The great Fudzilla is reporting that the successor to the acclaimed ION netbook/nettop chipset will launch by the end of the year.

“Nvidia’s chipset boss has confirmed that the company is on track to start shipping its Ion 2 chipset in 2009. He didn’t go into details telling about any specific designs as this depends on the customers,” he writes.

We last heard word on the ION 2 in July when it was rumored that the chipset would be doubling shader performance over current ION products. It is still believed that the product will undergo a die shrink and take the shader count up to 32, making for an overall improvement in both thermals and performance.

Silicon Valley’s favorite journo Fuad Abazovic is upturning rocks in NVIDIA land to reveal details of the firm’s second-gen ION part.

Confirmed in a late February investor presentation, ION’s next generation has been shrouded in secrecy until recent whispers from insiders at big green. The rumors go that the upcoming platform, dubbed ION 2 for now, will undergo a die shrink and bump the shader count from 16 to 32+.

The modifications to the core design of the ION package should considerably boost the ION’s 3D rendering process… Or trigger a deluge of crummy CUDA apps.

That said, ION’s already robust performance will need a sharp kick in the pants if it hopes to contend with Intel’s Pine Trail platform which we prattled on about in June.