if you want this motherboard, it is unbelievably easy. it's on sale for 30€, including the Xeon CPU it needs: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005008826220177.html
note that it is made to a price point and it is barebones: it has no USB3, for example. but on the flipside, you can split its PCIe x16 graphics port four ways and connect six PCIe Gen3 NVMe drives to it (plus some SATA)
@whitequark@social.treehouse.systems✧✦Catherine✦✧ In Shenzhen, early Xeon CPUs are perhaps the least valuable PC parts in the entire electronics market (especially the low-end spectrum). If I give a Xeon to someone for free, they may see it as an insult or hoax if they're impatient (as they're notorious among gamers for the low IPC). They're something that PC fans are willing to get for making a cool keychain by punching a hole on the interposer. It's truly cyberpunk, the Blade Runner world where a random guy in a slum does biotech and DNA design. So, of course, you get one or two Xeon for free if you buy an X99 mobo.
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