A compute device for operation in a rack of a data center includes a substrate, a solid state drive array, a fan array, and a plurality of physical resources. The components of the compute device are arranged on the substrate to prevent or reduce shadowing of heat-producing physical resources, such as a processor, by other heat-producing physical resources relative to an airflow generated by the fan array. To do so, ruler solid state drives are used to facilitate positioning of the fan array toward a front edge of the substrate.