Intel Expands 8th Gen Core: Core i9 on Mobile, Iris Plus, Desktop, Chipsets, and vPro
by Ian Cutress on April 3, 2018 3:01 AM ESTThe GIGABYTE H370N-WiFi
One of the motherboards we were sampled early was the GIGABYTE H370N-WiFi. This is GIGABYTE's latest mini-ITX motherboard, and in this case using the H370 chipset - traditionally GIGABYTE's H-series mini-ITX boards implement additional features, such as HDMI 2.0, and in this case, Wi-Fi.
The initial viewing of the board is one implemented more in function than overall style. The four-phase power delivery has a heatsink, the CPU is powered by an 8-pin 12V header, and the full length PCIe slot is shielded. GIGABYTE has two full-length DDR4 slots on this model, using double sided latches, and there are four SATA ports on the right hand side of the board out of a possible six that the chipset supports.
For storage, we get an M.2 2280 slot that sits above the chipset heatsink on the front, and another on the rear:
The two key parts on this motherboard that are going to be a little interesting start with the HDMI 2.0 implementation.
Here GIGABYTE is using the MegaChips MCDP2800 chip as an LSPCon to enable HDMI 2.0 from the processor. This is fairly common for HDMI 2.0, although due to the added LSPCon cost, we still only see it on a few motherboards - mostly GIGABYTE boards.
The other thing to note will be the Wi-Fi implementation. As the H370 chipset will support a native wireless solution, it all comes down to which companion RF model GIGABYTE has chosen. A quick look in the device manager shows this:
Here Intel is using the AC-9560, which is Intel's 2x2 802.11ac Wave 2 (160 MHz) solution - the high cost one.
Another feature on the new motherboards will be the USB 3.1 Gen 2 (10 Gbps) support. Here we see GIGABYTE not bothering with the fastest USB 3.1 implementation - all the ports here are USB 3.1 Gen 1 (5 Gbps) standard - even the port being enabled via a Type-C redriver. This means that this board could be seen as just a refresh of the 200-series version, with only the chipset changed to support the new processors. The motherboard does not have additional front panel headers for 10 Gbps either, meaning that this board uses exactly zero of the four that the chipset supports.
Elsewere on the board we spot the dual NICs, powered by Intel I219-V and Intel I211-AT controllers.
The audio, despite being a 3-plug stack, is powered by the Realtek ALC1220 codec.
In our box with the board, aside from the usual CD/manual/IO shield, we also got two SATA cables and a pair of Wi-Fi antenna. Nothing overly complex.
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wr3zzz - Tuesday, April 3, 2018 - link
What is the target market for the new T-series chips? It's the same price as the chip with iGPU and the lower TDP comes at the cost of lower clock and still no overclocking.A5 - Tuesday, April 3, 2018 - link
OEM SFF boxes, like the Dell Optiplex Micro series.xrror - Tuesday, April 3, 2018 - link
i9. Mobile. 6 core with no HT.Intel ... the i9 branding already is a tortured SKU name. Anything i9 should be auto-badass awesome insaneballs SKU.
Instead, we get the insult that i9 is not only brought back for ANY SKU, but a mobile SKU. Which is already lying BS marketing SKU (hey, a mobile i7 is actually 2 real cores + HT which in desktop land is a low end i3 but who cares! marketing!).
While a mobile coffee lake native 6 core with no HT WOULD have been impressive (assuming no tard low base speed) as a very high i5 or i7 mobile... resurrecting the tortured i9 branding with anything less than 12 cores (of any dam*** sort) is insulting.
FU intel. And FU to all the folks who gobble this up at a premium cause 9 > 7 in mobile land which enables Intel Marketing to justify this ****
xrror - Tuesday, April 3, 2018 - link
I just have to add, the cynicism in this article from Ian is amazing. That's no insult or judgement - just "holy moly, it's so bad even finally it broke through."I don't want to face the reality that PC hardware doesn't mean anything to the average (mass market - quantity) buyer when purchasing their next disposable facebook terminal....
I don't. .. . .. ... .. *cry*
close - Wednesday, April 4, 2018 - link
It's so bad even AT is kicking Intel to the curb :).satai - Tuesday, April 3, 2018 - link
iX does make sense only inside a segment. You can't suppose, that i7 for ultrabooks is comparable to i7 fo HEDT. This is not a technical term, it's marketing term. If you expect anything else...A5 - Tuesday, April 3, 2018 - link
...yeah. Getting *this* upset about a company's branding strategy is nuts.xrror - Tuesday, April 3, 2018 - link
fine, i guess I was nuts back when they did this with Sandy Bridge mobile. I'll consider myself chastised and STFU as you wish.Ratman6161 - Tuesday, April 3, 2018 - link
It bothers me because I'm involved in purchasing PC's for the company. Users always complaining because they bought the marketing and think what we are getting them is crap because it doesn't have an i7 sticker on it.PeachNCream - Tuesday, April 3, 2018 - link
Tell them they need to be more productive and waste less time so the company is more profitable an can afford to purchase i7 laptops.