[MaximumPC] Keep calm and carry on - Intel says sockets remain in "forseeable future"

[Makaveli]

Great, sound's good to me. More cores and higher freq with higher TDPs, I can handle it.

You sound like you like slow stuff?

Yep gotta pay to play!!

he must be new.

Glad we will continue to see more sockets cpu's for the near future. That alone would take alot of the fun out of what we do on this site.

 

[Idontcare]

Not to be chicken little, but Intel statement is as vague as it can be. One, foreseeable future is open to interpretation, and two, it still leaves possibility that only the E lineup will remain socket based while main stream stuff will be BGA.

So basically we still do not know anything.

If they intended to talk out of one side of their mouth while doing something else in the meantime then surely they would have simply elected to not say anything at all. Right? They gain absolutely nothing by misleading the market, so why would they mislead anyone and set expectations falsely?

Its not like they are saying IPC won't decrease or something like that where we could see them having a conflict of interest...but who is going to change their purchasing decisions NOW on the basis of a rumor of socketless cpu's that even if true wouldn't be coming to market for 2+ yrs yet?

There is just no rational basis for the rumor, or the fear. But the human reaction to it was timeless nevertheless. Somebody out there pulled off a good one this time, punked quite a few people.

 

[IntelEnthusiast]

“Intel remains committed to the growing desktop enthusiast and channel markets, and will continue to offer socketed parts in the LGA package for the foreseeable future for our customers and the Enthusiast DIY market,” Intel spokesman Daniel Snyder told Maximum PC. “However, Intel cannot comment on specific long-term product roadmap plans at this time, but will disclose more details later per our normal communication process.”

Now since the enthusiast space and the channel space (these are the local computer stores from Microcenter to Blue Skies computing) are very different markets for us I would have to say that it looks like it is not going to be only the high end enthusiast computers also lower end system that may be build for my parents.

 

[Charles Kozierok]

There is just no rational basis for the rumor, or the fear.

This board was filled with people making arguments in favor of this move that sounded reasonable enough. Including yourself, I believe. So I'm not sure you can really say that there was "no rational basis" for the rumor. It's not like people were saying Kim Kardashian was about to be made CTO of Intel or something.

 

[NTMBK]

Have you guys listened to Anandtech Podcast #12? Anand himself seems pretty convinced that Intel are going to BGA at _some_ point. The main question is when, as far as I can tell.

 

[Idontcare]

This board was filled with people making arguments in favor of this move that sounded reasonable enough. Including yourself, I believe. So I'm not sure you can really say that there was "no rational basis" for the rumor. It's not like people were saying Kim Kardashian was about to be made CTO of Intel or something.

All I could do was make a reasonable case for why such a change, in the unlikely event that it were to actually transpire, would not be as bad as some were making it out to be.

We've seen these "the consequences will never be the same" panics in other technology areas as well - I remember when LCDs were beginning to displace CRTs and it was going to be the deathknell of PC gaming because of the lag. Or the onset of SSDs replacing HDDs, right now we are supposed to be up to our eyeballs in dead SSDs that failed because of limited endurance, or so you'd believe if you paid attention to the fear mongers in the memory and storage forums some 3-4 yrs ago.

Getting back to BGA and Broadwell, I made no attempt to justify or rationalize why such a change would be made in the first place beyond the philosophical umbrella argument of "who are we, the non-artists, to tell the artist what color they ought to be using in their painting?" It was their innovative thinking that gave us our toys in the firstplace, we certainly didn't do it ourselves, and yet we reserve the right to second-guess their vision for our technological future? That would be a bit of self-hubris, wouldn't it?

Regardless, I posted on multiple occasions that I had zero confidence in the rumor given that it was being put forth for broadwell (versus Haswell or Skylake) and it made zero sense in that context alone. From that perspective, the rest of the discussion was one of pure Gedanken-type conversation, debate over a purely hypothetical quandary.

 

[Charles Kozierok]

All I could do was make a reasonable case for why such a change, in the unlikely event that it were to actually transpire, would not be as bad as some were making it out to be.

Seemed to me you were actually arguing that it would be beneficial -- the comments basically implying that those in opposition were luddites --not merely "not as bad", but perhaps I read too much into it.

We've seen these "the consequences will never be the same" panics in other technology areas as well - I remember when LCDs were beginning to displace CRTs and it was going to be the deathknell of PC gaming because of the lag. Or the onset of SSDs replacing HDDs, right now we are supposed to be up to our eyeballs in dead SSDs that failed because of limited endurance, or so you'd believe if you paid attention to the fear mongers in the memory and storage forums some 3-4 yrs ago.

Yes, and we've also seen cases where people said a new technology was being introduced for the wrong reasons and would have a major negative impact -- and they were right.

Rambus, anyone?

It was their innovative thinking that gave us our toys in the firstplace, we certainly didn't do it ourselves, and yet we reserve the right to second-guess their vision for our technological future? That would be a bit of self-hubris, wouldn't it?

Their innovative thinking without our dollars and support would mean nothing. Customers are an important part of the equation, and smart companies know that. It's not hubristic to tell a corporation that you think it is going in the wrong direction.

Regardless, I posted on multiple occasions that I had zero confidence in the rumor given that it was being put forth for broadwell (versus Haswell or Skylake) and it made zero sense in that context alone.

I wasn't trying to say anything about how likely you or anyone else thought this move was to transpire. Only saying that the idea is not outlandish at all, or you wouldn't be able to make arguments in its favor.

 

[Axon]

Intel can do this to us directly or indirectly. When SB came out and it was a quantum leap in overclocking, yeah it was a PITA to change the socket, but w/e, it wasn't too big a deal. So as long as we get good tech at solid prices, I'm okay with it.

 

[Axon]

“Intel remains committed to the growing desktop enthusiast and channel markets, and will continue to offer socketed parts in the LGA package for the foreseeable future for our customers and the Enthusiast DIY market,” Intel spokesman Daniel Snyder told Maximum PC. “However, Intel cannot comment on specific long-term product roadmap plans at this time, but will disclose more details later per our normal communication process.”

Now since the enthusiast space and the channel space (these are the local computer stores from Microcenter to Blue Skies computing) are very different markets for us I would have to say that it looks like it is not going to be only the high end enthusiast computers also lower end system that may be build for my parents.

Appreciate the info. As long as there is a market for this stuff, the bottom line is that it is in Intel's interest to sell LGA materials.

 

[ShintaiDK]

Rambus, anyone?

DRAM Chartel, price fixing, huge fines and Samsung execs in jail anyone?

 

[Axon]

Dat collusion

 

[AdamK47]

I'm willing to bet it is only the enthusiast segment that lives on as a socketed platform. Mainstream platforms are most likely going to be BGA only.

 

[Arachnotronic]

I'm willing to bet it is only the enthusiast segment that lives on as a socketed platform. Mainstream platforms are most likely going to be BGA only.

That's what I'm saying. See, nobody has any reason to buy an -E processor right now unless they have a heavily threaded workload. This means the 4 core variant is DOA.

Make the mobile-focused, mainstream stuff BGA, and then us enthusiasts get the -E series with sockets, up to 6 cores, and likely an expansion of the low end side too.

It makes perfect...PERFECT sense.

 

[Makaveli]

I'm willing to bet it is only the enthusiast segment that lives on as a socketed platform. Mainstream platforms are most likely going to be BGA only.

As long as our prices don't go up to much i'm ok with this.