This is a question that was brought up and i am no longer sure of what to reply with.   I have a user at the office who wants to "rename" their laptop.  This the the "Name" that shows up under advanced system properties <Computer Name>.   This name is not used anywhere that I know of in our Network in a specific manner and I would have no problem telling them to go ahead.

But I am no longer certain that there might be some link to this arbitrary name in a way that it w would create issues with their Microsoft Licenses and Office 365 setup.   I told them to wait until i could post this message to get more input.  Better safe than sorry.

Can anyone tell me if there is any reason why this one place should remain exactly as it wwas when the laptop was first turned on and that name was entered?  As I said, it has no direct meaning to me, the local network,  or anyone else here but I am not so sure that it is not already in some way linked to their Windows 8.1 licensing and Office 365 licensing.

Hi Questorfla,

Based on what I know, Computer name is not related with the licenses.

Computers on a network need unique names so they can identify and communicate with each other. Most computers come with default names, but you can usually change them. It's best to keep computer names short (fifteen characters or less) and easily recognizable.

We recommend that you use only Internet-standard characters in the computer name. The standard characters are the numbers 0 through 9, uppercase and lowercase letters from A through Z, and the hyphen (-) character. Computer names can't consist entirely of numbers, nor can they contain spaces. The name also can't contain special characters, such as the following:

< > ; : "  * + = \ | ? ,

More information, you could check:

Change your computer name

More on: Computer Names.

If nay further help needed, please feel free to post back.

Best regards