Coffee Lake Not Supported by Intel’s 200-Series Motherboards
by Ian Cutress on August 2, 2017 5:12 PM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- Intel
- LGA1151
- 200-series
- Core 8th Gen
- Coffee Lake
- 300-Series
In a stunning bit of Twitter, a tweet from one of the leading motherboard manufacturers has stated that Coffee Lake, Intel’s 8th Generation Core processors, will not be supported on the current generation of 200-series motherboards.
No，Coffee Lake CPU is not compatibilble with 200 series motherboards.
— July 31, 2017
Information like this is usually kept under wraps until an Intel reveal, but it seems to have been mindlessly posted to Twitter on July 31st, an account that last tweeted on April 11th before this tweet occurred. This tweet has since been deleted.
At this point, due to the similar microarchitecture to Kaby Lake being used in Coffee Lake, most of the technology press were under the impression that the Coffee Lake processors would be compatible with LGA1151 socket motherboards, namely the 100-series and 200-series. With the above tweet essentially confirming that Coffee Lake will not be supported, it means that either the new CPUs will not be LGA1151, or that the motherboards will lock-out the processors by firmware, or the CPUs and sockets will use a different notching system to ensure the wrong processor cannot be put in the wrong board. It does mean however that 200-series users hoping to upgrade to a Coffee Lake processor (which early reports are suggesting might be up to six cores, but this has not been announced) will not be able to.
There are many potential reasons for the change if the socket is still LGA1151. The obvious one would be product segmentation on Intel’s part, which would stick in the craw for a number of the user base. The second one that it might actually be a physical requirement for the processor – if previously unused pins are required for power and/or control for different elements of the DVFS in the chip. This would depend on new features on the chip, which could extend to different power management, different graphics, or different IP blocks that require separate pin-out connections. Intel might also be using a different power system for voltage regulators, which might not be compatible with current 200-series motherboards.
At this point, nothing has been made official. The fact that this was stated on Twitter so far from any launch date that we know of is an interesting development.
*The name of the manufacturer has been removed by request after this news was published.
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theuglyman0war - Friday, August 4, 2017 - link
A new chipset that introduces more lanes to go along with those extra core would easily open my walletm16 - Wednesday, August 2, 2017 - link
Kind of expected, they've been on a two and done status for a while, with some exceptions (I took heed with Sandy/Ivy Bridge, Haswell/Broadwell).On that front alone, it's perhaps notable to consider this if you're looking to upgrade later on or to maintain the same types of main boards, you might just need to buy the cpus and boards in bulk.
vegajf51 - Wednesday, August 2, 2017 - link
What sucks is I purchased a z270 board at launch, and its not even a year old yet and will soon be obsolete. :-(shabby - Wednesday, August 2, 2017 - link
But the new boards will be much better, they'll have two usb type c ports in the back, not just one... worth the upgrade!hansmuff - Wednesday, August 2, 2017 - link
Hah not only that, NATIVE USB 3.1!That's gotta be some sort of crazy train where i get CHIPSET SUPPORT FOR USB 3.1!
THERE IS NO WAY THAT A 3RD PARTY CHIPSET COULD HANDLE THAT, NONE. OR WAIT, THERE IS BUT THAT NEEDS CPU PCI-E LANES OR DMI BANDWIDTH. WE DON'T GIVE THE PEASANTS THAT FOR UNDER $1000.
I feel weird now.
nevcairiel - Thursday, August 3, 2017 - link
To be fair, third-party USB 3.1 controllers usually suck.mapesdhs - Thursday, August 3, 2017 - link
"I feel weird now.":D:D Well written.
It is kinda nuts, Intel eeking out these changes like they're tossing out scraps to beggars. Intel reminds me of Denethor in Return of the King when he's eating at that table.
nevcairiel - Thursday, August 3, 2017 - link
"Obsolete" is in the eye of the beholder. Maybe you don't have to replace the CPU with the latest and greatest immediately as its released.vegajf51 - Thursday, August 3, 2017 - link
I agree but I bought a really nice z270 board when kabylake launched hoping to use it with coffee lake later on. Intel should have never launched z270 and just kept using z170 until coffee lake.willis936 - Thursday, August 3, 2017 - link
The forced obselecense by Intel is getting more and more apparent. Driver support ends way sooner than any other manufacturer. Chipset update when there are no new features to add and no new architecture that could justify a change in what is on the chipset. There's no level of delusion possible that would make it so that Intel employees don't feel dirty putting out these hardware "updates".