For example, in this scenario, you can max out performance settings since it's probably always plugged in and battery life isn't a concern, as well as lid closed action, what the power button does when pushed, and so on.īy the way, I've been doing this sort of thing for a while and am surprised at how much value you can find in laptops like this and for how cheap people are willing to sell them for. For those unfamiliar with a "Power Plan", it's basically the rules that the laptop follows with regards to power use in various scenarios that allow you to determine the point where performance versus power/battery use intersect. Also, there are some more options for how the laptop will act with lid, power button, etc in different settings if you create/alter a "Power Plan". One of the options for laptops is "Choose what closing the lid does" located in the list in the left side column. Look in the "Power Options" section of the control panel. Plastic shards in your eyes is painful.Ĭut resistant gloves if you use a utility knife to trim the access hole. Plus keeping the lid on made it easier to find a place to put the laptop.Įye protection when you are drilling - the plastic will be going all over when you drill.
I wanted to keep the keys covered, but accessible in case I needed to get to them later.
How to turn on the laptop without opening the lid. Getting the laptop to always boot directly into an external monitor.Ģ. All of the connections were easily available! I didn't think about this until I started hooking things up.ġ. Suddenly I was able to open up a 18" x 24" space on the desk!Ĥ. Small footprint - I mounted the laptop up on it's side behind some other stuff.
I had to turn it off if I wanted to record.ģ. Plus I had problems getting to my home network with XP.Ģ. For some reason I couldn't get the old PC to run Win 7. Win 7 - I could now have Win 7 in the studio. Switching over to this laptop had several advantages:ġ. A friend had an Asus laptop (Pentinum dual core, 4 GB RAM) with a missing screen that was much more powerful than the single core Althlon (3 GB RAM) that I had been using. The PC in my home recording studio was really in need of upgrading and I didn't want to spend much money to do it.
It will also make sure you won't accidentally shut the lid and toss the laptop in your backpack while it's still running, which can generate a lot of dangerous heat.This is one of those easy mods that just presented itself. This allows the closed laptop to continue functioning while it is hooked up to a power source, so you can use it as a desktop alternative without having to deal with the device itself. The "When I close the lid" section presents a drop-down menu with four options-Sleep, Hibernate, Shut down, and Do Nothing-based on the laptop's power state: on battery or plugged in.įor example, you could set it to Do Nothing when the laptop is plugged in, but select the Sleep option when the computer is on battery power. You can also type "Lid" into the Start menu to immediately find this menu. Navigate to Hardware and Sound > Power Options > Choose what closing the lid does. When I click menu, it will show a blank box. No matter what active screen I choose on my windows bar, it will remain as showing desktop. Open the Start menu and search for Control Panel. When accessing it while the lid is closed, most of the screens become invisible.
You can change this behavior in any version of Windows with a simple settings tweak inside the old pre- Windows 10 Control Panel. Once set, your laptop can then work as if you are using it as a desktop computer with an external monitor. To achieve this, there are some settings you need to configure on Windows 10. (You could use your laptop as a second monitor, of course, but that takes up precious desk space you may not have.) Choose What Closing the Lid Does You can actually close the lid of your laptop but still be able to use it with an external monitor. This isn't ideal if you want to fold up your laptop and hide it out of sight while "docked" on your workspace. There's one problem: by default, Windows puts your computer to sleep when you close the lid.