Not just big and heavy. Old monitors were deep. Corners were a great place to dump all that wasted depth.

Also because everyone loves sitting in the corner. Bonus points if it's made out of oak and weighs 1500 kg.

Oh I had a really great corner desk for many years. I loved it so much. Similar to the one in the pic but no shelves at all, just all desk and a really sturdy steel frame.

The thing I liked most about it was that your arms were really well supported while typing and it never jiggled the monitor when you typed like my current cheapo IKEA desk. The bloody ginormous monitors of the time were a factor too as OP says.

probably because monitors where so big

Nah. Legroom.

Legroom is key for some of us, and the shallow side runs have nothing underneath for space.

Getting the right keyboard height was almost impossible. That keyboard tray was about 6 months of knee bumps away from death!

Motorized desks really improved things for me.

They don't work well with widescreen monitors, let alone ultrawide or multi monitor setups. They give this illusion of space but ultimately they're just too cramped.

lol .... I've got the exact same desk and I converted it to a longer desk to place two systems on it ... the corner design is a pain because they place a post at the corner so any leg room you had down there is lost because the of corner post. Then you also lose space with the keyboard tray because only a small area is clear in the center and you lose space at the angled corners where your hand keeps hitting the left keyboard side and the right hand is squeezed in by the desk and mouse. Then you also lose space in the corner desk area with a large monitor because you can't recess a 26" flat screen, you have to bring it out. I had to move and redesign the upper shelves to place two 26" monitors in the corner and one off the side.

Neat idea but it doesn't really save you any space or increase comfort.

Good times playing Gary’s Mod and Counter Strike sitting at that exact same desk.

I mean, photo was taken with a potato. Wifi router on the top, 15" laptop on the desk. Is 2015 really nostalgia worthy?

And there was still lots of paperwork in the paperless office.

both of our desks in the office are 'corner' ones.. no hutch over either, though, so the back corner space is usable. one has fairly large laser printer in the corner and the deeper 'leg' of the desk does still have a crt monitor (19in trinitron) on it (the other side has three 5:4 lcd), the other desk holds a sff slim tower and a rack for file folders in its corner. they each also have one or two midtower pc on the floor under the corner and out of the way.

Anytime I see these desks, I immediately hear the commercial jingle for 1-888-45-Closet, 🎵 Closet World 🎶

CRTs were one reason, but the other was because you had to have storage for all your manuals and CDs and Floppy disks and other stuff you were constantly putting in your computer and taking out.

I still don't know why we got rid of these. They were space-efficient and made a computer room look great.

I had a little corner cabinet that closed up when it wasn't in use. You would open the doors and slide the keyboard tray out when you wanted to use the computer.

I love them but I don't bother with custom jobs like this. I just put a desk in a corner and have another desk or table of the same height but up against it. I like putting some shelves in the corner behind the monitor for storage