Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang was personally on hand at Computex today, proselytizing his company's current flagship ARM chip, the quad-core Tegra 4. Beyond the usual claims of great CPU and GPU power, Huang showed off an impressive demo of how Tegra 4 can help improve stylus input as well. Using the third generation of Nvidia's own DirectTouch technology on a reference Tegra 4 tablet, Huang was able to draw with extreme precision using a very basic and crude conductive stylus. "The precision of DirectTouch is many, many times higher than your normal touch controller," said the CEO, "the resolution and sample rate are much higher."

His demo was indeed compelling, with fine gradations in pressure being picked up and conveyed on screen, resulting in smooth and flowing lines — calligraphy on a tablet, is how Huang described it. The company's premise is that any device manufacturer that makes use of this as-yet-unnamed technology will save itself $20 per unit by achieving quality equivalent to that of an active stylus. While such a pitch is clearly aimed more toward Nvidia's business partners, there's a good chance that the benefits could trickle down to consumers in the form of more competitive pricing or a better user experience.

Update: Nvidia has now settled on a name, DirectStylus.