Ion Platform For Atom Tested With Games, HD Video

J. Dzhugashvili writes "Nvidia has already pulled the curtain off its Ion platform, which couples GeForce 9400 integrated graphics with Intel's Atom processor. But how does it perform? The Tech Report has taken the tiny Ion reference system for a spin in games and video decoding to see if the GeForce GPU really helps. The verdict? 1080p playback is actually smooth, and the whole system only draws 25W during playback. Fast-paced action games are another story—Half-Life 2, Quake Wars, and Call of Duty 4 are all choppy with a single Atom core and single-channel RAM, although they do run. TR concludes that Ion is nevertheless a clear improvement over Intel's 945G chipset, especially since Nvidia doesn't expect Ion-based Atom systems to cost significantly more than all-Intel ones." Update: 02/04 09:14 GMT by T : HotHardware is one of the several other sites offering some performance benchmark numbers on the new chipset.

Comments

Re:nVidia is doomed.

[Bearhouse]

Insightful. If one looks at the post here today:

http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/02/02/2344208

About the new Acer with Intel's highly-integrated N280/GN40 chipset, you've got to wonder about the long-term viability of nVidia.

Re:But the real question is-

[frieko]

If I may take a moment to be a smartass: Assuming your P4 has a 25 watt power supply, the internet is about infinity times faster.