Dimitri John Ledkov of Canonical has conveyed to the Ubuntu release team to remove the Ubuntu Desktop i386 daily builds, beta, and final. There will no longer be any "ubuntu-desktop-i386.iso" produced. There is no longer any effective QA or testing being done on the Ubuntu i386 desktop image on actual 32-bit-only hardware. As well, most x86 systems in the past decade support x86_64, Ubuntu modern doesn't run too well on dated hardware, etc.
While the 32-bit Ubuntu desktop image is being dropped, the 32-bit package archive will remain along with the 32-bit net installer image, the mini.iso image, and other artifacts of Ubuntu's 32-bit support. As such, it will be possible for existing Ubuntu 32-bit users to upgrade to 17.10 via the package upgrade process and it will also be possible to install 32-bit packages on Ubuntu 64-bit, such as for Steam Linux gaming.
Ledkov communicated this action a few minutes ago on ubuntu-release.
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