WeerI wish they would spend their time on the Dual-Core N300 models instead of an overclocked N270. But the GN40 is just what we needed.

tkpenaltyA dual core atom is not necessary considering how hyper threading abolishes the issue with single core. The main gains from the N280 platform doesnt come from the CPU but the chipset as you said.

Anyone have any specs on the GN40? Hope they'll be using something like a GMAX3100

tkpenaltyA dual core atom is not necessary considering how hyper threading abolishes the issue with single core. The main gains from the N280 platform doesnt come from the CPU but the chipset as you said.

Anyone have any specs on the GN40? Hope they'll be using something like a GMAX3100

lemonadesodaLet's hope GN40 and Atom N280 support 64bit, VT, and SSE or GPU media acceleration (e.g. MPEG4, DivX movies)

Wile EA dual core Atom would spank all current offerings, even if they disabled HT on dual core models.

newtekie1The single core Atom is good enough for media applications, when paired with a decent GPU. My N270 does 720p H264 files just fine, and 1080p just kind of stutters with the GMA950. A better GPU would take the video decoding work load off the CPU more.

Musselsthe point is, the atom is too slow for a media PC use in a single core. we need the dual cores for the greater CPU power with H264 files - GPU acceleration just doesnt work on files, we NEED the CPU power.

(that said, i am 100% for the new chipset. the power savings from the chipset could be spent on another CPU core)

DaJMastaIt may be true, but this generation dual core atoms can't offer it. Find a atom 330 review, while some synthetic tests run near 100% performance increase, most real world apps struggle to see 20% gains with the dual core version, with some even turning out slower on the dual core than on the single core atom. Coupled with the drastically increased TDP, it's no surprise no netbook manufacturers have used the 330. That's why a 1.86 GHz chip may be exactly what we need.... if it's the same TDP then you get the same real world performance increase from an almost 20% boost in clock speed. Then with a higher FSB you get more bandwidth to lessen the bottleneck between the CPU and GPU sharing memory that already exists.

newtekie1What difference does screen res make? The same amount of data has to be decoded from the 720p/1080p media stream. All using a smaller/larger resolution screen does is add in the scaling calculations.

If the Atom was paired with a decent graphics processor, that supported hardware acceleration of HD Video, the Atom would be more than enough for 1080p. This is where I'm hoping nVidia's chipset will come in, as I don't think even the new Intel chipset supports hardware accleration properly.

MusselsGPU acceleration simply doesnt work on files. it ONLY works on disks. since none of these nettops come with a blu ray drive, that means that files are the main media type.
Since my AM2 4000+ struggles for 1080P without third party codecs, i highly doubt the slow atom will be able to handle it. Are you talking 720P anime/TV shows, or are you talking high bitrate (15GB+) blu ray rips?

I know for a fact that higher resolution increases CPU load, because i tested it. raising to 1080i added about 10% higher CPU usage on my TV.

newtekie1Both ATi AVIVO and nVidia PureVideo HD support H264 hardware acceleration if you use the proper software.

newtekie1Then don't use MKV files, MKV is just a containter file.