Nvidia ION claims tenfold graphics boost

And ten hour battery life

Nvidia has officially launched its next-generation graphics chipset at CeBit in Hannover, Germany.

The new ION 2010 architetcture, which Nvidia insists offers ten times the graphics grunt of the previous iteration, is designed to work alongside Intel's integrated GMA3150 graphics chipset in netbooks and other low power devices.

Exteneded battery life, which is being quoted at ten hours, is courtesy of NV's Optimus technology, which switches the graphics workload seamlessly between the two GPUs depending on the demand.

We're willing to bet that the 10-hour quoted battery life doesn't include too much HD video playback or hardcore gaming.

We're told, however, that the chipset will happily cope with DX10 gaming which will be good news for mobile WoW fans but not much use to Crysis aficionados.

Nvidia reckons the new chippery will tip up in more than 30 devices from companies like Asus, AsRock and Zotac by summer this year.

There's no firm word on pricing as yet but you can expect the ION 2010 chips to add $50 to $60 to the price of your mini luggable.