A server I have spent too much money on already. The CPU wasn't that expensive, roughly $30, and the RAM was actually a pretty good deal at $65 for all 4 sticks together, only about a dollar and two cents per gigabyte. The CPU cooler was sent to me along with all of the parts from The Main Rig, so I didn't have to pay for it at all. But the motherboard... goodness, the motherboard.
So, the Asus X99-WS/IPMI is actually one of my white whales. It is THE X99 motherboard I would have chosen if I could choose any, and I did. Originally, I tried buying an Asus X99-A for about $150, but it arrived with 13 pins in the socket that were bent, and in spite of being given the go-ahead from the seller to attempt a repair, and trying two different sticks of DDR4 in a few different slots (both my 3400MHz DDR4 from my gaming desktop and the 2133 ECC memory that I purchased for this system), it never posted, and continued to throw memory errors when trying. It was returned to the seller for a full refund.
SO I went on the hunt for another motherboard. And while I could have tried some Gigabyte UD boards for cheaper, I decided to go straight for my dream board. And I did end up finding one, for about $245. And I had to import it from Pakistan to get it. It probably spent weeks on a literal boat, wrapped in three layers of styrofoam, cardboard, plastic wrap, and finally on the outside, a literal pillowcase with my address written on it.
It arrived in one piece. It posts, too. So now I have my dream board for the X99/LGA-2011-3 platform. If only I could be so lucky with finding an SR-3 Dark...
Update: March 4th, 2024
I have listed the CPU, RAM, and Motherboard for sale on eBay. I simply have no use for them that would properly take advantage of the platform correctly. They haven't sold yet but I really hope they do, these are kinda big ticket items, lol
Parts On Offer:
Price to me: $343