Intel takes out the socket in Broadwell

semiaccurate.com

13 points·mtgx··3 comments

What's their basis for concluding that 'CPUs will be presoldered to the motherboard' implies "PCs have no relevance"?

Intel Atoms come presoldered too. I admit to finding that change a little disappointing, but not Earth-shattering.

I've been replacing chips since the original IBM PC, so I consider myself an 'enthusiast'. But I can count on one hand the number of times I've upgraded my CPU without upgrading the MB and RAM too. When building new systems, I always buy the CPU, MB, and RAM from the same dealer on the same invoice to avoid any ambiguities with compatibility returns.

And I'm part of that weirdo fringe who builds our own systems. I wish it were otherwise, but consumers who prefer to insert their own CPUs into MB sockets have never been a particularly large part of the PC industry.

Yes, you bought them together, but you still bought them separately in the sense that you were not married to a particular CPU depending on the motherboard you purchased (although it can restrict your option to varying degrees, of course). Now you are stuck.

The bigger worry is if they start to shut out third-party MB manufacturers. I don't get why the author of the article assumes they will, however.

> Now you are stuck.

Well, hopefully I will still have similar options as I would have chosen anyway. I.e., a reliable and performant combination of MB and CPU.

> The bigger worry is if they start to shut out third-party MB manufacturers. I don't get why the author of the article assumes they will, however.

Yeah, why would they want to harm their ecosystem partners like that? Last I checked, many of those Taiwanese firms are the same ones who were OEMing boards for the major desktop vendors.

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