As California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger told a CeBIT audience to stop whining about the global economy, Nvidia launched graphics processing units (GPUs) that aim to power up notebooks to the extreme.

Nvidia on Tuesday unveiled four GPUs. The company said the new lineup pushes performance to the "highest levels ever achieved" in enthusiast and high-performance notebooks. Nvidia said its fastest notebook GPU now boasts up to 50 percent more performance than previous generations.

"These new Nvidia GeForce GPUs are for those who won't accept compromise in notebook performance," said Rene Haas, general manager of notebook business at Nvidia. "These new GPUs meet the needs of the most demanding consumers in the marketplace by delivering industry-leading performance at all price segments, along with features that go beyond graphics."

The Need for (Quiet) Speed
Nvidia's GeForce GTX 200M and GeForce GTS 100M series are aimed at the high-definition market. The GeForce GTX 280M and 260M GPUs are meant for enthusiast notebooks and the GeForce GTS 160M and 150M GPUs are for high-performance notebooks.

Nvidia said the faster speeds do not increase power consumption. What's more, using Nvidia SLI technology -- which creates close to double the graphics performance over a single GPU -- two Nvidia GeForce GTX 280M GPUs can be paired. The result, Nvidia says, is the fastest notebook graphics solution available.

Designed with quiet operation and increased battery life in mind, Nvidia's HybridPower technology can power down the discreet GPU and transfer graphics operation to the integrated GPU for applications that don't require the high level of graphics horsepower.

Playing the Strengths
The GeForce GTX 200M and GeForce GTS 100M Series GPUs feature the Nvidia CUDA computing architecture and deliver Graphics Plus capabilities. These innovations are unique to Nvidia and make possible gaming effects and fast video and image processing.

"With these new products, Nvidia is aiming to highlight their graphic superiority, particularly over Intel, and continue driving the conversation around advanced media on consumer PCs," said Charles King, principal analyst at Pund-IT. "It's a good time for the company to accentuate its value play here."

It's a good time because the desktop market is declining more rapidly than the notebook market. PC shipments are expected to decline 11.9 percent to 257 million units in 2009, according to Gartner. That's the sharpest decline in history. But mobile PC shipments are expected to grow.

"The major differentiator in the notebook market has been media performance, which speaks well to Nvidia's strengths," King said. "Frankly, although Intel certainly has tried to position itself and tried to play more and more in media streaming, the company tended to lag specialists like Nvidia and ATI as far as performance goes. Nvidia is focusing on an area that's driving PC sales."

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