a little worried about noise
 

Ok - I'm not much of an auto-expert at all. I bought my first (gently) used 01 A6 2.7T in 11/05. Me and the car just survived it's first upstate NY winter...(-15F to -20F) not uncommon. Anywho, I noticed that the car just sounded "louder" at some point a few months ago. Nothing terribly alarming, but

1) I don't think it's gradual "old age" (or else I probably wouldn't have noticed it)
2) My girlfriend (who hadn't seen the car since our days a year ago in Texas) thought that it seemed louder

...makes me a little nervous.

The nearest dealer is 3 hours (one way) from me. And I hate to drive 6 hours roundtrip for nothing - but I am curious if this is anything or not. Here's what I can say....

1) The car hasn't lost any noticeable performance or fuel efficiency since I've owned it.
2) It just turned over 60K in the last few months
3) No indication or warnings from the instrument panel
4) The sound isn't a "noise" that I can describe really (it's not a clicking or a pitched sound, don't hear any difference at different engine speeds either) It just noisier inside the cabin - kinda another model car that would have less soundproofing.
5) It's been less than 3,000 miles since my last oil change (but just about 5 months....) synthetic of course.
6) During the oil change - the dealer said that there was a little oil on the turbo's or something so they replaced some seals/gaskets or something.
7) The car is still under factory warranty - for about 4 more months.
8) I'm an idiot and haven't really checked the oil level lately, but again - no indication from the instrument panel that there's a problem.

I was planning on taking it to the dealer sometime in the next 6 weeks (since it's so far away and I have to plan a whole day around it) should I plan to do it sooner or not drive it very much until then?

Also, would a dealer be more or less inclined to do a thorough inspection and fix anything when the car is approaching the end of the warranty - or do they have vested interest fixing stuff when the customer is paying for it all?

Thanks for any tips...hope there isn't too much bad news...

Joshua