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<font size=3>See
<a href="http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=791&type=expert" eudora="autourl">
http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=791&type=expert</a><br><br>
Key excerpts below<br><br>
-- Mache<br><br>
<i>Chipsets, the other NVIDIA market <br><br>
While Fermi was definitely the focus of the GPU Technology Conference, we
took the chance to pose some questions about ION and other chipsets to
the NVIDIA personnel on site. ION has seen moderate success in the
world of low power and low cost computers though I would say that the
number of implementations using
<a href="http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=663">the ION chipset</a>
have been fewer than expected. NVIDIA still alludes to the
pressures of Intel as the key factor of ION adoption which, even if true,
won't change a thing for NVIDIA in terms of market share or
profits. <br>
<br>
The future of ION is in doubt as well; remember that Intel will be
pushing for further technology integration with the
<a href="http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=715">upcoming Pine Trail
release</a> that moves a basic graphics core onto the CPU die. When
that occurs, system integrators like ASUS and HP might find it even more
of a stretch to spend the extra money on the ION chipset. NVIDIA's
plans for countering that trend will be to offer a discrete version of a
GPU under the ION brand that will remove the MCP features lowering costs
and probably power requirements. Whether or not this change is what
"ION 2" will materialize as is yet unknown. <br><br>
Finally, we have an update pending for the killer feature that would make
ION-based netbooks and nettops truly irresistible: GPU-accelerated
Flash. We saw this feature
<a href="http://www.pcper.com/comments.php?nid=7254">first previewed at
Computex last June</a> and even though there are announcements coming
VERY SOON on this new player revision, it will likely be sometime in Q2
2010 before Adobe Flash Player includes GPU acceleration out of the
box. I know many people that would love to put an EeeBox on their
home theater that could run Hulu reliably - I am one of them and eagerly
await the day we can do so! </font></i></body>
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