I think the enthusiast interest has moved over to 'green' PCs... which SPCR talks about all the time, but as a means to an end rather than as the end itself. People may be googling on to places where low power is more directly addressed.

Disk drives are noisiest in my low-powered server, but I was lazy and did not come up with vibration isolation for them... even so, they are commendably quiet and I don't obsess (yet) about the few dB elevation of the noise floor in my room.

I built an Atom-based WHS system around a fanless Intel mobo... but for the lulz, ordered an inexpensive (US$10) Nexus 120mm fan when buying parts. I found the fan would start reliably at 7V and was inaudible (in my very quiet country house) at any distance greater than 10-15cm. (Compared say to my ...