Italy 13 Ireland 37
Brian O'Driscoll became Ireland's most prolific tryscorer as Eddie O'Sullivan's side followed up their impressive opening Six nations win over Scotland with a comprehensive success over Italy in Rome.
The Italians, shock victors against Wales a week earlier, found Ireland a different proposition altogether, although they managed to breach the visitors line for the first time in the championship with Denis Dallan's 55th-minute try.
Ireland, though, scored five tries of their own through O'Driscoll - his 18th which took him past Brendan Mullin in the all-time list - Geordan Murphy, John Kelly, Peter Stringer and David Humphreys, who also kicked five goals for a 17-point haul.
Ireland shrugged off the absence of first-choice full-back Girvan Dempsey, Ronan O'Gara and Shane Horgan to secure an eighth successive win stretching back to last June in Auckland.
Italy had dominated the opening exchanges and came close to breaking the deadlock in the ninth minute, only for record points scorer Diego Dominguez to fall short with a drop goal directly in line with the posts.
But after absorbing early pressure from the hosts, Ireland hit back in clinical style with the game's first try. Italy full-back Paolo Vaccari kicked the ball into touch five yards from his goalline with Denis Hickie breathing down his neck after a hopeful punt, and from the resulting line-out, Ireland gained possession.
The ball was worked to Peter Stringer who broke through desperate Italian tackling to touch down for his second international try. Humphreys converted with ease before slotting home a penalty from 20 yards seven minutes later after the Italians had strayed offside.
Ireland kept their foot on the pedal and increased their lead to 15 points just after the half hour mark when Kelly went in by the corner for Ireland's second try and the third of his international career, all of them coming against Italy.
Humphreys failed to convert from an acute angle before Dominguez put Italy on the board with a penalty from close-range.
But Humphreys made up for his earlier wayward kick by converting his second penalty in first-half stoppage-time to give Ireland an 18-3 interval lead.
Marcus Horan replaced the injured prop Reggie Corrigan for the start of the second-half and it wasn't long before he was applauding another Ireland try.
Humpreys picked up the ball 30 yards from goal and sold Marco Bortolami a delightful dummy before carving through the home defence and touching down in the left-hand corner. The Ulsterman however failed to convert.
Italy's task of hauling themselves back into the match were dealt a massive blow moments later when Dominguez limped off to be replaced by Ramiro Pez. But lifted by a partisan home crowd, Italy rallied strongly and scored their only try in the 56th minute when Dallan punished weak Irish tackling to bundle over.
Pez took over the kicking duties from Dominguez and made no mistake with the conversion.
O'Driscoll, who by his high standards had a quiet afternoon, touched down on the hour mark after collecting a superb reverse pass from Humphreys who duly converted to give Ireland a 20 point lead.
A Pez penalty added to Italy's tally but Murphy once again widened the gap by touching down seven minutes from time adding to his try in last Sunday's clash with Scotland.