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Nvidia ION 2 set to launch by end of year?

October 27, 2009 at 2:55 pm


Nvidia IONWe are only now just starting to see Nvidia’s ION chipset hitting netbooks and the general consensus appears to be that it was well worth the wait (despite a hit to battery life). However, Fudzilla is reporting that ION 2 is scheduled to launch before the year is out and will deliver twice the graphical power of its predecessor.

I’d take the news with a pinch of salt as Nvidia would no want to cannibalize sales so soon after ION’s launch. Personally, I’d be surprised if we saw ION 2 netbooks before Q2 2010. The interesting part is that we are expected to see switchable graphics next year that will allow you to disable the Nvidia GPU to preserve the battery when not needed. That could be a real killer feature for netbooks going forward, marring an uncompromised computing experience with strong battery life.

In other news, Fudzilla is also reporting that netbooks based on 1.66GHz Atom Pineview processors will see their Intel suggested retail price drop from $299 to $249-$299. Whether this translates to cheaper netbooks for the end-consumer remains to be seen.

Comments

414 Responses to “Nvidia ION 2 set to launch by end of year?”

  1. SpencerUk said:
    October 27th, 2009 6:35 PM

    Ion isn’t even proven yet and already in the works for a second version..heh

  2. nuke1 said:
    October 27th, 2009 7:50 PM

    How on eath would it cannibalize sales? The original ION only pairs Nvidia 9400M with Intel’s Atom processor, whereas the ION2 chipset(s) is to pair it with other types of processors, such as CULV. Granted it will be pairing it with VIA NANO, but then that’s just giving ION2 wider coverage. And still, the chipset is to pair it with other mobile processors.

    So essentially, ION2 is aimed at a different market.

  3. Jet Sun said:
    October 27th, 2009 8:36 PM

    But remember Nvidia has roadmaps in place with the various manufacturers. These companies (Asus, Samsung, HP etc) wouldn’t be too happy if their snazzy new ION netbooks releasing this quarter were suddenly made redundant by devices armed with ION 2.

  4. nuke1 said:
    October 28th, 2009 12:00 AM

    @ Jet Sun,

    Clearly this would be the fault of those ODMs as they waited for Win7, no? Nvidia launched it a long while back. Besides, the number of nettops incorporating ION are many.

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