Intel's Newest Ivy Bridge CPU Launch Plans – Rumor

We learned yesterday (Monday, February 27, 2012) that Intel had delayed its Ivy Bridge CPU launch, despite words to the contrary, and now we get to tell you what the new launch roadmap looks like. 

We risked the hope that, since Intel's next-gen motherboards had already been detailed, there were no actual problems with the CPUs, but we were either wrong or the company chose to delay them for different reasons. 

The folks at Sweclockers are the ones who took the plunge and revealed the new release dates for the upcoming chips and supporting motherboards. 

Apparently, rather than unleash all of the chips in June, the product releases will be spread across the whole second quarter (April-June). 

On April 8, the Z77, Z75, H77 and B75 motherboards, from Intel and/or its OEMs, will begin to sell (or so rumors say). 

After that, the CPUs will begin to arrive on April 29, when the quad-core desktop models will be made public. 

Sales will not start right away, and it is unclear when mass availability will actually ramp up, but at least reviews will be allowed to be published. 

Moving on, the Q77 and Q75 desktop chipsets, for business computers, will be formally announced on June 3. 

Only later on will dual-core mobile processors be released (standard voltage and ULV models), and there seems to be no mention of quad-core Ivy Bridge parts. 

All in all, this is a launch schedule that is bound to leave motherboard makers and PC vendors, including Apple, reeling and experiencing severe, figurative headaches. The same goes for consumers. 

As if that wasn't enough, the issue is made somewhat more awkward by how, according to VR-Zone, the reason Intel gave for the delay was not the real cause behind it. 

Intel said it was having chip manufacturing issues (low yields), but the report says that this excuse is “highly exaggerated”. Given that we would have probably learned of chip issues from other sources by now if that was really such a large problem, we cannot help but wonder what this all really means.

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