Intel To Still Launch Sandy Bridge-E in 2011, But With Reduced Platform Feature-Set

[btarunr]

Sandy Bridge-E is Intel's next-generation high-end desktop and enterprise platform that is an upscale of the Sandy Bridge platform the company launched early this year. At this year's major trade-shows such as Computex, motherboard partners displayed their socket LGA2011 motherboards with the complete feature-set of the platform. Apart from the large socket, and memory slots at odd places, the most distinct feature of those motherboards was the plethora of SATA ports they came with. Even the most [relatively] low-end LGA2011 motherboards had around 10 SATA ports, most of which were 6 Gb/s. Platform schematics also made it to the public domain around that time, revealing a key feature that makes driving 8 SATA 6 Gb/s ports possible: a supplementary PCI-Express 3.0 x4 link between the X79 PCH and the LGA2011 processor, that adds 16 GB/s (8 GB/s per direction) of bandwidth between the processor and the chipset, without which the storage controller would be severely bottlenecked with the DMI Gen2 (physical PCI-Express 2.0 x4), with its puny 8 GB/s (4 GB/s per direction) bandwidth.

Originally slated for Q4 2011, Intel's Sandy Bridge-E platform was reported to have been delayed to Q1 2012. It is now emerging that Patsburg-D, the variant of Patsburg X79 chipset, which features 8 SATA/SAS 6 Gb/s ports, which requires that supplementary PCI-E 3.0 x4 link, may be causing a development hold up at Intel. So, the company is planning on launching the platform this year itself, but with Patsburg-B, a variant of the chipset that has only four SATA/SAS 6 Gb/s ports, and relies entirely on DMI as the chipset interconnect. The slide below lists out differences between the many variants of Patsburg PCH. DMI would give the platform the same amount of chipset interconnect bandwidth as today's LGA1155-Cougar Point platform. It is, however possible that the higher Patsburg-D/X variants will be launched when Intel irons out whatever issues exist with them.



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[Pestilence]

Eagerly awaiting E.

 

[The Von Matrices]

I'm curious why Intel is not branding this interconnect DMI 3.0 since DMI versions 1.0 and 2.0 were basically PCI express anyway.

 

[btarunr]

I'm curious why Intel is not branding this interconnect DMI 3.0 since DMI versions 1.0 and 2.0 were basically PCI express anyway.

Because DMI isn't basically PCI-E. It is physically PCI-E, but it has a different low-overhead data-encoding scheme. AMD's A-Link, on the other hand, is purely PCI-E. The PCI-E 3.0 x4 link in Patsburg D/X is pure PCI-E.

 

[mastrdrver]

So is that five 8x PCIe links for a total of 40 PCIe 3.0 lanes that I'm seeing from that diagram?

 

[Wile E]

Well this is poop. I want more storage.

 

[Flibolito]

Fine with me as long as everything else is equal. LSI megaraid here I come.

 

[Trackr]

I would prefer 16 SATA 3.0Gbps ports, rather than 8 SATA 6.0Gbps ports.

Unless you're using 8 SATA multipliers or 8 Vertex 3-level SSDs, what's the point?

Oh, and if you are, you're not going to be using motherboard RAID anyway.

 

[gR3iF]

No Usb 3.0, not enough S-ata Ports, First boards looked like crap...


Even Broadcom/Amd handled this better with S-ata 6gb...


So plz Intel get this on and stop making your chipsets in 65nm...

 

[Disparia]

Nice. As long as it gets the chips out sooner, I'll live with having only 10 ports on my motherboard initially.

 

[1c3d0g]

Yawn. Wake me up when Haswell arrives...THIS is something that will be revolutionary.

 

[ensabrenoir]

Yes !!!!! One insanely overpowered build still on schedule...... I guess.... might have 2.wait on the fully optioned one though. Anyway at some point this year2011 and bd... maybe...... could b an exciting time.....could be....

 

[Frick]

And a C2D build is still enough for the vast majority of users. Pretty cool.

 

[Hayder_Master]

So now we depend on product's what they can add on motherboards, more nforcs chipsets or something to add more sata ports, or we going pci-e storege.

By the how much bandwidth PCI-E X16 can hold.

 

[[H]@RD5TUFF]

Well this is poop. I want more storage.

Agreed, 8 internal SATA ports doesn't cut it, and no one uses eSATA.

 

[Disparia]

Would it help if it's actually 10 ports in total?

They all have PCH 4 x 3Gb/s, 2 x 6Gb/s SATA RAID-0/1/10/5. What changes is the SCU support.

Patsburg-A: 4 x 6Gb/s SATA RAID-0/1/10

Patsburg-B: 4 x 6Gb/s SATA/SAS RAID-0/1/10

Patsburg-D: 8 x 6Gb/s SATA/SAS RAID-0/1/10

Patsburg-T: 8 x 6Gb/s SATA/SAS RAID-0/1/10/5

(at least, that's how I read the diagram)

The previous news was everything is delayed. At least now the chips and one or two of the chipsets might be available earlier. Can't wait? Can always go backplane. 24Gb/s over 4 links is still pretty decent bandwidth.

 

[[H]@RD5TUFF]

Would it help if it's actually 10 ports in total?

They all have PCH 4 x 3Gb/s, 2 x 6Gb/s SATA RAID-0/1/10/5. What changes is the SCU support.

Patsburg-A: 4 x 6Gb/s SATA RAID-0/1/10

Patsburg-B: 4 x 6Gb/s SATA/SAS RAID-0/1/10

Patsburg-D: 8 x 6Gb/s SATA/SAS RAID-0/1/10

Patsburg-T: 8 x 6Gb/s SATA/SAS RAID-0/1/10/5

(at least, that's how I read the diagram)

The previous news was everything is delayed. At least now the chips and one or two of the chipsets might be available earlier. Can't wait? Can always go backplane. 24Gb/s over 4 links is still pretty decent bandwidth.

I hate eSATA I would rather boards came without it and gave me the 2 internal headers in it's place. But yes 10 would be preferable, ATM my storage machine is forced to use a PATA optical and OS drive because all the SATA ports are occupied by 2 TB drives.

 

[Frick]

I hate eSATA I would rather boards came without it and gave me the 2 internal headers in it's place. But yes 10 would be preferable, ATM my storage machine is forced to use a PATA optical and OS drive because all the SATA ports are occupied by 2 TB drives.

Then it might be time to buy a controller card.

 

[[H]@RD5TUFF]

Then it might be time to buy a controller card.

I have 1 has a 12 drive raid 6 array, but I really think mobo manufacturers need to get with times and realize people don't really want to have to have 3 systems to have room for all their storage.

 

[Damn_Smooth]

I am completely at a loss as to why they want to rush it. It's not like the market segment this is aimed at is overflowing with competition.

I guess if you have the money to buy one of these chips though, throwing more money at a new board when they get it right won't be much of an issue.

It still seams like a waste to me though.

 

[[H]@RD5TUFF]

I am completely at a loss as to why they want to rush it. It's not like the market segment this is aimed at is overflowing with competition.

I guess if you have the money to buy one of these chips though, throwing more money at a new board when they get it right won't be much of an issue.

It still seams like a waste to me though.

One could make the same argument for the 9xx chipset as AMD has even said they will need to change the socket to add more cores and it will be phased out come the end of 2012.

I don't see it as rushing or a waste of money.:shadedshu

 

[Pestilence]

I am completely at a loss as to why they want to rush it. It's not like the market segment this is aimed at is overflowing with competition.

I guess if you have the money to buy one of these chips though, throwing more money at a new board when they get it right won't be much of an issue.

It still seams like a waste to me though.

Life is a waste of money

 

[Frick]

I have 1 has a 12 drive raid 6 array, but I really think mobo manufacturers need to get with times and realize people don't really want to have to have 3 systems to have room for all their storage.

Avarage users do not use all that space. Also centralized storage is gaining grounds and that makes lots of SATA ports even less of a necessity.

 

[Damn_Smooth]

One could make the same argument for the 9xx chipset as AMD has even said they will need to change the socket to add more cores and it will be phased out come the end of 2012.

I don't see it as rushing or a waste of money.:shadedshu

The key difference being that AMD does have competition in the market.

There's a big difference between needing to put something out to stay competitive, and releasing something with no competition, with less features, to save a month or two.

 

[Disparia]

I am completely at a loss as to why they want to rush it. It's not like the market segment this is aimed at is overflowing with competition.

I guess if you have the money to buy one of these chips though, throwing more money at a new board when they get it right won't be much of an issue.

It still seams like a waste to me though.

Well, you have early X58 adopters antsy for a new platform as well as those who want to move up to high-end, but don't want to buy into an aging platform. Especially with the performance segment (SB) nipping at it's heels. They need LGA 2011 out regardless of what happens with BD.

IMO of course