Well, the video card in my main surfing/streaming box bit the dust yesterday.

It was an ASUS PCIe with GT8500 chips from nVidia. It did the job OK but it had a fan. Every video card I've ever owned that had a fan has failed, prematurely.

I didn't buy (or build) the system. I actually took it as payment from a client. I ended up buying a fanless Gigabyte video card from Amazon for $35. It has HDMI, 1GB & 210 chips from nVidia so that should be fine for my purposes.

So, in the last month, I have had a hard drive fail, power supply fail and now the video card. I guess that's what I get for taking a used HP computer instead of cash.

I guess I'll be on this old laptop for a week.

At least my TV plays MPG, MKV, AVI and other video files from a USB stick. I can keep up with Hell on Wheels and Blacklist.

Aw man that really stinks.
I just installed a really nice video card with a fan. Hope I don't run into any issues with it down the road.

Well, many of the higher end video cards don't have a fanless option. GPUs can get really hot and some of the fanless cards have really big heatsinks, which can be a downside in a tight case.

I suppose it just depends on what you want to do with the computer. If you want to play the latest video games, you're probably stuck with a fan. If you're using the system to power your home theater, stream, surf or pretty much anything other than gaming, you're better off with a quieter, more reliable, fanless card. Of course, that's just my opinion, based on my experiences with video cards.

If you keep your fan clean and replace it at the first sign of trouble, you'll should be OK for the foreseeable future.

I did a lot of research before purchasing the video card I now have, to be sure it fit with my set-up.
It was the best match I could find. Needless to say... I wasn't thinking about whether it had a fan or not.
I try to keep things as clean as I can, but messing with the heatsink isn't something I really want to do.
It is new computer, so it's got some time yet, hopefully.

A lot depends on the environment your PC is in. Pets, smoke and dust are the main concerns. Standard maintenance would be to blow out the fans every couple of months with a can of compressed air. Doing so can really make a difference in the life of your PC.

I'm back up with a spare PC connected to the 42" TV. This will work until my replacement video card arrives. It's not as fast as my quad core unit but at least I can stream and surf now.

woo hoo. go for it. (I mean the surfing and streaming).