Even with Nova Lake rumors swirling and the newest Arrow Lake refresh chips incomes excessive reward, Intel sees advantages in supporting its older-generation {hardware} as worth options.
“Raptor Lake will proceed to be abundantly out there,” Robert Hallock, VP and GM of Intel’s Fanatic Channel Enterprise, tells Club386. He additionally means that new DDR4-supporting motherboards are within the works.
Within the wake of the DDR5 reminiscence disaster, the place costs have skyrocketed and availability has cratered, players and PC fans are discovering novel methods to proceed having fun with their hobbies. One technique is to change to older platforms that help DDR4 reminiscence, which is cheaper and extra broadly out there. That does current consumers with fewer choices for CPUs and motherboards, however Intel is seeking to help these efforts by its {hardware} technique.
“Raptor Lake is a giant a part of our technique,” Hallock says. “It’s nonetheless actually, actually good, even with a number of generations of {hardware} from different distributors coming after it, so it’s not going anyplace.”
Certainly, Intel’s Core Extremely 200 CPUs have solely actually simply eclipsed Intel’s thirteenth and 14th Technology chips in gaming with the Arrow Lake refresh 250K and 270K Plus designs. Though they cannot maintain up in opposition to AMD’s prime X3D chips, the worth proposition adjustments dramatically while you issue within the excessive price of reminiscence for constructing one thing current-generation. If players and fans can get a lot of the efficiency they need from an older Raptor Lake system with DDR4, that is typically the smarter purchase in 2026.
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(Credit score: ASRock)
Essentially the most intriguing assertion from Hallock, nonetheless, involved DDR4 motherboards. There, Hallock mentioned: “You’ve additionally seen some new motherboard bulletins that help each DDR4 and DDR5 on Raptor Lake, as sort of like a bridge between worlds for individuals. That’s reflective of our general confidence and expectations.”
So, Intel is conscious of the DDR4 motherboard hype and needs to be part of that, it appears. Maybe we’ll see extra, lower-cost DDR4 motherboards that help these older socket designs and provides players that pathway to a brand new PC that is not operating absolutely the cutting-edge equipment. Higher but, we would see extra boards just like the ASRock H610M Combo II, which encompasses a slot for DDR4 and twin slots for DDR5, opening up the choice for future reminiscence generational upgrades with out the necessity to substitute the motherboard and CPU, too.
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Jon Martindale
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Jon Martindale is a tech journalist from the UK, with 20 years of expertise masking all method of PC elements and related devices. He is written for a spread of publications, together with ExtremeTech, Digital Traits, Forbes, U.S. Information & World Report, and Lifewire, amongst others. When not writing, he is a giant board gamer and reader, with a selected behavior of speed-reading by lengthy manga sagas.
Jon covers the newest PC elements, in addition to how-to guides on every little thing from take a screenshot to arrange your cryptocurrency pockets. He significantly enjoys the battles between the highest tech giants in CPUs and GPUs, and tries his finest to not take sides.
Jon’s gaming PC is constructed across the iconic 7950X3D CPU, with a 7900XTX backing it up. That is all the ability he must play light-weight indie and informal video games, in addition to extra demanding sim titles like Kerbal House Program. He makes use of a pair of Jabra Energetic 8 earbuds and a SteelSeries Arctis Professional wi-fi headset, and kinds all day on a Logitech G915 mechanical keyboard.
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