Power strips are often located under desks, or at minimum on the floor well out of reach, which makes this clever foot-switch power strip particularly handy.


Recently I noticed what a pain it was to toggle my power strips on and off every time I wanted to shut them down to save power (especially from energy vampires). You can buy power strips that sense when the computer hooked up to them powers down and shut down the peripherals accordingly, but it didn't fit my need. Often times I would leave my computer on to do some task but I wanted to kill the power to the monitors easily and with a single motion.


You would think a foot switch for a power strip wouldn't be hard to find but 99% of the ones you can find are light duty extension cords designed for holiday lights—no grounding prong, light-gauge wire, not safe for three monitors worth of juice. After much searching I found the strip pictured here from Woods Industries. Since I already had a heavy-duty APC power strip, I just unplugged the monitors from the APC strip, chained this one onto that strip and hooked all the monitors back up. Now when I get up from the computer, even if only for ten minutes, I can easily tap the foot pedal and kill the juice to all three monitors.

It's a great addition to your office if you want an easy way to toggle the power for peripherals without hibernating your computer or wasting time with a half dozen switches. The Woods Industry power strip with foot-pedal is available for $13 at Amazon. Have a piece of office equipment—big or small—that you can't image life without Let's hear about it in the comments.

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Woods Industry 6 Outlet Power Strip with Foot Switch