Before CES 2017, Intel Desktop Was Leaked

A few weeks ahead of the CES 2017 convention in early 2017, there have been whispers of a possibility that Intel will reveal its seventh-generation Kaby Lake-S desktop processors. A new report states that the lineup will be publicly announced during the show. The processors will be officially introduced following a closed news conference on 4 January at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas.

The news stems from a recent leak that provided those dates along with the entire list of seventh-generation desktop processors that will be announced on 5 January. They will be accompanied by the new Intel 200 Series chipsets for motherboards that will support the new processors.

The list of leaked processors is rather long, consisting of 16 CPUs that includes the Xeon E3-1205 v6, three Core i7 chips, seven Core i5 models, two Core i3 units, and three Pentium processors.

The upcoming desktop CPUs will support Intel’s Optane storage technology that relies on its 3D XPoint memory, which promises to be 1,000 times faster than the current NAND technology used in solid-state disks and other flash-based storage. The new desktop processors will also support HDCP 2.2, hardware-based encoding and decoding of H.264, HEVC Main, and VP9 video codecs. The integrated graphics are better too compared to the older sixth-generation Skylake processors.

Intel’s 200 Series chipsets bring new technologies to Intel-based motherboards. Some of the features include support for up to 10 USB 3.0 ports, support for up to 24 PCI Express 3.0 and six SATA 3.0 high-speed I/O lanes, support for Intel’s Optane technology, and the addition of Intel Rapid Storage Technology 15 and Intel RST PCI Express Storage x4 Generation 3. Intel’s RealSense and Ready Mode technologies are also supported.

The leak should be no surprise given that secrets can never be kept from the internet. How the information was obtained is unknown at the point, so the two lists need to be regarded as rumor and speculation until Intel reveals the whole lineup during CES 2017. There is a good chance Intel will conduct a private meeting with a few specific sites as a pre-briefing before the press conference, so we may hear more about the new processors over the next several weeks.