I'm all for giving devs a comfortable workplace -- and that comes at a cost. Big desks and comfortable chairs are a given.

We initially wanted to set up programmers with a laptop each, and add a 22" monitor and external keyboard as extra funds became available.

I remember seeing NComputing and similar virtualization hardware that allows you to share a high-powered PC with multiple users. Is this a feasible alternative for us? Assuming that each PHP dev would be coding, SVN, testing, etc and of course researching their tasks... I'm not familiar with the CPU usage of hardcore programmers. How many would be able to share an Intel Core 2 Duo or Quad, 4GB RAM, 320 GB HD? This can just be a temporary setup until we can afford to provide each with a laptop so they can telecommute -- would you recommend this? Would devs be just as productive as having their own machine? Cost-wise, the initial investment appears to be at least 60% less -- but I wouldn't be too keen if productivity would suffer.