Nvidia To Release Scaled Back ION LE

Fudzilla is reporting that has introduced a lower-priced version of its ION chipset, which is branded as ION LE. Like the original ION, the LE is designed to boost the graphics performance of CPUs by providing a faster alternative to ’s sluggish graphics chip. However, unlike the original ION, the ION LE will only support Direct X 9, which means it won’t play all the latest games that take advantage of Direct X 10, which comes standard with Vista and is supported by (which has Direct X 11).

Nvidia spokesperson Ken Brown assured us that the new chip will work well with Windows 7, stating “ION LE is fully compatible with Windows 7 and provides the same level of graphics performance as ION, but it will not support DirectCompute or DirectX 10 APIs.”