Rumor Outlines Intel Comet Lake Features, Specifications, and Launch Window

Rumored details of Intel's upcoming Comet Lake architecture have been posted via XFastest which published supposedly internal presentation slides that mention Comet Lake. The information gleaned from these slides seem to confirm most of the details assumed about Comet Lake thus far: fabricated on a further enhanced 14nm process, up to 10 cores, new chipset and socket, and availability late this year or early 2020. But as with all unverified information, we need to view this with suspicion.

XFastest leaked three slides, one detailing features and specifications of the CPU and new 400-series chipset, one showing the consumer roadmap for the next few quarters, and one revealing the launch window of the processors. There aren't any SKUs or product names on these slides, however.

When it comes to features, the information claims Intel is expanding its mainstream core count from 8 to 10 cores and keeping Hyper-Threading. The slide boasts several new features, such as "enhanced core and memory overclocking," integrated USB 3.1, support for gigabit WiFi and Bluetooth 5, and support for Intel's Optane memory which is currently more of an enterprise technology. The purported new 400-series chipset actually looks quite compelling: it has up to 24 PCIe 3.0 lanes (meaning up to 40 for the entire platform) and up to 16 USB 3.1 ports. It isn't PCIe 4.0 like the X570 platform, however, and it does use a new socket, LGA 1200.

The supposed consumer roadmap is a little less interesting. It basically shows Comet Lake replacing the entirety of the 9th-gen CPUs (based on Coffee Lake) in Q1 of 2020. It does tell us that Comet Lake is a full product stack replacement for Coffee Lake and won't exist alongside it, but otherwise, there's not much here other than the launch window. Curiously, the Core i9-9900KS is missing, even though we know that it is coming later this year.

The final slide shows us more launch windows and availability for mainstream and HEDT CPUs. The Xeon W-3175X doesn't seem to be getting a replacement before Q2 of 2020, and like the previous slide, we see Comet Lake being available in Q1 of 2020. A new X299 refresh, Glacier Falls, is apparently arriving in Q4 of this year, and it will be based on Cascade Lake. We've heard about Glacier Falls before, but it has not yet been seen; if this refresh comes up late this year, then we may be able to expect these slides to predict the launch of Comet Lake as well accurately.

If these slides are accurate, then Intel is not planning a response to Ryzen 3000 until early 2020 at best, which is a shame since we would like to see a more competitive series of Intel CPUs sooner rather than later. But, as with all leaks, take this with a grain of salt.