Saw this on another forum I visit might be useful to some;
just in case anybody missed it: http://www.servethehome.com/intel-xeon-e5-2670-v1-prices-still-plummeting/
facebook recently decommissioned a huge amount of servers, and the many pc recyclers in the states have dumped a massive load of cheap 8c/16t Intel Xeon E5-2670 V1 cpu's driving down prices to $174-$299 per cpu. And their selling like hotcakes.
do note: SR0H8 is C1 stepping. VT-x is supported but VT-d is broken in C1 SR0KX is the C2 stepping with the VT-d fix (important for virtualization pass-through... eg: GPU's)
enjoy!