With Alder Lake-S, Intel will be debuting the LGA1700 socket. This socket is known to be considerably different from most sockets for Intel Core processors, featuring a rectangular form. This means that current reference CPU coolers for Intel processors won't work, so Intel is apparently planning to refresh them.
The first images of these alleged new Intel reference CPU coolers were shared by @Ayxerious (via VideoCardz). The slide features three different designs developed with customer and partner feedback, with each being dedicated to certain processor families.
Not sure if real, intel hasn't gotten the hint if these are real lol. pic.twitter.com/8YTFtiylMz
— Ayxerious (@ayxerious) September 10, 2021
First, there's the Laminar RH1 cooler for Core i9 processors, featuring RGB lighting and a taller design than the rest. Then we have the Laminar RM1 cooler for Core i7, i5 and i3 chips, which comes with an RGB halo around the heatsink, similar to AMD's reference CPU coolers. Lastly, there's the Laminar RS1 cooler, which should come with Pentium and Celeron CPUs. This one looks to be the same as the RM1 cooler, but without the RGB halo.
These three cooler designs are supposed to be paired with 65W TDP processors, suggesting we might see different solutions for higher TDP CPUs. However, it's also possible these higher TDP CPUs won't come with a reference cooler at all, as Intel has been doing with past generations.
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KitGuru says: Judging from this slide, it looks like Intel finally decided to update its reference CPU coolers. With that said, the authenticity of the slide has not been confirmed yet. Intel is expected to unveil its Alder Lake-S processors in late October.