It's one of the oddities of the major international IT shows, that all of the major players like Asus, Gigabyte, Asrock and MSI – almost always end up with similar sized stands.
At CeBIT 2012, Gigabyte seemed to be using every inch of its stand space to show off its 3rd-generation Intel CPU mainboard designs.
Happy snappers inc was on hand to relay these images.
There has been a lot of hoo-har around the launch of Ivy Bridge. Most of the journalists we have spoken to about it think that Intel has spread the launch over too great a period of time and, as such, system builders across the globe have been sitting on CPUs and mainboards for several weeks. During that time, the inevitable has happened, benchmark scores etc have leaked out while sites like KitGuru have been sticking to its agreement with Intel not to run and publish its own tests until the deadline for launch happens. Very strange.
Against that backdrop of NDA-required silence, it IS alright for mainboard manufacturers to show you their products, but you can't touch – so to speak.
Confused? Yep, us too.
Anyway, arguments about an Intel NDA that staggers the release of products, information and numbers over a 2 month period to one side, let's head over to the Gigabyte stand shots and the wonderful Andrew Ditchburn. Looking across the vast array of new products that he was using to decorate the Gigabyte stand, one thing is for sure – there will be no shortage of price/performance/feature options for the KitGuru reader's ‘3rd Generation' build.
Whether you want the full-on tweaking ability of the ‘Z' versions of the chipset or the super saver ‘H' version, you will plenty of choice.
Even to a complete novice, there's no doubting which of these boards is most likely to find its way into an enthusiast build.
But Andrew was keen to point out that the reason why he has an entire wall covered with new boards, is that the 3rd Generation of Intel Core processors will appeal to a much broader range of users – and he has the mainboard line up necessary to satisfy.
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KitGuru says: So there you have it. Intel is about to puts its considerable technical/marketing/sales muscle into ‘The chip formerly known as Ivy Bridge – but which now prefers to be known as the 3rd Generation Core Processor'… and Gigabyte promises to have a board for you – no matter what your aim/objective/budget. Must be love.
Comment below or in the KitGuru forums.
they make good boards, looking forward to seeing them soon