In a recent post, we talked about upgrading the HP Slimline desktop. While doing this I wasn’t able to find good instructions on how to take the thing apart to get access to the RAM and HD, so I decided to write my own.

To get to the RAM and the HD there is on step that gets in the way, everything else after that is simple.

To start off, you need to take off the case housing. 3 simple screws as pictured below and then slide off the side panel.

This is where it got a little tricky. To remove the HP expand bay, you need to pull the black tab up while slideing the whole piece to the left, once you get that out, its pretty easy to do the rest.

To remove the CD-ROM to get to the RAM slots, after you remove the HP expansion bay slot, there is a black screw. remove then..

you need to push the tab on the top outwards and then push the back of the cd-rom to gain enough access/room

To remove/replace the HD:
unscrew the screw in the left hand corner and then unlatch the HD lock, after that unplug and pull the drive out.

I went a step further and replaced the video card. After reading some more about the board/power supply, i have come to the conclusion that you can only replace the CPU with one that is 65watts. I have been hearing rumors that anything more might blow out the board. Upgrade the cpu with caution.

End results of total upgrade on my PC:

Begining Spec:
AMD x2 5000+
400gb HD
2GB Ram
GeForce 7260 on board Video card (Shared Ram)

Updated Spec
AMD x2 5200+
500gb HD
4GB DDR2 667 RAM
PNY GeForce 8600 GT VCG86512D2GXWB 512mb Video Card (dual outs)

I also ended up punching out a whole in the back and adding another video port so that it could run dual monitors. Pictures below.

[Show as slideshow]

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