Buying Q9550, what to do with E8400 (except crunch)

[inCore]

I'm looking at buying a Q9550 now that it has dropped in price, to 269 Swiss Francs or 249 USD.

I currently own an E8400 that will then be replaced and I'm wondering what to do with it. It's obviously going to crunch as much as possible, you don't need to worry about that, it's just that I don't have the hardware necessary (motherboard etc.) to just place it in another system and let it run.

What do you guys suggest? I'm thinking about making a web-browsing station for my mother, her laptop is on the old side, what parts would be good for that?

I posted in this section because I figured you guys would not only be faster but also have better ideas. :p:

[karl_eller]

Use it for whatever you can find an excuse for :p: My first spare comp turned into a torrent box/file server, or you can use it as a comp for your family (install BOINC as a service, and nobody will ever know :p:), or even just have it as a bare-bones cruncher hiding in a corner somewhere.

As for hardware, probably a P45 board (gigabyte P45-UD3R?) with PC8000 or PC8500 RAM (depending on what FSB the chip hits), and if it's a PC for your mother/family, a low-end GPU (8400, 9400, HD4550, something like that). If it's a file server or similar, pretty much go for whatever GPU you can find for the cheapest. Add hard drives, cheap PSU (Vantec Ion, Antec EarthWatts, etc) and case to suit.

Eller

[inCore]

The problem with getting a P45 board is that I currently own a P35 that I was aiming to keep and getting a more expensive motherboard than the one that I own makes me feel like an idiot when we're talking about Socket 775. :p: I'm basically trying to find a way to justify spending money on a Q9550, I'm not getting an i7. I'd rather way out the whole Intel marketing campaign (and of course AMD's too) and see what the next generation offers me.

My E8400 is a huge, gargantuous, massive, ginormous craptastic piece of junk, it used to hit 3.85 GHz with 1.41 Volts, now even those days are over. :p: This is also why I don't want to waste money on a good motherboard and RAM, my CPU doesn't deserve it.