Intel 7-Series Ivy Bridge Motherboard Chipsets to Arrive in Q2 2012

Together with the first 22nm Ivy Bridge processors, that are expected to arrive in the second quarter of 2012, Intel will also launch two new series of Panther Point motherboard chipsets destined to address the consumer and enterprise markets.

This news was uncovered by the DigiTimes website and the publication has also revealed that the mobile version of these controller chips is scheduled to arrive in the same March/April timeframe.

The consumer sector will witness the introduction of three platform controller hubs (PCHs) dubbed Z77, Z75 and H77, which feature similar specifications apart from some minor changes.

Starting with the most feature rich chipset, the Z77, this packs four USB 2.0 ports, two SATA 6Gbps and four SATA 3Gbps connectors as well as support for Intel's Smart Response (SSD caching) technology,

Furthermore, the PCH can split the 16 PCI Express lanes available for the CPU into a pair of x8 lanes or into an x8 + x4 + x4 configuration.

This feature is only available in the Z77, as the Z75 only supports a single x16 slot or dual x8 slots.

The Z75 also lacks support for the Smart Response Technology, but all the other features are common between the two chipsets and both of these offer CPU overclocking support.

As far as the H77 is concerned, this also comes with four USB 3.0 ports and the same storage configuration as its older brother, but Intel has decided to disable processor overclocking and dual-GPU operation and re-introduced Smart Response to make up for these shortcomings.

Features common to all the three Panther Point PCHs include Intel HD graphics support, with up to three individual displays, dual stream HDMI and DisplayPort audio and RAID 0/1/5/10 support.

Together with these three consumer chipsets, Intel will also introduce three Panther Point controller hubs for the business market that add various enterprise specific features such as vPro and AMT 8.0 or SIPP support.