The launch details rumors started with two slides from XFastest, spotted by Videocardz.com, stating that the Core i9-9900K, Core i7-9700K, and the Core i5-9600K could launch in Q1 2019 or Q3 2018, starting an avalanche of rumors.

The latest set of slides on the other hand, which are also more detailed, come from HKEPC and pins the date to October 2018. Slides also show that the 9th gen Core series will launch alongside the Intel Z390 chipset motherboards, as well as Basin Falls Refresh Core X-series HEDT CPUs, which will have up to 18 cores and 165W TDP. Leaked slides also reveal that the review embargo on Coffee Lake-S Refresh SKUs is also set for October 2018.

We already wrote about Intel's upcoming 9th generation Core Coffee Lake-S Refresh CPUs earlier and these three SKUs should keep Intel going until it gets its 10nm process sorted. According to earlier details, Intel killed Hyper-Threading on its upcoming Core i7 and Core i5 parts, as only the flagship Core i9-9900K will have eight cores and 16-threads.

AMD has put a lot of pressure on Intel with its Ryzen lineup, pushing the company to squeeze as much performance as possible from its aging architecture and 14nm manufacturing process.