Smart Home Blog

All users of HTPC based on Atom processor and nVidia Ion graphics should know the GPU acceleration works pretty well for HD movies and doesn’t work for Flash video at all. That’s really bad because more and more online services stream 1080p video. But likely situation is changed and Linux users can utilize GPU power for Flash video decoding with new Adobe Flash Player 10.2. Just download and install it. Firefox should start using it immediately. Chrome users should do a simple manual configuration – type about:plugins in the address bar to open config page, press button Details, find option Flash, disable stock player version and enable new one. That’s it. Now you may enjoy HD video from Youtube or some other online strimming service.

[via Aleutia Blog]

Finally nVidia confirmed that the next generation of its popular platform Ion will be released in Q1 of 2010. That’s good news for all who’d like to have a compact and power HTPC. The nVidia Ion2 will be compatible with Intel’s new Pine Trail platform and it should be faster and more energy efficient. So, if you decided to buy Ion based motherboard or nettop it’d be better to wait a bit. Because the new Ion 2 will give you more options while price to the Ion 1 products should be reduced.