CeBIT 2008 Day 1 - New Intel Chipsets, Atom on Display, and lots from AMD/NVIDIA

Intel's 4-Series Chipsets: Everywhere

Despite lacking an official launch, Intel gave motherboard vendors the green light to display motherboards based on its upcoming 4-series chipsets due out in Q2 of this year.

The chipsets are P45, G45, G43, and X48. The G45 chipset includes the new Intel GMA X4500 HD graphics core which adds support for H.264 decode acceleration, something that has been absent from all previous Intel integrated graphics solutions. Hardware H.264 decode acceleration is not included in G43 (the G43 only uses the X4500 GPU, without the HD suffix).

Both the G45 and G43 support HDMI/DVI/Display Port and have dual channel memory controllers, but the G43 only allows 1 DIMM per channel vs. 2 on the G45.

All of these chipsets support 1333MHz FSB and DDR3 up to 1333MHz (except the G43 only supports up to 1066MHz DDR3).

The big feature is that all of these new chipsets are built on Intel's 65nm process for the MCH vs. 90nm for the older 3-series generation. The smaller manufacturing process should mean that they draw much less power.

abit's IP45 based on the P45 chipset

abit's IP45 Pro, also based on the P45 chipset

abit's IX48-MAX based on the Intel X48 chipset

Albatron's PX48 motherboard based on the Intel X48 chipset

ASRock's X48 motherboard

Biostar's T-Power I45 based on the P45 chipset; note the jumpers used to switch between a single PCIe x16 slot and two x8s, all Gen2

Foxconn's G43 based motherboard

And G45 from Foxconn

Foxconn's motherboards are "Green" in that they include power saving techniques such as reducing the number of phases used in their power delivery system during idle periods.

Gigabyte's G45 motherboard

MSI's P45 based P45 Diamond

A closer look at the P45 MCH

We've only shown off a handful of 4-series motherboards here, but their presence at CeBIT was nothing short of impressive. It reminds us of the old days of chipset launches. Intel is definitely looking to migrate quickly to the new 4-series.