CPU Upgrade Question

Hey guys, I have a question concerning a CPU upgrade a friend of mine wants to do but I'm not sure if it'll work without issue.  A friend of mine built a system awhile back with the Z68 chipset as its base.  The motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-Z68A-D3H-B3 rev. 1.3. CPU is an intel core i3, kingston hyper x 4GB kit, radeon 6670 video card, 64 GB SSD, 500 GB HDD, Corsair 500W PS. The other day he mentioned about upgrading his CPU to a Core i5 or i7 chip, expanding on his memory, a new video card, bigger SSD etc,. But than mentioned that he seen that micro center was selling a Xeon E3-1270 processor for about $162, and asked me if its worth picking it up as an upgrade for his system.  I told him that I'd get back to him; now here's my question. I know that the xeon chips are server/workstation processors that usually use ECC memory; however I know that the board he has uses lists support for Xeon E3 processor. My question is this, can he use that chip on his board with regular desktop memory without any major issues? As I understand the socket 1155 Xeon E3 chips are similar to their desktop counterparts, with some minor differences obviously. Thanks for the responses in advance its greatly appreciated.

The mentioned Xeon cpu is supported on that motherboard with the bios version F13.  It comes down to the motherboard requiring ECC ram and not the cpu & this z68 board does not support ECC memory so just use existing ram (just add another 4gb of ram so there'll be 8gb - matched if possible). Having just 4gb will be a substantial bottleneck in the coming times.

I'd put the most money into the gpu - something like a gtx760 would be a good match to the psu and remainder of the build.

if the cpu is supported by the motherboard then sure totaly no problem. Memory is not somthing to botter about, ECC memory (error checking correcting) is used alot in workstations. But you can run a Xeon with non ecc memory without any problem. Just make sure that the Xeon version cpu is supported with the motherboard. and you will be absolutly fine.

Is it worth it? in my opinnion yes it could be worth it, its a bit depending, on his needs. If he does gaming and productivity, then it could definitely be worth it. the Xeon is basicly an i7, with a locked multiplier and NO graphics on board. But it does have Hyperthreading and VT-D support. The only con side is that it has a locked multiplier, so its not realy that overclockable!! thats something to keep in mind.

If he only play games, and just some casual stuff, and he like to overclock, then an i5-3570K would be a better choice, for him.

Grtz Angel ☺