Intel 8 Series Not Compatible With Broadwell, Bi-Directional Backward Compatibility Issues

According to a VR-Zone report Haswell and Broadwell could use significantly different electrical arrangements on the CPU pin contacts . What this basically means is that there will be bi-directional backward compatibility issues with Haswell processors. Haswell CPUs may not work in Intel 9 Series motherboards (Z97/H91/B95…etc) and Broadwell CPUs may not work in Intel 8 Series (Z87/H81/B85…etc) motherboards. The reason for this is explained by VR-Zone as:

“The most notable changes are in the V_PROC_IO connection, as it requires a 1.05V power source, VCCST, because of a new type of power supply required, and to THRMTRIP because of a slightly different chip topology.”

What this means is that only motherboards which support the Haswell “refresh” chips will support Broadwell CPUs. We are currently on the Haswell generation of CPUs, there will be a new refreshed generation of CPUs based on Haswell architecture shrinking down from the 22nm process to the 14nm process and then there will be Broadwell which will use the 14nm process but use a redesigned architecture. If VR-Zone are correct then all three CPU generations will share the LGA 1150 socket but only Haswell Refresh and Broadwell CPUs will work together on their respective motherboards and the current Haswell generation will only work on current Haswell motherboards.

VR-Zone’s sources also state that there is mixed information on whether Broadwell has DDR4 support or not. It is confirmed that the Intel 9 Series chipset has SATA Express support.

Images courtesy of VR-Zone