With many builders still sticking to DDR4, Intel is reportedly lining up a new family called Raptor Lake Next. Expect a debut in H1 2027; it won’t be a clean-slate generation but rather a third refresh of the Raptor Lake line that underlies the 13th and 14th gen silicon.
The headline: compatibility with the familiar LGA 1700 and support for cheaper DDR4 RAM. That lets budget-focused rigs squeeze more performance without being forced into DDR5 (yes, DDR4 again—some people will cheer, others will gripe).
Intel plans to offer these parts alongside its Nova Lake flagship CPUs aimed at higher-end DDR5 builds, so you’ll see both directions in the market at once rather than a hard cutover.
A couple of mobo makers have reportedly already said they’ll ramp production of LGA 1700 boards with DDR4 slots to meet demand — proof there’s still appetite for affordable upgrade paths.
Specs are still under wraps, but Intel’s work on Intel 7 process tech will likely carry over. Case in point: the industrial Bartlett Lake chips, which use only P-cores. The top model, the Core 9 273PQE, packs 12 P-cores — more "big" cores than the Core i9-14900K’s 8 P + 16 E arrangement — an eyebrow-raising configuration if you care about core balance and workloads.
Bottom line (personal take): for anyone who’s already on an LGA 1700 board, this could be a welcome way to extend that platform’s life. Keep your mobo and DDR4, drop in newer silicon — less pain, less cash outlay — and you avoid jumping to LGA 1851 and DDR5 unless you really want to.