Why You Can Trust CNET Just Mobile Lazy Couch - notebook stand review: Just Mobile Lazy Couch - notebook stand
With a serious design and a silly name, the Just Mobile Lazy Couch is a portable ergonomic helper for your laptop or tablet.
- Author of the award-winning, NY Times-reviewed nonfiction book The Tetris Effect; Longtime consumer technology expert for CBS Mornings
Most of the laptop coolers, stands, and risers we've reviewed have been serviceable, but not always the kind of thing you're likely to use full-time. Some are big and bulky, some only work with certain sizes of laptops, and others are just plain ugly. I first ran across this set of laptop feet, the Just Mobile Lazy Couch, at the MOMA Store in New York, and picked them up on a whim.
The Good
The Bad
The Bottom Line
Since then, I've used this $19 gadget on various laptops and my iPad, both at home and at the office, and frequently toss them in my shoulder bag along with whatever computing device I'm using that day.
The design feature that helps these laptop feet stand out from similar products, such as the Bluelounge Cool Feet set I reviewed several years ago, is that the two feet can lock together for easy transport and storage. Both Lazy Couch feet are grooved on the bottom, so that the two pieces snap into place, forming a small cylinder. That keeps the two parts together, which is important as they don't attach to either your laptop or table in any way, and makes it less likely you'll lose one (when I looked recently, I was only able to find three out of the original four pieces of the aforementioned Bluelounge Cool Feet set).
When positioned under the rear edge of a laptop, the feet provide 0.7 inch of lift. The angle can be tweaked a tiny bit by moving the feet farther in toward the front. I tried the feet with smaller 13-inch laptops, midsize laptops, and also a 17-inch desktop-replacement laptop. On the biggest, the feet may be too small to make a huge difference ergonomically, but at least the rubber top and bottom surfaces gripped the chassis, and I never felt like it was going to slip.
Many laptop accessories, including the recent Targus Space Saving Lap Chill Mat, are functional but made almost entirely of plastic, so the look and feel may not match up well with a highly designed laptop that costs $1,000 or more. There's a good reason I found the Lazy Couch at the MOMA Store. The combination of aluminum and matte black rubber looks sharp and matches up aesthetically with any laptop, and when the two halves are locked together it looks like a funky abstract desk toy.
My biggest problem with the Just Mobile Lazy Couch is that the feet, when snapped together, create a bulky shape, about 1.4 inches thick, and can be tough to fit into slim laptop bags or cases. This defeats the purpose of a highly portable laptop stand, especially as many cases for ultrabooks or ultraportable laptops are deliberately snug. It's a borderline fit for the tight front pocket of my current personal laptop bag, a Jack Spade leather messenger bag that easily fits a 13-inch MacBook Air.
The Just Mobile Lazy Couch, if you can look past the grating name, is a clever laptop accessory that succeeds in both form and function, without being too expensive to be an impulse buy or stocking stuffer.