If able to sell off current Z68+2500k, worth it upgrading to Ivy (gaming purposes)?

[BonzaiDuck]

Well, as a few respondents to this thread pointed out, the benefits of HW over SB in terms of gaming performance are negligible, which means I won't see much of a benefit on a relatively expensive upgrade. Added to that is the fact that a HW dual core and micro-ATX motherboard are going to run my dad in the order of €100, which is probably less than I could sell my own kit for anyway, and which will suit his needs perfectly (low power consumption, compact form factor).
In the end it there don't appear to be any benefits to this, for neither him nor me.

I keep telling myself the same thing. For a good part of the last decade, my building/modding projects were deliberate. I'd start compiling the list, research the processor and chipset options as I tried to save the money. Or -- I'd charge it up on my Newegg "Preferred" account with prospects of paying no interest with a year to pay it off -- giving me time to "budget and save" while I "borrowed" the parts from the Egg.

I always build systems for the fam-damn-ily. Or -- I give them "hand-me-downs" as you'd considered doing with the 2500K system. But with those machines which I built from scratch for Mom and Bro, I found budget mATX motherboards for < $100, boxed processors for the same price. For a long time, I modded old IBM-beige ATX computer cases from the '90s and repainted them -- still one of those left.

Really depends on the beneficiary's needs and wants. I just can't see moving up to Haswell with this 2600K monster I have now. Go figure! It's been running nonstop for two years, four months!

Because I got elected to be Treasurer of a condominium association, I finally had justification to put all my property/real-estate business on a separate machine with separate e-mail account etc. I had a spare E8400 system and an NVidia 780i motherboard, spent $50 to double the memory. You can see the CPU usage go way up for some operations, but it's more than I need for that purpose. Also -- a nominal "Schedule E" tax deduction. It's my SKYPE machine -- nice Logitech web-cam -- for condo "board" meetings. That nails down the tax angle, since I live 3,000 miles from my property, and couldn't attend board meetings otherwise in the flesh.

It's a new world. Definitely.