Perhaps another idea? There is a mini-itx made by Intel that is inexpensive and fan-less (look for Intel d201gly2, there might even be Atom CPU upgrade by now). Can be used in combination with an Ati Remote Wonder II remote, which is based on radio, not IR, and goes through walls (the remote worked for me until a driver change in Ubuntu 8.10 which somehow caused a conflict). I don't have exact numbers, but I spent in the order of $200-$230 (board, memory, harddisk, 2nd soundcard, riser card, remote, picoPSU).
There are reviews with more
details of the board and for me it was an easy solution for a larger audioPC-headphone setup (
pic,
pic).