ASUS Z8PE-D12 Bundle Dual Xeon L5640 48GB RAM MIO-Audio 892, IO Shield, E5504 for Sale

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ASUS Z8PE-D12 Bundle Dual Xeon L5640 48GB RAM MIO-Audio 892, IO Shield, E5504 For Sale

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ASUS Z8PE-D12 Bundle Dual Xeon L5640 48GB RAM MIO-Audio 892, IO Shield, E5504:
$110.00

This is a high-performance workstation bundle centered on the dual-socket ASUS Z8PE-D12 motherboard. This setup served as my primary workstation for several years. It has been a reliable workhorse for multi-threaded engineering tasks and high-uptime.

Detailed Component List

Motherboard: ASUS Z8PE-D12 (SSI EEB Form Factor, Intel 5520 Chipset)
CPUs (Installed): 2x Intel Xeon L5640 (6-Core/12-Thread each, 2.26 GHz (2.80 GHz Turbo), 60W Low Power TDP)
RAM (Installed): 48GB (6x 8GB) Micron DDR3-1333 PC3-10600R ECC Registered
Audio Card: ASUS MIO-Audio 892 (7.1 High-Definition Audio)
Cooling: 2x Dual Tower Heatsinks (Detached for shipping safety)
Accessories: Original ASUS I/O Shield included
Bonus Spares: 2x Intel Xeon E5504 CPUs (4 Cores / 4 Threads each, 2.00 GHz, 80W TDP, included as tested, known-good backups)

Usage & Performance

I ran this system for years in a specialized workstation role. It proved exceptionally stable.

The L5640 CPUs are the "sweet spot" for this platform; they provide 12 cores and 24 threads of total compute while only drawing 60W each. This allowed me to keep the workstation remarkably quiet and cool in my office environment while still having enough horsepower for heavy multi-tasking.

Mac Pro Inspired Heritage:I originally based this specific hardware selection on the Apple Mac Pro (Mid-2010/2012 "Westmere") architecture. Like the classic 5,1 Mac Pro towers of that era, this build utilizes the Intel 5520 chipset and LGA 1366 sockets to provide a stable, industrial-grade platform. By using an ASUS workstation board instead of a proprietary Mac logic board, I was able to retain the same high-density compute and ECC memory reliability while gaining the flexibility of a standard SSI EEB form factor and a modern BIOS.

The Benefit of the MIO-Audio 892 Card

Unlike standard consumer boards, this ASUS server-grade motherboard does not have integrated audio on the back panel. I am including the proprietary MIO-Audio 892 card, which is essential for turning this into a true workstation.

Noise Isolation: The MIO card is a discrete daughterboard that sits in a dedicated slot, physically isolating the audio signals from motherboard EMI. This results in significantly cleaner 7.1 surround sound.
Zero PCIe Impact: Because it uses the specialized MIO header, it provides high-quality audio without consuming any of your four PCIe x16 slots—critical if you plan on running multiple GPUs or high-speed NVMe controllers.

Bonus Backup Inventory

I am including a second pair of CPUs: the Intel Xeon E5504s that originally came with the board. While the L5640s are currently installed for their superior performance, I’ve kept these E5504s as "tested spares." Having a known-good backup set is invaluable for troubleshooting or as a baseline for system testing.

Shipping & Setup Notes

Safety First: To prevent motherboard damage, the heavy dual-tower heatsinks will be detached and wrapped separately in the box.
Socket Protection: The L5640 CPUs and 48GB of RAM will remain installed to protect the 1,366 fragile pins in each socket and to ensure the DIMM slots stay clean.
Workstation Ready: With the included I/O shield and the MIO-Audio card, this is a "complete" kit ready to be dropped into an SSI EEB compatible chassis.

This bundle represents a proven, high-durability platform for a budget homelab, a specialized TrueNAS build, or a retro-workstation project. I am only liquidating it to consolidate my hardware footprint.