Rumour: nVidia Ion-Powered Apple Mac Mini Coming

Author Hugo Jobling
Published 16th Jan 2009
Rumour: nVidia Ion-Powered Apple Mac Mini Coming
Bookmark and Share discuss this article  3 comments    Email  Email trustedreviews newslettersTrustedReviews Newsletters

Chalk this up to dubious, but according to Tom's Hardware, sources at an nVidia partner have said that Apple has a Mac Mini refresh sporting nVidia's Ion platform in the works. Apparently Apple had some very early prototype systems, before many other partners, no doubt partly by dint by of its collaboration with nVidia on pushing 9400M out, via the recently updated MacBook range. Assuming such a development is happening at all, of course.


Other sites' sources, though, conflict with this report, suggesting that ION will actually see its way into Apple TV boxes. That makes a lot of sense, as the relatively low processing power but very small form factor is a perfect match for the HD media streaming box. Especially with the 9400M chipset's excellent HD decoding capabilities.

That Ion would appear in refreshed Apple TV boxes, rather than Mac Minis, definitely seems more likely. Yes, nettops have their place, but with rivals such as the Dell Studio Hybrid slowly offering compelling (albeit Windows-based) alternatives, Apple surely needs to compete with systems offering similar performance.

There is a possibility, though, that both Atom and Ion-powered and regular Core 2 Duo (or even quad!) Mac Minis could be launched together, obviously having a reasonable pricing gap between them to differentiate the performance difference. Supposedly the new Mac Mini will be launched in March, so feel free to speculate wildly until then.

Link:
Tom's Hardware.

discuss this article  3 comments
Email this article to a friend Email
Bookmark and Share


 

Related Articles

Newsletters

Register to receive the latest Reviews and News Headlines directly to your Inbox every day, and enter our regular competitions. More Info.

Your Name


Email Address


Latest 3 of 3 Comments

Have your say: Leave a comment below about this article.

comment Ohmz said on 16th January 2009

""...with rivals such as the Dell Studio Hybrid slowly offering compelling..."

Aah...

"(albeit Windows-based) alternatives,...&quo... more

comment AndyR said on 16th January 2009

It'll be displayport only, HDMI no way. Also will just be regular DVD as stevie said "BluRay was a bag of hurt".

Shame :(

comment Mathew White said on 17th January 2009

I've been using my 2Ghz Mac Mini as a media centre for 6 months now and slowly encoding lots of video in the hope of one day streaming it over a wireless N netowrk to a scrumm... more

See all 3 comments on this article.

add comment Add your comment

You must be logged in to comment. Login or register here.