Yeah I wish people wouldn't make such smartass replies like they did, especially when they know absolutely nothing about my life or what I even did.
Before I was forced into the SB upgrade, I "tried" to stay on the 775 bandwagon by trying to buy a new UD3P to replace my almost dead p5wdh, and it was an emergency. End result was, I was winning an auction with my high bid being $200, for a new unopened 1.6 UD3P (no warranty, no returns), and in the last 30 seconds of the auction, some desperate fool OUTBIDS me. And I didn't even notice it until the auction ended. End selling price for that board was $202.75. MSRP was $150.
Now, you tell me why any fool would pay that much money for a board, that, although unopened, MIGHT be completely DOA, and you can't return it, either! When THIS:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128478&Tpk=p67a-ud4 goes for $190 new, WITH warranty! And 2500k's are $100 CHEAPER than Q9650's!
What's worse, I saw a USED board go for over $200, also, and I even contacted the seller before the price went that high, and he told me a couple of pins were bent.
So, yeah. A fool and his money are soon parted.
There's absolutely NO reason why anyone should consider getting a new system with these parts, unless they already have everything EXCEPT the board. Using spare parts to make a nice powerful backup system is cool to have, but there's no point when a new UD3P and new Q9650 costs over $100 MORE than a NEW P67a-UD4 plus a 2500k. And a used Q9650 is as much as a 2500k. And used parts are like playing Darwin award Lottery. Before I get flamed again, the author of the famous xtremesystems P5Q Mbioses (Great bioses btw) had to buy a used UD3P from ebay, from a seller with 100% feedback, and that board had two bad RAM slots! And when Ket contacted the seller, he got ignored.
I know how some people loved the UD3P and it was one of the best motherboards ever made, rivaling the famous old Abit BH6 (and even that was superceded by the Bh6 1.1's stronger AGP 2x signaling and ability to run 150 FSB with sidebanding disabled). But time waits for no man. Ud3P+Q9600's are still a capable system to wait for socket 2011, but unless you can get a good deal on a FULLY WORKING guaranteed P45 board now, and have all the other parts already, it's not worth taking the chance on getting screwed, or throwing away money best spent elsewhere.
Still want to play roulette? Fine by me.....but it's not my money!
I rest my case.
