Intel to abandon the motherboard market
Intel motherboards are soon to be a thing of the past, as the company is to close down that segment of its business following the launch of Haswell later this year.
The company's exit from the market comes as a shock: it has been manufacturing own-brand motherboards, which serve as reference designs for its processor chipsets as well as being commercially-available products in their own right, for nigh on two decades. Its boards are regularly chosen for reasons of compatibility and build quality, but rarely on features: manufacturers licensed to produce Intel-compatible motherboards typically offer significantly more capability including additional ports, more overclocking features or support for non-Intel technologies. While some boards - including the Intel Desktop Board D5400XS 'Skulltrail,' which supported two LGA 771 processors - were more exciting than others, it's clear that Intel feels its efforts would be better concentrated elsewhere.
Thus far, there has been no formal announcement from Intel on why or when it is exiting the motherboard market, but Intel spokesperson Dan Snyder confirmed to PCWorld that the exit is both very real and very imminent: following the release of Intel's Haswell chips later this year, the company will begin the process of winding down its motherboards efforts over the following three years.
With the resources freed up by no longer having to produce full-size motherboards, Intel is reportedly to shift its efforts onto new form factor products including the Next Unit of Computing, an ultra-compact desktop-class product which packs a dual-core 1.8GHz Core-i3 processor into a board measuring just 100cm².
Those with existing Intel motherboards needn't worry, though: Snyder has reportedly confirmed that all warranties will be honoured in full, while Intel-manufactured Haswell motherboard will continue to be available for 18 months after they ship alongside the processors later this year.
UPDATE:
Intel has confirmed its plans to phase out manufacturing of own-brand motherboards for the traditional desktop market, with Haswell to be the last processor family to receive Intel-branded desktop boards. However, the company has provided the following statement: 'It is important to note that Intel will be maintaining its server motherboard and server systems (integrated board, chassis, and accessories) business. Intel’s Enterprise Platforms and Services Division (EPSD) produces server building blocks for resellers, integrators, and OEMs world-wide,' the statement reads, noting that the work of Intel EPSD will continue as normal even as the desktop motherboard business is wound up.
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Discuss in the forums Reply"would be better" or "should be"?
10cm² does that for you. Feel free to delete this post once you've read it, sorry to be a stickler.
I am interested to see how this plays out for them. Company evolution can often be a really good thing, stagnation in a boom leads to losses in the future. Doesn't bode well for AMD though that Intel are still keeping a close eye on the ball.
But yeah, Intel sticking to what they do best isn't a bad thing. It's stupid not to.
I bought a few. The thing is, if you need an atom board for anything but multimedia, your choice is either Intel or Supermicro (expensive). I still haven't seen anything like D2500CC (dual intel NIC, mini PCIe, multiple com ports, LVDS, LPT) for the same price from other manufacturers.
Apple and Dell the 2 biggest users of this board type do not buy them from Intel Shockingly enough.
They are basically a stable board test platform for most manufactures. But from what ive read elsewhere they will stop manufacturing of boards for public use but still supply OEM boards for the manufactures of the new cpus.
Yep. And I went on the basis that I'd never bought one because of the lack of features, and I don't know anyone that has.
Lots of people get confused about it so don't feel bad.
No it isn't.
A 10cm² box has an area of 100 square cm. Don't confuse the writers.
Intel will no longer sell consumer motherboards aka to joe public.
They will still supply Oems boards for there CPUs as test beds for the mainboards.
+1
10cm x 10cm is categorically 100cm² - I think this is a perfect example of Muphry's Law in action. None of it gets away from centimetres being awful SI units though - their mere existence causes confusion, lol!
Regarding the actual subject matter, it's not unsurprising but still a pity to see Intel stop making motherboards. Since Abit went the way of the Dodo Intel have been the only ones with really good onboard fan control suitable for proper silencing of air-cooled PCs straight out of the box. Despite other manufacturers (most notably Asus) making a big noise* and designing lots of logos and graphics for their boards' temp/fan control abilities, Intel has just quietly* gone about showing them how it's done.
* puns not intentional, honest
Really? If you read about Intel's drop in profits due to tablet and competing devices it comes as no shock at all that they will change the business model to adapt to the current market trends - a trend that is now establishing itself and the new norm.
I for one and pleased that they are exiting, rightly or wrongly this shows that the top dogs at Intel are reacting to a profit dip, changing their global business model and attempting to adapt to the changing consumer needs.
I guess you just need to look at Comet and HMV to see that even though the markets are different, change in any sector is required.
Good stuff.
Were we not discussing very recently Intel's plan to do "non-swappable" CPU's? Where the cpu was soldered to the motherboard?
One of the arguments was whether intel would use their own boards or a thrid party board.
My thoughts are this question has just been answered.
That question was answered at start of December when rumors of all-BGA lineup was denied by Intel itself :
http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2012/12/06/intel-denies-bga/1
[/embarrassed face]
I've had a few, they are generally rock solid in reliability terms, 3 year warranty on the retail versions matches anything the other manufacturers put out and in my experience better customer service if something did go wrong. As for less "features" it depends what you are looking for in a board, overclocking sure but their media boards are excellent.
Frankly while this is a wise move business wise, I'll miss their boards. Although it should be noted (as per the article) that it could be a good while before they stop producing them. I suspect we might even see Intel branded boards for the next generation if they are already in the pipeline.