Started off with my PC rig; for years, the noise from the fans was never really quiet, and replacing a few of the stock case fans with new quiet ones helped a little, but the noise was still irritating. Only today did I finally think to take a look in the BIOS at the MB fan settings. Lo and behold, the CPU fan setting was on "standard", but I decided to test out the "silent" setting.
Ho-lee-shit.
I can play games and actually hear sound effect/dialog, etc., without having to either wear headphones or crank the volume up to get past the case fan noise. Same goes for music listening; way cool. Been kicking myself for hours now for not dealing with this years ago.
Second task knocked out was replacing the lamp/bulb assembly in our 2007 Samsung DLP tv. The bulb started dying a few nights ago, to where the TV was nearly unwatchable. Found a replacement for it on Amazon for $30 yesterday, delivered today, and with 10 minutes of work (taking my time), we have what is effectively a brand-new TV. Saved us from dropping $2k+ on a new tv.
Hopefully we'll get 16 more years out of this TV before we have to finally get a new one.