[pHaestus]

I find myself just using my notebook with battery power when I want to work on a computer in silence. IBMs turn the hdd down and put the CPU and GPU into lower speed mode when on battery so the thing doesnt generate enough heat for the fans to spin up. And it takes up very little space and can move along with me. I get about 4.5 hours on battery which is enough for most evenings of surfing/working on site/whatever.

My main file server PC's never gonna be silent because it has 3 big hdds in it. I care more about my data than my noise levels so I have Panaflos blowing over hdds. My gaming PC also won't ever be silent because I overclock the crap out of it. Oh and I also have a 22" CRT monitor on that box so if I did get the PC completely silent then that would start annoying me.

I guess what I am saying is that it DOES make good sense to have a non-overclocked silent PC for day to day use and "normal noise level" PCs for gaming and file serving. However, I think it's sort of silly to use desktops for this when such nice high end notebooks are available.