Woah, we have just received confirmation from Benchlife.info that Intel is going forward with the 12-Core Skylake-X part after all. This is pretty big news which I had previously published as a rumor. Meanwhile, the launch of the company's X299 platform is going to happen at Computex 2017 as previously stated. It will be unveiled at the Intel Keynote by Navin Shenoy who is the General Manager and Senior Vice President of Client Computing Group (CCG).

Intel's response to Ryzen: Rolling out 12-Core Skylake-X HEDT chip under the X299 platform on 30th May

Benchlife has also revealed the mass availability date for the platform, which is going to be on 26th of June 2017. This means that Basin Falls will be shipping with not 4 but 5 SKUs. The five SKUs will include a 12 core, 10 core, 8 core, 6 core and 4 core model. The 12, 10, 8 and 6 core models will be based on the Skylake architecture. The 4 core model will be based on the Kaby Lake architecture which launched on mainstream platforms earlier this month. All Skylake-X chips will feature a rated TDP of 140W (with the possible exception of the 12 core die) while the Kaby Lake-X chip will feature a TDP of 112W. All chips will be marketed as the Core i7-7000 series processors and utilize the LGA 2066 socket.

The LGA 2066 socket of the HEDT Basin Falls platform is called Socket R4. SKL-X will have up to 44 PCIe 3.0 lanes (a total of 68 lanes) while Kaby Lake-X will have only up to 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes (a total of 40 lanes). Skylake-X will have quad channel DDR 4 memory up to 2667MHz in 1DPC mode and up to 2400MHz in 2DPC mode. Kabylake-X on the other hand will only have dual channel DDR4. The Kaby Lake PCH will have 24 PCIe 3.0 lanes, 8 SATA Gen3, 10 USB 3.0 ports and connected via 4 DMI 3.0 lanes to the processor. Intel LAN (Jacksonville PHY) will also be present on the chipset.

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This move is something that can be categorized as unprecedented from Intel and can be cautiously allocated as a reaction to AMD's Ryzen. Or more specifically the looming threat of bigger and faster Ryzen processors with even more cores inbound. Remember that word on the grapevine is that AMD is planning on releasing its 16-core Ryzen CPU and the X399 platform in the 3rd quarter of 2017 for the gaming market. If such a thing should happen, it would turn the tables on Intel, which will need to revamp its lineup in order to compete with the sheer number of cores that AMD will be throwing at it.

According to the source, the 14nm Coffeelake processors and its Z370 chipset will be releasing in August as well as more CPUs and the H370 and B360/H310 chipsets following at the end of 2017 or early 2018. There is also one very obvious implication in all this: that Intel will be cutting prices for the price points across the board as well. Microcenter has already started cutting prices, but as of yet there is no word from Intel on an official price cut. It is possible that Intel will introduce the new set of price cuts with the new Skylake-X lineup and has currently adopted a wait-and-see strategy, which would make a lot of sense.

The x86 battleground has been silent for far too long and things are obviously starting to heat up for both companies. Armed with the flexible Zen architecture, AMD makes a formidable opponent thanks to their value proposition of perf per $. Not only can they now match Intel in terms of core count (remember, 16 Naples dies can be re-purposed for the commercial space if AMD sees fit) but are in the same league in terms of performance per core as well. Intel will need to accompany this 12-core reveal with a price cut for maximum effect but regardless of how many $ Intel shaves off the MSRP, one thing is clear: The Game Is On.

Intel HEDT Processor Families: