Intel Coffee Lake CPUs Delayed to 2018, 8th Gen Gets Kaby Lake Refresh This Year

Jun 5, 2017

Intel's new Coffee Lake family of 6 and 4 core CPUs has reportedly been delayed to February of 2018. The news comes courtesy of the latest desktop roadmap which the company had presented to partners at Computex according to WinFuture.de via Golem.de.

Intel Desktop Roadmap Detailed - Core X Series, Coffee Lake & Gemini Lake

The company will be introducing three product families over the next four quarters. The first is the high-end Core X series which the company introduced last week and includes Skylake X and Kaby Lake X CPUs and the X299 Chipset. These will include four core Kaby Lake X i5 7640X and i7 7740X CPUs as well as the 12, 8 & 6 core i9 and i7 Skylake X 7920X, 7900X, 7820X and 7800X CPUs, whilst the 18, 16 and 14 core parts will see a delayed launch.

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Intel Core X Series Processor Family Specifications:

CPU Name	i9-7980XE	i9-7960X	i9-7940X	i9-7920X	i9-7900X	i7-7820X	i7-7800X	i7-7740X	i5-7640X
CPU Process	14nm+	14nm+	14nm+	14nm+	14nm+	14nm+	14nm+	14nm+	14nm+
Architecture	SKL-X	SKL-X	SKL-X	SKL-X	SKL-X	SKL-X	SKL-X	KBL-X	KBL-X
Cores/Threads	18/36	16/32	14/28	12/24	10/20	8/16	6/12	4/8	4/4
Base Clock	2.6 GHz	2.8 GHz	3.1 GHz	2.9 GHz	3.3 GHz	3.6 GHz	3.5 GHz	4.3 GHz	4.0 GHz
(Turbo Boost 2.0)	4.2 GHz	4.2 GHz	4.3 GHz	4.3 GHz	4.3 GHz	4.3 GHz	4.0 GHz	4.5 GHz	4.2 GHz
(Turbo Boost Max 3.0)	4.4 GHz	4.4 GHz	4.4 GHz	4.4 GHz	4.5 GHz	4.5 GHz	N/A	N/A	N/A
L3 Cache	24.75 MB	22 MB	19.25 MB	16.5 MB	13.75 MB	11 MB	8.25 MB	6 MB	6 MB
L2 Cache	18 MB	16 MB	14 MB	12 MB	10 MB	8 MB	6 MB	4 MB	4 MB
Memory	Quad DDR4	Quad DDR4	Quad DDR4	Quad DDR4	Quad DDR4	Quad DDR4	Quad DDR4	Dual DDR4	Dual DDR4
PCIe Lanes	44	44	44	44	44	28	28	16	16
Socket Type	LGA 2066	LGA 2066	LGA 2066	LGA 2066	LGA 2066	LGA 2066	LGA 2066	LGA 2066	LGA 2066
TDP	165W	165W	165W	140W	140W	140W	140W	112W	112W
Price	$1999 US	$1699 US	$1399 US	$1189 US	$999 US	$599 US	$389 US	$349	$242

Intel Coffee Lake Delayed To February 2018 - 8th Gen CPUs To Feature Refreshed Kaby Lake Parts

The second family of products from the company will be aimed towards the mainstream market and will feature Intel's six core and quad-core Coffee Lake CPUs and Z370 chipset. Intel has reportedly postponed these 8th generation parts to February of next year. Earlier reports indicated that the company had been attempting to push the launch to the second half of this year. However, if this recent report regarding the company's latest roadmap is anything to go by, the company will now be launching refreshed Kaby Lake parts this year instead and postponing Coffee Lake to 2018.

The new family will not be compatible with current LGA 1151 boards and will require a new revision of the LGA 1151 socket dubbed the V2. These processors will feature 6 core, 12 thread i7 parts and 4 core, 8 thread i5 parts. This represents a substantial step away from Intel tradition of sticking to four cores for this segment. These higher core count processors are now a necessity to compete with AMD's Ryzen in the mainstream.

It's important to note that only a partial number of Coffee Lake SKUs will be available at first. The majority of Coffee Lake parts and 300 series motherboards will follow later in Q1 2018. For its 8th generation processors the company is said to be introducing a Kaby Lake refresh instead of Coffee Lake this year. The new 15W Kaby Lake U parts will double the core count from 2 to 4 and are said to deliver up to 30% better performance for Ultrabooks. They will be available in time for the back to school season.

Intel Coffee Lake S 6 Core Processors Specs (Preliminary):

CPU Name	Intel Core i5-7600K	Intel Core i5-8600K	Intel Core i7-7700K	Intel Core i7-8700K
CPU Family	Kaby Lake-S	Coffee Lake-S	Kaby Lake-S	Coffee Lake-S
CPU Process	14nm	14nm	14nm	14nm
CPU Cores	4	6	4	6
CPU Threads	4	6	8	12
Base Clock	3.8 GHz	3.50 GHz	4.2 GHz	3.7 GHz
Boost Clock	4.2 GHz	TBA	4.5 GHz	TBA
L2 Cache	1 MB (256 KB per Core)	1.5 MB (256 KB per Core)	1 MB (256 KB per Core)	1.5 MB (256 KB per Core)
L3 Cache	6 MB	9 MB	8 MB	12 MB
Unlocked Design	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Socket Support	LGA 1151	LGA 1151?	LGA 1151	LGA 1151?
PCH	200-Series	300-Series	200-Series	300-Series
TDP	91W	95W	91W	95W

Intel Gemini Lake

The third family of products is based on Intel's BGA Gemini Lake chips which will feature 2 to 4 cores on a frugal TDP of 10W. These parts will be targeted towards small form factor machines and low power designs and will all be fused into motherboards. These chips will likely be popular amongst OEMs and PC manufacturers for HTPCs and NUCs. If you're a DIY builder you'll want to stick to the socketed parts instead. Gemini Lake is now scheduled to debut at the end of the year.