If you hadn’t heard yet, last week we talked about a potential delay to the release of Intel’s upcoming Ivy Bridge processor. Well pretty much everything we feared was "kind of" confirmed by Intel’s Sean Maloney when he said:
“I think maybe it’s June now."
Huh. It’s gets worse though as Maloney apparently was "blaming the push back on the complexity of the new manufacturing process." That process in particular was the 22nm tri-gate technology that Intel has been touting as one of its biggest developments in recent years.
Is this completely altered now??
The EETimes story gets more specific with date quotes from Jim McGregor of In-Stat.
Jim McGregor of In-Stat told EE Times that according to his industry sources in Taiwan, Intel’s Ivy Bridge server parts were only delayed from April 8 until April 29, though the dual core i5 and i7 parts for notebooks had been pushed out from a planned May 13th launch to June 3.
Last week we were hearing that Intel would still launch Ivy Bridge parts in April but wouldn’t send out the mass shipments until June, and while that is still possible, that seems much less likely after hearing Maloney’s words today.
And if you haven’t had enough bad news for today, there is this comment that pretty much backs up my thoughts that I laid out in our 190th episode of the PC Perpsective Podcast last week:
“It doesn’t really matter because there’s not really any compelling competition right now,” said one industry analyst on condition of anonymity, referring to AMD’s recent lag in the market.
AMD, we need you in our lives so badly. Please don’t leave us here…alone…
I find it to be a smoke
I find it to be a smoke screen to say the process is the issue. If there where issues with there 22nm process they would not be offering their process for others to use. It’s like they heard people talking about them holding the chips back for “monetary gain” and they where like…. um no that’s not the reason…. umm ummm it a problem with the process.
I’m glad I built a Sandy
I’m glad I built a Sandy Bridge system in Nov 2011 instead of trying to wait for Ivy Bridge. I was undecided and put my build off for 6 months but went with socket 1155. Even when Ivy bridge does release, it looks like my system will not be outdated yet because Ivy doesn’t improve gaming performance. It will have an updated IGPU, lower temps, and tri-gate transistors. I may upgrade to Kepler though.
I also updated to Sandy
I also updated to Sandy Bridge around that time, but with the plan of upgrading to Ivy bridge (MSI Z68A-GD65 G3 + 2500K), and i tend to hold onto my hardware for many years, so i’m in no hurry for Ivy to get here. I look forward to it, but my current setup will be more than enough for me for a while.
On the surface, maybe, but I
On the surface, maybe, but I think it is more likely that the process IS the issue and they were trying to hide that fact with the other reasons.
Still, an interesting debate for a while until we see the answer truly revealed.
but don’t you think that they
but don’t you think that they would have the process figured out before offering services to clients? I don’t see a company like intel doing a homer doh! I personally find it hard to believe that they would announce they where taking customers before they have it mostly nailed down. That just not good business sense.
Also Ryan how would we know if it is an issue with the process or not? It kind of we have to take their word for it.
We can gauge the process
We can gauge the process performance by looking at clock speeds, prices and availability to a certain degree.
As for offering services; they announced they were going to offer production services but I doubt they have started production for anyone yet.
all of which intel
all of which intel controls… so even if there was not an issue they could manipulate the variables to suggest there was. (i know sounds like a conspiracy theory)
I also doubt they started production to anyone yet either. It just sounds weird to go we’ll make you chips with our new process and then to come out and go… only to say a week or two later, yeah we are having issues with that process.
I heard that the Z77 chipset
I heard that the Z77 chipset used the 22nm tri-gate process and Z77 motherboards would actually be available earlier then expected (before Ivy Bridge CPUs). If it’s the process at fault here it would be rather curious if Z77 boards shipped early. Boards using the new chipset, assuming there is no problem with them, could be used with existing Sandy Bridge LGA1155 chips. Therefore, manufacturers would be itching to release them regardless of Ivy Bridge delays.
Interestingly enough, with the Sandy Bridge release due to the P67 chipset issue causing a recall there were processors available with few higher-end boards. With Ivy Bridge it could be the reverse.
You are correct in that board
You are correct in that board vendors are itching to release their Z77 products but no, the chipset itself isn’t built on the 22nm process.