It’s being reported by Digitimes that Intel is planning to cut the prices of its 8th and 9th generation CPUs by as much as 15 per cent. This move seems motivated by the forthcoming arrival of the next generation of AMD Ryzen CPUs, based on AMD’s Zen 2 architecture.
The next-generation Ryzen CPUs introduce support for PCI-E 4, as well as up to 16 cores in one AM4 CPU that costs $750 US (around £706 inc VAT), thanks to the use of two 8-core chiplets in the same package. They’re potentially a compelling alternative to Intel’s mainstream and HEDT CPUs, especially when the 16-core Core i9-9960X currently costs £1,650 inc VAT.
Intel’s VP of marketing has downplayed the significance of PCI-E 4 at E3 this year, but it seems that Intel is nonetheless starting to worry about the threat from AMD.