Thought I'd start here as none of the existing Hardware forums seemed to match well, though perhaps the overclocking one might have the most modding talent around at any one time.
My wife wants to venture into computing (right now she's still scared of the mouse!) I've built a few units, nothing special, but for this one I'm envisioning a "quiet PC." To wit:
- Minimal, if any fan noise (fanless?)
- Unit can stay on all the time with quick wake-up
- Minimal power draw when not in use - i.e, hard drives stop spinning, stuff like that.
The unit will be in our kitchen, but away from the stove! I can custom build a case or buy one (searches haven't been all that productive so far).
I had looked at the Sony and Gateway "computer behind the monitor" machines at Best Buy (she liked the idea of those at least), but these are expensive and probably not one you could readily swap new components into if need be. Plus, as I noted, "quiet" is a big deal, I couldn't really determine that in the store. In addition to hardware issues, operating system capabiliities and utilities for standby/hibernation, etc, may be issues as well.
Hence my post here: requesting that a moderator move it to what they deem an appropriate section of the forum. Or perhaps we need an new "System Builder" section where we can discuss overall system design, compatibility, etc.
I've never really gone this way before- at work, noise/power consumption isn't an issue, and my home unit is set up for flight simulation, so I'm going for all the speed I can get out of it (though I'd like to quite that beauty down a bit as well...).
Thanks all. Let me know where this is going!
DangerousTom
(who knows just enough to be...)
ETA: Searching for "Silent PC's" yield better results. Still wondering if a forum for overall system build might be useful.