Nvidia Chief confirms ION price: 3x more expensive than Atom
July 3, 2009 at 6:24 pm
There has been much speculation as to how much Nvidia’s ION platform costs netbook manufacturers. Now Nvidia’s Chief Executive, Jen-Hsun Huang, has unveiled the price via an interview with the French La Tribune newspaper. It appears that the ION platform (GeForce 9400M GPU + Atom CPU) is approximately three times more expensive when compared to Intel’s own platform.
“[The price of Nvidia Ion chip] is between $30 and $35. This is significant, but it is [needed] to have a good high definition video on the screen,” said Jen-Hsun Huang. Intel recently confirmed that it was charging more for the Atom processor than it does when combined with the Intel chipset.
According to reports, Intel sells its Atom processor for $45 per unit. However, if this is combined with the chipset, then Intel charges just $25, a huge discount and a significant competitive barrier for ION’s success. Whilst one could buy the cheaper package and swap the chipset for ION, the process is both cost and time prohibitive.
Therefore, if a manufacturer wants to use ION, then you are looking at a total cost of $75 to $80 – over three times more expensive compared to the standard Intel package. Despite this, the ION platform is in demand and it appears that many people would be willing to pay the premium for the increase in performance.
Via X-bit labs.
July 3rd, 2009 7:05 PM
Hope the $ is below 400 mark. ION seems worthy. I wonder how Tegra would pan out !!
July 4th, 2009 10:14 AM
$80 is nothing, seriously. £80 is bringing the smackdown on the wallet. I hope it is $80.
July 16th, 2009 2:23 PM
I completely agree with nuke1, in the grand scheme of things… $80, what’s all the fuss about? I thought they mean that one was £100 and the other was £300. They always find something to whinge about…
July 17th, 2009 6:30 PM
“Whilst one could buy the cheaper package and swap the chipset for ION, the process is both cost and time prohibitive.”
How exactly is it time and cost prohibitive to get two pieces of silicon and throw one of them away? Intel doesn’t provide these already soldered to a main board or does it?