So Fry's has an i7 and corresponding 1366 motherboard, for $160
i7-960 $150 http://www.frys.com/product/6272550
MSI Big Bang XPOWER X58 $10 http://www.frys.com/product/6349911
Is this worth it or is the i7-960 just way too outdated to be viable in a gaming build?
For the price, you really can't beat it! The bad part is that the socket is dead, so it will be a one off. If you're going for gaming make sure the chip can handle a strong video card. For the performance it shouldn't have any major bottlenecks on the Graphics Card. Since it's an MSI board, try to stick with MSI graphics cards so that it will have special strings for temperature read outs. A lot of branded boards do that.
Hmm well I won't be doing anything super intense like Crysis or anything, I'll be running this setup along side an ASUS GTX 560 DCII TOP, if I ever update it won't be so bad to just ditch the $10 motherboard. Thanks for the help.
Dude that motherboard cannot be really 10 dollars, thats over a 200+ dollar motherboard. I am so fucking pissed off it's not at any of my local stores to pick up!
you can pick up 1366 xeons for like 30 bucks on OCN, if you're into a cheap ass PC coming from nothing that's the thing to pick up
They could pay you to buy it, but if it's unavalible then it doesn't matter. Would be a great deal though