Ah, I can see how what I wrote could be confusing. For the workspace where you're prepping your reactions, yes the work bench you described is what you'd want.

Ah, I can see how what I wrote could be confusing. For the workspace where you're prepping your reactions, yes the work bench you described is what you'd want. I was referring to a workspace for working with post PCR product (which is what you'd need to do to run a gel), for which you'd want the opposite - since effectively what you're doing is handling a super dirty sample, and you want to contain that as much as possible. Even if you're pretty confident of your PCR workspace, dealing with random PCR amplicon contamination in your overall lab space can just lead to random frustrations. It's not like it'll for sure ruin everything forever, but it can also just... be very annoying at exactly the most inopportune times. But right, if all of your stuff is going to be sent off for sequencing or analysis, then my warnings is totally moot - just be care to not accidentally open your post run tubes =P. I just got hooked by you asking about gels.