Laptop as Music Server - Wear?

I like the concept of the Fit-PC2. I wish one could put OS X on it. That's where my music is now and that's what my less-than-ultra-computer-savvy wife deigns to use. I assume that's not an option...

I was using an MSI Wind Nettop for about 6 months(both the single core and dual core version). The Wind worked fine once I changed the stock fan for a quieter unit. However, under full load it did tend to get a bit noisy. Two reasons for changing to the Fit was the size (think phonebook) and power draw (18 watts under load for single core, 22 watts for dual core). Most people wouldn't think twice about 22 watt power draw but I'm trying to as green as possible. I guesstimate that the Wind was costing about $6 a month to leave on all the time; the Fit cost less than $2. The big advantage the Wind has over the Fit is ram; the Wind can be fitted with up to 2GB and the Fit is limited to 1GB.

One of the Poster above mentioned E-SATA. I've only seen E-SATA on a few top of the line Gaming "Laptops" which are way overkill for a music server. While E-SATA is a lot faster than USB2.0 it's not required for serving music. The one place that you're really going to notice the difference is at backup time. Backing up my music library on my main PC using E-SATA takes under two hours. Backing up using USB2.0 takes 12-14 hours.

It's been a long time since I've seen a laptop computer with a PCI slot. However, many laptops have PCMCIA slots and E-SATA cards are available. A lot of the newer laptops/notebooks are using the smaller Express Card slots which are smaller than PCMCIA. Express Card E-SATA cards are available.

"Backing up my music library on my main PC using E-SATA
takes under two hours. Backing up using USB2.0 takes 12-14
hours."

This is good to know! Just ordered a new 1 TB eSATA/USB
drive ($70 after $20 rebate) to use with my system. I have a
little more than 400 Gbs of Music and Movies that I need to
transfer to it. I plan to use it with eSATA port instead of
USB 2.0.

I'm hoping it helps with my streaming of movies more than
music. Since the movie files are massive by comparison, some
as large as 8 Gbs! Just 43 minutes of Blue Planet Blu ray on
hard drive is 5 Gbs!

That Fit PC is one neat little unit! That would make a great
little music server. Just not enough processing power for Hi
def movies in my opinion.

With laptop price under $500, I don't think cost is a concern.

As for data transfer rate, I have my music stored in NAS and retrieve them wireless using 802.11g and still fast enough. In fact, I can upload/download music files simultaneously w/o issue.

Storing files in NAS has the added benefit of automatic backup. Buffalo NAS has RAID and I prefer having redundancy than larger space, I don't have to worry about HD crashing. Also, I can put the noise making HD away from my listening room.

I wouldn't use a laptop to STORE files, but you could use one as your interface, server. Laptop components run too hot and are too unreliable for long term file storage. You need a desktop or NAS for that, preferably with enterprise grade 3.5" drives and ventilation. Also, if your laptop requires replacement it would be a chore to retrieve your library.

The best solution will be to have a small silent, solid state drive based device (HTPC, notebook, tablet, ect) in the listening room (the drives are too small and expensive to be of much use right now) and then a network attached drive or drives for the files.