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• In most of the comparisons we’ve seen, Ion has been pit against either a low-cost Intel G45-based desktop setup or a 945G-series Atom configuration. Given the strength of its IGP, we took it as a foregone conclusion that this setup would outperform Intel’s own mini-ITX D945GCLF2 Atom board (which incidentally costs $80 to the Ion’s $180). So instead, we built a platform that cost the same amount of money, but relied more heavily on desktop-oriented hardware. We used a Gigabyte MA78GPM-DS2H micro-ATX motherboard (AMD 780G chipset with 128 MB side-port memory), AMD’s recently-released Athlon X2 7850 dual-core CPU, and an Enermax ETK405AST 405W power supply—all of which add up to $187, matching the CPU/motherboard/PSU combo being offered by Zotac. Now, the contention from mini-ITX purists is going to be that our micro-ATX build can’t go into the same places. This is true. And we have a recommendation for the folks who just have to have mini-ITX coming up. It’s more expensive, though, and doesn’t make for an ideal performance comparison to Ion as a result. And just to be clear, we would not recommend our AMD-based build as a better HTPC solution. Its lack of multi-channel LPCM audio (we haven’t even been able to get it to pass-through DD or DTS in Windows 7 with the Reaktek HDMI driver) precludes it from most semi-serious home theater efforts. Test HardwareProcessorsIntel Atom 330 (Diamondville) 1.6 GHz, 441-ball FC-BGA, 533 MHz FSBAMD Athlon X2 7850 BE (Kuma) 2.8 GHz, AM2+, 1,800 MHz HT, 2 MB L3 Cache, Power-savings disabledMotherboardsZotac ION-ITX-A-U Nvidia Ion Graphics Processor, BIOS N0508WZTGigabyte MA78GPM-DS2H (AM2+) 780G/SB700, BIOS F4MemoryCorsair 4 GB (2 x 2 GB) DDR2-1066 5-5-5-15Hard DriveIntel X25-M 80 GB SATA 3 Gb/s Flash SSDGraphicsNvidia GeForce 9300ATI Radeon HD 3200 w/ 128 MB Side-Port MemoryPower Supply Enermax ETK405AST 405W ATX12V v.2.2System Software And DriversOperating SystemWindows Vista Ultimate Edition x86, Service Pack 1 / Windows 7 Release Candidate x86DirectX DirectX 10Platform/Graphics DriverGeForce/Ion 185.85 for Vista/Win7Catalyst 9.4 for Vista/Win7 Benchmarks and Settings3D GamesLeft 4 DeadQuality settings set to Low, 1280x720/720x480, latest Steam version, timed demo.World of WarcraftQuality settings set to Fair, 1280x720/960x600 (Ion) and 800x600 (780G platform), Patch 3.1.1, Ironforge circuit, Fraps (120 seconds).Audio EncodingiTunesVersion: 8.1, 32-bit, Audio CD ("Terminator II" SE), 53 min., Default format AACLame MP3Version: 3.98 (32-bit), Audio CD ""Terminator II" SE, 53 min, wave to MP3, 160 Kb/sVideo EncodingMainconcept Reference 1.6.1MPEG2 to MPEG2 (H.264), MainConcept H.264/AVC Codec, 28 sec HDTV 1920x1080 (MPEG2), Audio: MPEG2 (44.1 KHz, 2 Channel, 16-Bit, 224 Kb/s), Mode: PAL (25 FPS), Profile: Tom’s Hardware Settings for Qct-CoreApplicationsWinrar 3.80Version 3.80, Benchmark: THG-Workload (334 MB)Winzip 12Version 12, Compression=Best, Benchmark: THG-Workload (334 MB)Synthetic Benchmarks and Settings3DMark VantageVersion: 1.02, GPU and CPU scoresPCMark VantageVersion: 1.00, System, Memory, Hard Disk Drive benchmarks, Windows Media Player 10.00.00.3646SiSoftware Sandra 2009 SP3CPU Test=CPU Arithmetic/MultiMedia, Memory Test=Bandwidth Benchmark

• We removed the Ion platform from its box with a certain amount of excitement; it’s an object that inspires fascination. Being accustomed to the Mac mini, we were genuinely surprised by its compactness—we couldn’t believe such a complete platform could fit in there. Of course, we got out our screwdriver and took a look inside. First came the cover panel that protects the hard disk--a 200 GB Seagate Momentus 7200.2. The main entrance, though, is via the other side of the micro-case. You slide back the top cover, and then the motherboard becomes visible. The Ion is, in fact, made up of two PCBs stacked on top of each other inside the chassis. The first is the motherboard itself. The Atom processor is mounted on it, next to the chipset. They’re both covered by a thin aluminum radiator with a 40 mm x 10 mm fan in its center. Judging from its size, we can already surmise that the cooling system will provide minimal heat dissipation. In addition to the processor and chipset, mounted on the motherboard are the necessary connectors for making this a standalone PC: Serial ATA (SATA), Gigabit Ethernet, Dual-Link DVI and USB 2.0 ports, and even an HDMI port. What about the RAM? It goes into the back of the motherboard, in a SO-DIMM slot. To suit the occasion, Nvidia has used DDR3 memory. While still more expensive than DDR2, DDR3 is a good choice here. Its higher frequency guarantees increased bandwidth to the CPU, and more importantly to the chipset and its integrated graphics core, the main memory is used as the video frame buffer. It’s also more power-friendly, which is right on target for a platform touted for its low power consumption. One final connector on the motherboard, which we couldn't immediately identify, serves to connect the motherboard with its daughterboard on the level below. Despite its proprietary physical format, this port is surely a PCI Express. It has to supply enough bandwidth for all possible connections to the daughterboard—and there’s a number of them: SATA (used by the internal hard disk), two eSATA, six USB, eight-channel analog audio, and digital optical. This port also supplies power to the motherboard, so the latter isn’t entirely autonomous. In all, our Ion reference PC has no less than: 2 internal SATA ports 2 eSATA ports 7 USB 2.0 ports 6 analog audio jacks 1 S/PDIF audio connector 1 DVI Dual Link connector 1 VGA connector 1 HDMI connector 1 Gigabit Ethernet connector It’s a pleasure to see such complete connectivity on such a small PC. Let’s hope that the nettops based on the Ion platform will keep this decisive advantage of the reference design.

• Editor's Corner: Nvidia’s Ion Revisited, 7.1 Ch. LPCM Fixed

  When I first looked at Nvidia’s Ion platform last month, I tested in three different ways: as a desktop PC, as a gaming system, and as a home theater machine. Of course, this meant a lot of extra time was spent actually using the configuration that Zotac sent my way. During the course of testing, I convinced myself that I’d never be truly happy with Ion as a desktop system, even under Windows 7—the operating environment I used, assuming Vista would be too cumbersome. It was just too slow. Sitting there waiting for menus to pop and apps to open just isn’t my gig—and I suspect many of the enthusiasts who read Tom’s Hardware would feel the same about a new technology purchase. I also wasn’t impressed enough with Ion’s gaming performance to recommend it in such a role. Sure, I could jog around Ironforge using Fair settings in World of Warcraft, but who spends close to $200 on a motherboard/processor for that? When it comes to gaming, you could do much better for the money, or even a little more money. Intel suggested that Ion was overkill last week at Computex, and it was right. Nvidia’s GeForce 9300 platform is more chipset than the Atom processor can handle. Though, to be fair, we’re expecting more out of the architecture here than Intel designed it to deliver. Nevertheless, if there was one segment in which I suspected Ion might be able to succeed, it was the HTPC market, where GeForce 9300 could offload playback of HD video content and, hopefully, factor Atom right out of the picture. Ion In The Theater Given the platform’s GeForce 9300 foundation, which includes the latest generation of Nvidia’s PureVideo (VP3) technology, hardware offload of MPEG-2, VC-1, and AVC (H.264) is fully enabled—a good omen for using an Atom-based PC in a home theater environment. Additionally, the chipset was said to support 7.1-channel LPCM audio over its HDMI output. Now, this feature is more important than you might realize at first. If you’re watching Blu-ray content on a big-screen TV in a home theater, there’s also a good chance you’re using six- or eight-channel surround sound. There are actually a few different ways to achieve multi-channel audio with your HTPC. Perhaps most familiar to the PC crowd is through a TOSLINK optical (or S/PDIF coaxial) output connected to your receiver. You can transmit encoded Dolby Digital and DTS signals over an optical cable, but not Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD Master Audio—the two optional, lossless formats commonly featured on Blu-ray movies. In order to play back TrueHD (with a maximum bitrate of 18 Mb/s) or DTS-HD (with a maximum bitrate of 24.5 Mb/s), you have to use an HDMI 1.3 connection. Hallelujah, Ion has that. From there, you have two options. You can either pass the encoded Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD signal to your receiver, which performs the decode and plays back the lossless studio soundtrack in all of its glory, or use your DVD software to decode the signal and pass multi-channel linear PCM over the HDMI output (so long as it’s supported). The problem with the former is that it requires a protected audio path—otherwise your decoding software will fall back to lossy codecs like Dolby Digital and DTS. We’re still waiting on a chipset that’ll do this, but right now the only component in the lab capable of it is Asus’ Xonar HDAV 1.3 sound card, a $200+ add-on. Incidentally, this is how you get your receiver to light up with the TrueHD or DTS-HD logos (meaning the receiver is leveraging its built-in decoding capabilities). The problem with the latter is that it requires specific platform support. For instance, ATI’s 780G/790GX will only pass stereo LPCM (you can do AC3 and DTS, though). Nvidia's GeForce 9300 and Intel's G45 both support 7.1-channel LPCM over HDMI.  As an aside, and for the record, this is the way Sony’s Playstation 3 is able to serve up TrueHD and DTS-HD playback. You don’t get the little lights on your receiver flashing Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD Master Audio, but you can view the playback status as a movie is playing and see the PS3 is doing the decoding, then sending uncompressed LPCM to your receiver.    Well, Ion supposedly supported multi-channel LPCM via HDMI. However, in my initial review, I revealed that, despite Nvidia’s claims, Ion wasn’t outputting multi-channel audio in either Windows Vista or Windows 7, in either PowerDVD 9 or TotalMedia Theater 3. Had it been a persistent flaw, that would have been a deal-breaker for Ion as an HTPC solution. Fortunately, I was able to work with both Nvidia and CyberLink to get PowerDVD 9 working properly under Windows 7. The latest build, 1719, properly enables multi-channel LPCM output via HDMI (TotalMedia Theatre still doesn’t work).