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Nvidia launches next-gen laptop graphics chips

GeForce 9M series unveiled

Computex Nvidia has taken the wraps off the next incarnation of its notebook-oriented graphics chip line, dubbed unsurprisingly the GeForce 9M series.

The chip maker claimed the parts will be up to 40 per cent faster than their GeForce 8M equivalents and ten times faster than typical laptop-oriented integrated GPUs. That gives them the horsepower needed to support the latest additions to the Blu-ray Disc spec, including dual-stream video for picture-in-picture presentations.

The new 9M GPUs also support a greater range of monitor connections, including DVI, HDMI 1.3 and now DisplayPort 1.1.

Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT

Nvidia's GeForce 9600M GT:

However, Nvidia was most keen to stress the chips' support for Hybrid SLI, allowing them to be partnered with an integrated graphics core - from Nvidia, natch - to co-operatively render 3D graphics and to save power by allowing the discrete part to be turned off when it's not needed, leaving the integrated part to handle basic 2D and 3D graphics.

Nvidia's GeForce 9M line-up includes the 9300M G, the 9500M GS, the 9600M GT and the 9650M GS.

The 9300M, for instance, has 16 unified shader Stream processors and runs at 400MHz. It connects across a 64-bit bus to up to 256MB of DDR2 or GDDR 3 video Ram running at 600MHz. It's got a fill rate of 3.2bn texels per second.

The 9500M ups the shader count to 32 and the core clock speed to 475MHz. This time up to 512MB of memory sits on a 128-bit bus and is clocked to 700MHz. The 9650M is essentially the same part clocked at 625MHz and with memory running at 800MHz. Ditto the 9600M, though its clock settings are not yet known.

Nvidia didn't say when the GeForce 9M family members will ship exactly, but it suggested that machines incorporating them will launch "this summer".

The GPUs will also ship integrated on MXM 3.0 modules.

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