Intels LGA 2011 Socket & Chipset Pictures Leaked

Hot on the heels of Intel’s P67 chipset comes some photos of the replacement for the X58 platform. What has been found on an overseas website is a picture of the LGA2011 socket itself and the bare southbridge chip on an unnamed X68 MSI motherboard.

The X68 chipset will take the place as Intel’s new enthusiast level platform, the former being LGA1366. Processors will feature an updated architecture with chips sporting 6, 8 or 12 cores and quad channel DDR3 support. Due to size constraints, it appears that there will only be four DIMM slots, two either side of the CPU, limiting it to 16GB of RAM with current DDR3 4GB modules. Since the price of 4GB modules has dropped significantly, we’ll start to see 8GB become mainstream soon enough. Another major change is the split of the northbridge chipset by moving the 32-lane PCI-E controller onto the CPU die.

Also found on the site are the same blurred pictures of sockets from Intel Z68 and AMD 990 AM3+ sockets, the latter of which was found at this year’s CES. Anticipated release date of the X68 should be Q3 of 2011 so stay tuned for more details.

Here are the first pictures of Intel’s new high-end CPU socket, the 2011-pin land grid array (LGA2011). A selection of pictures of an unannounced motherboard by MSI made it to the internet. LGA2011, coupled with a new chipset, the Intel X68 Express, will drive the company’s new high-end and enthusiast-grade processors that feature 6, 8, or 12 cores, and quad-channel DDR3 memory controllers.