And in yet another question brought to you by a Google search…. Can you set an HP slimline computer on its side?
Yes.
How anticlimactic of me.
My Slimline 7220n has rubber pads on both the bottom and on one side of it, so clearly it was intended to be used either way. I have mine set on its side right now, sitting under my monitor, in fact.
Anymore it doesn’t matter whether you lay a computer vertically or horizontally, other than needing to make sure that it can still get adequate ventilation. When you’re choosing which side to lay the computer on, the ports should all be closest to your desk or table surface. If the writing on the back of the computer is upside down, flip it over.
If you’re really paranoid, go to a frame store or craft store and get some of the stick-on rubber feet that are meant to stick on be back of picture frames to keep them from scraping on walls and stick those on the computer’s new underside to elevate it a little bit. Then it will be able to get some airflow on all four sides.
Yes, you used to have to do a low-level format on your hard drive (an ancient 1980s ritual made obsolete by IDE hard drives) if you flipped the case around, but that’s not true anymore. Any drive made since the mid 1990s, at the very latest, can adjust to a change of position without hurting it. I only bring this up because some people may have vague memories of this. Hard drives are much more precise and sophisticated today, so they can adjust to changes of environment, unlike some of their 1980s predecessors.
Glaurung_quena
/ March 30, 2011The only caveat with putting any computer on its side that I’m aware of is that a lot of optical drives don’t work well (or at all) if the drive tray is vertical. Obviously not an issue if the optical drive is one of those notebook-style ones where you clip the disk onto a spindle.
Dave Farquhar
/ March 31, 2011Good point. In the case of a Slimline, the optical drive ends up horizontal if you place it on the side. So with this particular line, that’s not an issue.