This kind of proposal has been cropping up for over 15 years now and always end up not really working out. We actually looked seriously into this as an option when we moved into a new office and two major issues were immediate dealbreakers:
1. The depreciation cost of new hardware made this economically a no go. With second hand hardware, there was some number fiddling you could do to make it kind of work until it required any kind of human intervention whatsoever, then the labor costs dwarf the savings.
2. Computer enclosures are not designed to minimize the db/W/$. Low noise computers are generally achieved by reducing the power of parts and using expensive materials. High wattage computers tend to be extremely noisy. We couldn't be having a noisy heating system in our workplace, distracting everybody.
Doesn't depreciation apply equally to servers in dedicated datacenters? I think the bigger issue is the cost of going in and reparing/replacing parts when they break.
1. The depreciation cost of new hardware made this economically a no go. With second hand hardware, there was some number fiddling you could do to make it kind of work until it required any kind of human intervention whatsoever, then the labor costs dwarf the savings.
2. Computer enclosures are not designed to minimize the db/W/$. Low noise computers are generally achieved by reducing the power of parts and using expensive materials. High wattage computers tend to be extremely noisy. We couldn't be having a noisy heating system in our workplace, distracting everybody.