Well, I have a Core i7-11700 with a B560 motherboard, and I haven't experienced any of the "buggy mess" every media outlet was writing about at launch. I think it all comes down to 1. motherboard choice and quality, and 2. the media writing about every small thing like it was the end of the world just to gain readers/viewers.
It's easy to hate on the latest Intel products without trying them first hand. I've had several Ryzen 3000 and 5000 series CPUs, as well as my 11700 right now, and I'm actually happier with Intel. It is easier to cool in a SFF case with limited airflow, its BIOS options are much clearer and easier to understand, it doesn't need any stupid chipset software to run properly like the Ryzen 3000 series does, and it behaves much better during idle by just adapting to Windows power settings.
Edit: About the "paying beta tester" mentality: I agree that it's at play here, and it's wrong. People tend to advocate choosing a fresh platform with a fresh socket for long-term compatibility. As for me, I tend to go with the last generation of a specific platform to make sure I get something that's well-tested by the public and all issues have been ironed out.
Saying the B560 was a smooth launch is kinda missing the point because the B560 was little more than a rebrand of existing silicon. The only thing new in B560 was some additional USB 3.2 support trickled down from higher chipsets in the 400-series and everything else that it offered was either just a change in artificial product segmentation mandated by Intel (Rocket Lake support, unlocks, higher RAM frequencies etc). It was tried-and-tested hardware getting the benefit of trickle-down technology - the literal definition of "playing it safe" for the mass market by Intel.
I'm not even going to bring up AMD here; Just within Intel's own platform history the Z490 was a complete mess. The Z590 didn't do much better despite Intel delaying it two months from CES to their second re-announcement, followed by a month or two to get products on shelves and for vendors to get their initial buggy BIOSes fixed up by a version or two.
For this reason, I avoid Z-series flagship boards whenever possible, choosing H-series or B-series depending on the features needed.
Getting back to the topic at hand, if Intel can't even get Coffee Lake > Comet Lake > Rocket Lake right - all of which are very similar architectures, specs, and sharing the same RAM type, what makes you think they can be trusted for Alder Lake?
- new architecture,
- new cores, and mixed core types for the first time.
- new socket,
- new RAM type,
- new PCIe version.
I mean, I would
*like* the launch to go well so that we, the consumers, win - but my expectations are extremely low and they are not wild guesses but based on
plenty of empirical data.
I'm being optimistic when I say that Alder Lake Z-series might be what I'd call ready for headache-free mainstream users by the time its replacement is officially announced.
Not really a valid comparison as the DDR5 kit you refer to is JEDEC standard speed and timings while the Viper Steel are overclocked DDR4 chips that were originally rated from the manufacturer to run at 2133-2666 1.2v.
This argument has come up every single time there's a new memory technology since as long as I can remember.
Cheap, stable, abundant "overclocked" DDR4
coexists in the market at the same time as expensive, unproven, low-clocked DDR5. Whether you
like the comparison or not doesn't change the fact that those are your only two options.
You can't compare heavily-overclocked DDR5 with heavily-overclocked DDR4 because those two things aren't competing in the market at the same time.
