So progress on Operation Dai-Q has been great and today I have passed a new milestone. With everything cleared, I have successfully ordered the initial shipment. I'm still missing the CPU and USB 3.0 back plate which I will have to order with the CPU together. The CPU is still the Core i5 3570K and the new motherboard would be the Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD5H. After weeks of shopping around and consulting with friends and online colleagues, I have finally nailed down the final design of the rig.
The final full specification of the rig will be:
| Name | blutyphoon (Operation Dai-Q) |
| Motherboard | GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD5H |
| Processor | Intel Core i5 3570K 3.4 GHz (Ivy Bridge) |
| Graphics | XFX Radeon HD 6870 Dual Fan w/ 1 GB GDDR5 |
| Audio | Auzentech X-Raider 7.1 |
| Cooling |
Zalman CNPS8700 LED |
| Power Supply | OCZ ModXStream Pro 500W PSU |
| Memory | Patriot 4 x 4 GB DDR3-1600 CL9 (PGQ316G1600ELQK) |
| Solid State Drive | Mushkin Chronos 120 GB SATA III (MKNSSDCR120GB) |
| Hard Drive |
Western Digital Caviar Black 500 GB 7200 RPM 32 MB Cache SATA, |
| Optical Drive | ASUS DRW-24B1ST |
| Operating System | Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard (RTM) |
| Build Date |
May 2012 |
| Decommission ETA | 2017-2018 |