http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... bwind%2bpc

Looks like it only has one (small) fan, which is hopefully swappable for something quieter if necessary.

Supports desktop hard drive, but seems like it could be very quiet if you put a notebook hard drive in there.

Yeah it actually looks pretty nice. I'd sort of like to get one to use as a file server (mainly backups using rsync.)

I'd love to see spcr get one of these and one of the eee boxes in and test them.

I saw this in PC Pro, the power consumption was good, but the performance sucked, at 0.3 on their benchmarks, a typical AMD dual core machine was more like 1, and the highest performing SFF (which actually used about the same power) was 1.49 (which is fast).

I suppose for a little file server 0.3 doesn't matter, but why not just use a smart NAS?

Because if you know what you are doing, Ubuntu provides a much more secure, flexible and manageable NAS solution then any of the appliances on the market.

Of course, if you're not a linux guy---then it's not necessarily a good choice.

I have a MSI Wind PC, and I love it. I have a 120gb 2.5" HDD, 1GB SO-DIM Ram, and Windows XP Home SP3 running on it. The MSI Wind PC sits directly in front of me, acting as a stand for my LCD. The fan and HD are audible, but does not bother me at all. It is a big change from my Antec Solo with the 120mm rear FAN and 80mm front FAN on low, and Nvidia GeForce 8800GT.

Windows Vista with 1gb RAM was painfully, painfully slow with this system. XP is quick, although it can still be a bit slow at times when opening up more than 2 web pages and having things like an AVG Anti-Virus Free running in the back ground. I can watch DVDs fine with no slow down, but 720 and 1020 stuff does not have acceptable frame rates.

The MSI Wind PC makes for the perfect MS Office, mp3 listening, IMing, and web surfing system.

The best, most succinct description of the stengths and weaknesses of an Atom-based system that I have seen to-date. The netbook/nettop concept does have merit.

I'd guess it would be a bit quicker with Ubuntu Linux (faster & no AV needed), significantly quicker yet with a lighter Linux, but still very weak with multimedia. (I do my web surfing on Ubuntu with a 900 MHz/512 MB AMD Duron with comparable/slightly better performance.)