer.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,922,249, to Marchand, describes a modular office desk and chair set embedded in a variable angular positioning mechanism. The mechanism enables a user to define the required angle of tilting of which the desk and chair are set, and other angular positioning and positioning of each element of the workstation in relation to other elements may be set. Thus the proposed invention provides the user with multiple levels of freedom in multiple directions to achieve customization of the orientation and position of the workstation.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,092,868 to Wynn, discloses a computer work station including a reclining chair with a back rest, a seat, a leg rest, and a pair of arm rests, supported on a support base. A computer is mounted to the chair and each of the arm rests has a key pad swivelably attached thereto for controlling the computer. A monitor is pivotally connected to the back rest and is electrically connected to the computer for displaying visual images from the computer.
And U.S. Pat. No. 7,887,130 to Zvolena, teaches a workstation including a chair and operator equipment that move together in a pivoting motion through an automatic, time-controlled program, in which an orientation of the chair relative to the operator equipment is maintained during the pivoting motion.
In addition to the devices described in the foregoing patents, many, if not all of which have never been seen in the public marketplace or otherwise commercialized, there are a number of ergonomic workstations that have at least gestured in the general direction taken by the instant invention. Among them are included the Nethrone (Classic) Workstation, by Nethrone of Herzelyah, Israel. This workstation includes a massage chair with a seat adjustably and slidably mounted on arcuate rails and having a tiltable backrest. The video display is also mounted on an arcuate scaffold and can be adjusted vertically and tilted to harmonize with the adjustments of the seat and backrest. All adjustments, however, are manual and independent of one another.
The iClubby workstation by Gravitonus, Inc., of Fairfax, Va., is a computer workstation with a seat, display support, keyboard and input tray, and armrests, all mounted on a vertically oriented ring and all of which can be rotated or tilted, including into reclining positions, with all seating and workspace surfaces and elements moving in concert.
The Emperor 1510 and Emperor 200 workstations by MWE Lab of Quebec, QC, Canada, each provide independent and coordinated monitor and seat adjustment. Configurations range from a fully upright sitting position to a fully reclined or supine position. The systems are prohibitively expensive, however, the former costing approximately $6,000 and the latter $50,000 at the time of this writing.
Without question each of the foregoing products would be characterized as high end, luxury workstations, and most would be considered exotic (and possibly ostentatious) by most consumers. Some provide a wide range of positions, from seated to reclined, but none fully coordinate the movements of the user, the monitor(s), the input devices, and the workspace, while truly enabling the user to achieve a fully reclined position as well as a fully standing position. In fact, to achieve coordinated movement of the various workstation apparatus, the prior art devices essentially keep users in a fixed posture, generally suitable for sitting and reclining slightly, but unsound ergonomically for a fully reclined position. Moreover, in even the most upright positions, these products give the impression of being somewhat recreational in nature: when a user achieves a semi-reclined or reclined position, it appears as if they are engaged in a leisurely activity, and it can feel similarly to the user. Some of this relates to the design choices made by the product designers; some, however, is inherent in the technical features of the workstation chairs. That is, they tend to depart dramatically in appearance from conventional task chairs and in their unusual appearance may signify either luxury or recreation or both, and as such they are certain to meet with resistance from department managers and others in office settings responsible for furniture purchasing decisions. Even if a workstation were truly successful in enhancing productivity, companies simply do not want to suggest to their employees or to visiting colleagues that workers are at leisure in the company workplace.
The present invention provides functionality and versatility beyond that offered by any of the prior art products mentioned above, and at a price substantially lower. Further, it does so without creating the appearance of either luxury or leisure. It achieves this by using the general design of a task chair for the seating portion of the inventive workstation.
It will be appreciated from the foregoing that ergonomic workstations have been fashioned in a number of different ways, with a principal focus variously placed on seating, desk apparatus, computer peripheral mounting and adjustment systems, or some combination thereof. None of the extant systems—including each of the exemplary systems referenced and described above, whether only a paper prototype in the form of a patent disclosure or an actual product in the marketplace—provides the features achieved by the workstation of the present invention. Specifically, no known system enables a user, without the assistance of other apparatus and without considerable expenditure of time, to adjust the workstation to configure it for work while sitting, standing, reclining, or collaborating with one or more colleagues standing at the side of the workstation, and to do so while maintaining an optimally ergonomic relationship between the user and various input devices and with more than one video display monitor.
The foregoing patents, patent applications, and commercially available products reflect the current state of the art of which the present inventors are aware. Reference to, and discussion of, these references is intended to aid in discharging Applicants' acknowledged duty of candor in disclosing information that may be relevant to the examination of claims to the present invention. However, it is respectfully submitted that none of the above-indicated patents disclose, teach, suggest, show, or otherwise render obvious, either singly or when considered in combination, the invention described and claimed herein.