Not all NVIDIA ION machines are created equal

Not all NVIDIA ION machines are created equal – Video

The HP/Compaq Mini 311 and Lenovo IdeaPad S12 are two of the first laptops available with NVIDIA’s ION chipset which combines and Intel Atom CPU with an NVIDIA GeForce 9400M graphics processor. And Johannes at NewGadgets.de happens to have one of each right now, so did the sensible thing and pitted the two machines against one another in a battle to the death. Or at least a battle to see which machine performed better on the 3DMark 2001 graphics benchmark.

You can see the results in the video below. You don’t have to speak German to get the gist, but here’s the short version: Both machines perform pretty well when it comes to displaying 3D graphics. But as the video goes on, you can see that the Lenovo IdeaPad S12 is lagging a bit behind the Compaq Mini 311. At the end, you can see that the HP laptop finishes the test first and gets a total score of 7121 while the Lenovo machine scored 6030.

You can check out the video for the blow by blow action after the break.

Update: As has been pointed out in the comments, the Compaq Mini 311 in this test is running Windows XP, while the Lenovo IdeaPad S12 is running Windows 7, which could explain some of the disparity. It’s also possible that differences in hard drives, RAM, or other hardware could play a factor. It’s not a perfect test, but it’s probably the same one I would have run, since these are the two machines that happen to be available at the moment (although the HP Mini 311 is now available with Windows 7, in the US at least).

Update 2: Johannes installed Windows 7 on the Compaq Mini 311 and now both laptops get similar scores (6056 for the Compaq Mini and 6043 for the Lenovo S12).

Posted on Saturday, November 14th, 2009, 3:52 pm by Brad Linder

MonkeyKing1969

Well, that is all well and good…but what does it mean is a total score of 7121 compaired to 6030 a significant amount? Or better stated would you notice playing a game?
Kadath

What the heck kind of test is this? The Mini 311 is running XP and the S12 is running 7. Install 7 on the Mini 311 and redo this test.

I'm not saying running XP will result in a better score, or that 7 results in a worse score, but at least have both machines running the same OS!

As a side note, the video seems to indicate that the Mini 311's display has better color saturation, with better contrast than the S12's. If you're going to be doing a lot of movie watching and/or gaming on one of these machines, it looks like the Mini 311 would be a better choice.
michael

Do you think the Atom and ION combination machines would survive since now the faster culv processor machines are becoming so cheap? Eg the Acer 1410?

I rather have an overall fast machine than a machine that is so very good in graphics but crap in all other areas.
Kadath

There's a place for both.

That is, until we see ION with CULV processors.
eK

No one seems to notice that the 311 has DDR3 1066 RAM… that's the difference right there.
Dave Clarke

CULV processors are for work, ION is for play (movies). You can't play games or 1080 HD on a non-ion netbook, and good luck running anything that needs processor power on an atom. If you can get a decent graphics chip and a decent processor (like the dv2z), then you're in business. Otherwise, you're buying the computer for one purpose or the other.
codedivine

CULVs with dual cores play 1080p just fine and they are faster at everything else too. The only thing CULVs dont do is games.
JohannesNewGadgetsDe

I've installed Win 7 on the HP Compaq 311 and now the 3DMark2001 results are quite the same… (Video will be uploaded soon)
Michael

Depends of which CULV. The Core2Duos like the 7300 and SU9400 can handle nearly everything. I am sure even games. Why even bother with ION when it cost nearly the same?
JohannesNewGadgetsDe

There are more videos available:

S12 + Win7 & 311 + WinXP -> 3DMark 2001: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnLHmtVNbuw
S12 + Win7 & 311 + WinXP -> 3DMark 2006: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu39clF1BkQ
S12 + Win7 & 311 + Win7-> 3DMark 2001: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hP2b8aKz_Q
S12 + Win7 & 311 + Win7-> 3DMark 2006: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnRGreTHXls

The difference between the S12 and the 311 is not that big anymore when they both have Windows 7 on it.
lightsout565

its probably due to the HP 311's 1066 DDR3 RAM
JohannesNewGadgetsDe

There are more videos available:

S12 + Win7 & 311 + WinXP -> 3DMark 2001: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnLHmtVNbuw
S12 + Win7 & 311 + WinXP -> 3DMark 2006: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu39clF1BkQ
S12 + Win7 & 311 + Win7-> 3DMark 2001: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hP2b8aKz_Q
S12 + Win7 & 311 + Win7-> 3DMark 2006: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnRGreTHXls

The difference between the S12 and the 311 is not that big anymore when they both have Windows 7 on it.
lightsout565

its probably due to the HP 311's 1066 DDR3 RAM
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I’m not saying running XP will result in a better score, or that 7 results in a worse score, but at least have both machines running the same OS!

Not all NVIDIA ION machines are created equal – Video

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