Since Intel was incapable of making an HD decoder chip that could play HD in 1080p for its Atom platform, it reached out to one of its competitors, Broadcom and used their HD chip.

Intel's latest Atom platform codenamed Pinetrail M can play HD 1080p with the help of Broadcom's BCM70015 HD video decoder chip and it will be up to Intel’s partners to implement and buy this chip.

We are not aware of the chip pricing but we are quite sure that this will cost less than Nvidia’s Ion 2. Still, Ion 2 will let you play some games on your netbook while Broadcom can only make sure you HD 1080p works without stuttering.

It looks like little green Nvidia has pushed Intel to do something it didn’t originally plan, as Intel's Atom graphics won't be able to play HD 1080p at least until the next generation in late 2011. End users can be happy as they will get HD 1080p support on netbooks, if anyone still wants to buy one, considering that for just over €300 you can get a nice thin and light Lenovo, Acer or similar 13-inch notebook. Pinetrail M Atom will usually cost more than that and it's evident that it will offer less, a lot less.