I have a ridiculous system at home, and after years of building everything myself I now opt for base boxes that give me 90% of what I want.
What I'm using is a HP Z800.
It can take 192GB RAM in 12 slots (and mine does, I started on 24GB made up of very cheap 2GB sticks and upgraded later), and I also put in 2 Intel X5560 Xeon CPUs (they were new at the time and 4-core, if I did it again I'd be tempted by the X7550 which are 8-core).
The Z800 chassis is one of those zero tools systems, and best of all it is virtually silent (quiet enough that you don't hear it even when the work environment is silent).
Note: This stuff costs a bomb.
Topping out the RAM is expensive, but if you go for the smaller sticks in many slots you really get a lot of value for money.
The CPUs can cost a bomb too. But... if you're running many virtual machines (VirtualBox and Vagrant) then you shouldn't max out RAM and neglect CPU.
On motherboards, unless you're going for a server or workstation motherboard you won't get the best out of the rest of the components. You want tons of bandwidth to and from the RAM and CPU.
What else? Just use it. This type of hardware is incredible, but if it's just running Facebook then buy an iPad instead. I have nothing against people spending lots and not using it, but there's something really nice about great hardware being pushed at times.
It sounds like I've a very similar setup to the one in the article, the only differences would be that I haven't yet put an SSD in (though I do have a 3 HDD RAID for data), and I prefer 1 very high quality large monitor over several large monitors (I like a desk that isn't dominated by the computer).
What I'm using is a HP Z800.
It can take 192GB RAM in 12 slots (and mine does, I started on 24GB made up of very cheap 2GB sticks and upgraded later), and I also put in 2 Intel X5560 Xeon CPUs (they were new at the time and 4-core, if I did it again I'd be tempted by the X7550 which are 8-core).
The Z800 chassis is one of those zero tools systems, and best of all it is virtually silent (quiet enough that you don't hear it even when the work environment is silent).
Note: This stuff costs a bomb.
Topping out the RAM is expensive, but if you go for the smaller sticks in many slots you really get a lot of value for money.
The CPUs can cost a bomb too. But... if you're running many virtual machines (VirtualBox and Vagrant) then you shouldn't max out RAM and neglect CPU.
On motherboards, unless you're going for a server or workstation motherboard you won't get the best out of the rest of the components. You want tons of bandwidth to and from the RAM and CPU.
What else? Just use it. This type of hardware is incredible, but if it's just running Facebook then buy an iPad instead. I have nothing against people spending lots and not using it, but there's something really nice about great hardware being pushed at times.
It sounds like I've a very similar setup to the one in the article, the only differences would be that I haven't yet put an SSD in (though I do have a 3 HDD RAID for data), and I prefer 1 very high quality large monitor over several large monitors (I like a desk that isn't dominated by the computer).