I bought this to hold an aquarium which isn't the standard use. It's very sturdy and looks very nice, but there is no polite way to say it: the knobs are nasty. They're coming right off with new ones from Home Depot. Why spoil a nice piece of furniture with disgusting knobs? Marketing mystery there. The drawers pull from either side but do not have a metal track. For my use, that doesn't matter in the least, but someone using those drawers daily might find it annoying. (Blue line is the top of the invisible aquarium.)