The Trouble with Atom

For all the praise and support the Intel Atom processor has received and so far, there is merely ane big trouble that all solutions based on it have had to face from day 1: the dodgy old chipset that Intel decided to pair it with.

In a move that can only exist considered as insane, Intel went with the old ability hungry 945G chipset for supporting the Atom. This chipset alone consumes 22 watts and in the procedure provides users with a poor graphics engine. Sadly, this has rendered the Cantlet useless for a number of tasks that otherwise they would be platonic for, such equally a HTPC. The 945G chipset is the biggest reason why the Cantlet has been limited to bones give-and-take processing, Cyberspace surfing and email apply.

Although the original single-core Atom N270 was kind of underwhelming, nosotros institute it ample for the basic tasks it was designed for. The dual-core Atom 330 provided actress guts, but the chipset constraint would even so drag it downward for any other potential uses.

The announcement of the Ion platform meant pairing Nvidia's GeForce 9400M (MCP79) chipset forth with DDR3-1066 or DDR2-800 retentiveness, with the Intel Cantlet processor. Essentially this enables 1080p HD playback, as much of the work tin can exist offloaded to the GPU.

The starting time small form cistron Ion-based computers were launched around April-May 2009 with an introductory asking price of $300. These Ion computers were DirectX ten and OpenGL 3.ii capable, allowing for full 1080p high-definition video playback and 7.ane surround sound audio output. Despite the potential of the Atom/Ion duo, manufacturers have been quite slow to deliver. Nonetheless, equally Intel's pressure on manufacturers for not using Ion seems to exist dissipating, nettops go along to gain momentum with at least one-half a dozen manufacturers getting products ready.

The Asrock Ion 330 serial start at $350 for which you can become a consummate working computer capable of running Windows 7 and equipped with a more capable GPU than annihilation we've been able to see in this category until this day.