X299 chipset remaining unchanged. Support for Basin Falls requiring a bios update only.
 
New Basin Falls HEDT CPUs out. Exiting news at the low end: 6-core goes, but more interesting is the 8 core which now gains PCIe lanes from 28 to 44. Also minor bump to base clock speed. Also increased cache, but could be latency issues in the way this is achieved, so not as exciting as at first glance. Still not 100% clear if they up upgrading from Dow Corning's finest toothpaste to soldered IHS. Here is hoping.
 
My 7800X might not stay in my EVGA X299 Dark for long...!
 
Linky here: https://www.anandtech.com/show/13402/intel-basin-falls-refresh-core-i9-9980xe
 
Enjoy!

SimonOcean
Still not 100% clear if they up upgrading from Dow Corning's finest toothpaste to soldered IHS. Here is hoping.

Soldered this time.

The claimed 15% efficiency gain is sad, worse still is to attribute it to the repeatedly refreshed 14nm. No folks, TDP is just a category and Intel isn't obligated to publish actual values which are trade secrets. The idea is simple: If a processor can't get filed under 140W (i.e. if it's 143W actual), then it gets filed under 165W. If cranking up frequency lands it to 158W, it's still getting a 165W rating. Intel will even deliberately put a processor in a higher TDP rating to ensure the proper heatsink is used. That's the point of TDP, so cooling companies pair the right heatsink with a whole group of processors, keeps costs down rather than getting a separate heatsink for every processor.

It's just dumb to look at two different specs in the same TDP and claim a gain (i.e. 7980XE vs 9980XE). Intel has never told us actual wattage values per core per clock, faster models within the same TDP only references a low actual per core that allows overhead.

But there isn't any magic here, like the progression of core counts from 7700K to 9900K, all thrown within 95W ratings category. Logically, half the cores at the same frequency would be around half wattage, etc. In otherwords, 7700K could have qualified for 65W TDP, but being unlocked put it in 95W.

So does this mean x299 mobos will support some or all skylake-x refresh CPUs then? If so then I will be so happy!

joshuarsmith1
So does this mean x299 mobos will support some or all skylake-x refresh CPUs then? If so then I will be so happy!

yes. 8 core up to 18 core. not higher as they are different socket.

Any ideas about where the Z399 chipset will fit in? I have to assume some new EVGA boards will turn up, and a Z399 Dark 2 would be pretty sweet!