Stipes, have you considered dual E5-1620's ?

You'd get 8 cores, 3,6 Ghz for 600$.

I'm happy with my single.

E5-16xx is for single-processor systems only (no QPI).

E5-1620 is basically just an i7-3820 with ECC memory support (and less overclockability).


Btw, as for calling other posters "clowns", hey, I think we're all bozos on this bus <honk>!

Although, to be accurate, the clown college was up the trail in Sarasota, not in Ft Myers... 

I have the E5-2690 2.9 8c. I can add another if I want down the line, but this single is doing everything great. And the only reason I put another 16gb ram in was because of its price, otherwise the 20gb I already had in it was really enough.  So I have one CPU with 36gb ram upgradeable to 64 and can double that with another CPU/64gb depending on future needs. The price is starting to come down on this particular chip, so I will just keep an eye on the market for now. But, someone just turned me on to the idea of using Process Lasso to optimize core usage, so that's what I'm exploring/researching at the moment.

Goddard

Btw, as for calling other posters "clowns", hey, I think we're all bozos on this bus <honk>!

Although, to be accurate, the clown college was up the trail in Sarasota, not in Ft Myers... 

I very much agree.