[Silent Warrior]

Hey, I kinda ran into some... rather more interesting deal than I'd anticipated. Sorry if I sound less polite than is warranted, but I'm sort of in a hurry both as I'm typing this (need to be off to school soon) and seeing as I'd hoped to get back to the seller yesterday. I expect this topic should've outlived its usefulness long before the week ends.

Now, what I've stumbled across is an LGA1156-motherboard (yes, I know LGA1155 is right around the corner and will kick ass all over the place; no, I don't really care ), an i7-860, 4 Gb DDR3-1600 (Corsair XMS3 something or other), together with an aftermarket cooler. The motherboard is what I'm most undecided about - it's mini-ATX, and my chassis isn't; I feel conservative (ATX-chassis demands ATX-boards, yo), but the seller assures me there won't be a problem due to the form-factor. Besides that, it looks ok in my eyes. There's only one PCI-slot, where my soundcard will go, but lots of PCIe-slots where I can stick an NIC if the built-in chip doesn't like Linux. The CPU is the same speed as what I had meant to buy new if I'd go with an Intel-config - i5-760 - but I honestly don't feel I need HT at all, what with all the quad-core monkey-business.
The second most serious uncertainty-generator: The price for the whole pack is about what I'd pay for a new i5-760, fair, not lavish, motherboard and not so expensive RAM, PLUS I'd get a cooler.

What should I do, educated majority?

[Rodo]

Used equipment?

I'm guessing no warranty right?, if so: do you trust the guy?

[MR_T3D]

the performance hit, in terms of gaming, won't really matter unless you care about 70 vs. 58 FPS.
I'm thinking new, the warranty and stuff outweigh the cons of some performance.

[Silent Warrior]

Rodo: I confess I know nothing about any warranty. It's still not that difficult to find information about the motherboard at the manufacturer's site, so the system shouldn't be that old. But this isn't just any shady garage-deal, this came from a public overclockers' forum. Perhaps not quite the dignity of Tom's Hardware, but probably as near as we Swedes can manage. Objectively... I have no concrete reason at all to trust him, no. And is that different from Ebay or 3rd party Amazon-sellers? (It might be the place to point out that I haven't been scammed online since the whole trade-things-online was in its infancy in the '90s.) I just figure he wouldn't want to lose face by scamming - he probably means to deliver the goods in person, too. (Yup, Sweden's that small - and he has business going to and fro the town where I live.)

Mr T3D: I don't really fuss over performance - and it's not like I play the hottest fanciest latest heaviest bling-laden shooter of the day. Witcher 2 and NWN2 are the biggest concerns - though X-Plane 10 looms on the horizon. (Bah, just stick a passable GPU in there when all is said and done!) I get what you're saying about warranty, but ideology is a factor. Meaning I'd like to AVOID buying new, if possible. And here you find me, today.

But, I think I'll go for the CPU and RAM, see if I can get one of the coolers. Passing up the motherboard.

[Rodo]

Well warranty is what makes me feel better about what I'm about to buy, but if you don't have any problem with that then go ahead, the CPU + Mem combo would be a good buy with and without warranty.

[Silent Warrior]

Aaaaand... seller contacted, I suppose I'll hear from him later today. (... Duh. ) Excitement! First Intel-purchase since socket 478 was the latest and RDRAM a viable option! (Well, I guess I shouldn't count my chickens before they're in the roost...)
Now to investigate ways to have this topic closed or deleted.

[MR_T3D]

I bet that comment is enough that when one of the mods peeks in, they'll lock it for you.

inb4 lock!

[Rodo]

Normally they don't get locked, admins just wait for them to be buried under tons of other newer threads and then eventually be forgoten.
So stop looking, and good on you man, nice rig you're getting