Will X79 have any CPU upgrade path?

MR.B · 6 May 2011 at 18:17

Does anyone know if the X79 platform will ever have support for Ivy Bridge CPU's in some form? Or will it only ever support Sandy Bridge (SNB-E) CPU's?

I cant find anywhere that says it will support Ivy Bridge. All the current mid-range series will support Ivy Bridge (H61, H67, P67, and Z68 boards) as it's just a "tick" and not a new architecture, so it would make sense that X79 also supports some version of Ivy at a later date.

Otherwise there will no longer be any point in the high-end. It would have no CPU upgrade path and just months after X79 comes out there will be Ivy CPU's with better performance for all the mid-range platforms.

Orcvader · 7 May 2011 at 00:10

It's really hard to say at the moment, no one knows at this point apart from Intel. Perhaps it will, since IB is a die shrink of SB then there could be some sort of IB-E and hopefully will be compatible with LGA 2011.

MR.B · 7 May 2011 at 08:06

Well i really hope X79 gets some form of Ivy Bridge at some point. Cant see any point in the high-end otherwise, and then a big market would be left out and a lot of people will be *****.
The only thing i've found after searching for ages is some leaked road maps that say IB for LGA2011/X79 will be out in late 2012 which would make sense as it's a year after SNB-E, but theres no way to know if it's genuine or not.

Cr416 · 7 May 2011 at 12:50

Have to wait until release

Ingleberry · 7 May 2011 at 22:18

Technically it is possible however it is unlikely they will it's about making more segmented markets cutting off cross platforming whilst using the similar architecture.