Nintendo Switch Tech Speculation discussion

[Cyan]

speculated specs:

CPU:
Four ARM Cortex-A57 cores, maximum 2 GHz
L2 cache, 2 MB
64-bit ARMv8
Crypto extension enabled

GPU:
NVIDIA second-generation Maxwell architecture
256 CUDA cores, maximum 1 GHz
1024 FLOPS/cycle
Texture: 16 pixels/cycle
Fill: 14.4 pixels/cycle

Main memory:
Capacity of 4 GB
Bandwidth: 25.6 GB/s
VRAM: shared

System Memory:
Capacity: 32 GB, Maximum transfer rate: 400 MB/s
USB
USB 2.0 and 3.0
Video Output
60 fps, at a maximum of 1920×1080 pixels
Or 30 fps at 3840×2160 pixels
The screen:
6.2" IPS LCD, 1280×720 pixels
Capacitance method, 10-point multi-touch


My theory, either 1 Teraflop or something like this 256*1000*2/1.000.000=0.512 Teraflops. Numbers could change if Switch runs on batteries or connected to the current in docked mode I guess.

 

[Cyan]

that seems to be Skyrim remaster, which is going to appear on PS4 and XB1 soon. And it looks fine to me.

I wonder if Switch can compete with the most powerful gaming table in the market, the Razor Edge Pro.

http://www.razerzone.com/gaming-systems/razer-edge-pro

that one looks awfully similar to the Linx Vision 8 tablet

 

[Ike Turner]

that seems to be Skyrim remaster, which is going to appear on PS4 and XB1 soon. And it looks fine to me.

The gameplay shown looks composited on to the TV in post-production...like 90% of the ads out there..so there's no way to know anything about how the final procudt will look like yet.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Not a hardware expert, but isn't that 1Teraflop?

256 Tegra Maxwell ALUs at 1GHz do 512 TFLOPs FP32 or 1 TFLOP FP16.

I'm not sure what to think of those specs, TBH. They seem realistic but disappointing.
- If it's Tegra Maxwell, it's probably TSMC 20nm (otherswise it'd be Pascal)
- Cortex A57 is the last thing I'd expect to see in a late 2016 SoC in a handheld. That CPU core did not go well for power consumption at all. I think a ~2GHz Cortex A53 would make more sense, or e.g. 1.2GHz Cortex A72.
- 25.6GB/s unified RAM seems very bandwidth starved to me.


512 sustained GFLOPs wouldn't be bad at all for a handheld.
I imagine it could play anything at 720p 30/60FPS that the PS4 is required to do in PSVR at 2*960*1080 60/90 FPS.

 

[3dilettante]

Nvidia's offerings sit in something of a sweet spot with:
There's CPU support that is not out of norm, with the likely suspects similar to last time being x86 or ARM. This time, ARM is safely 64-bit and implementations are less of a question mark. Unsure whether that means an ARM core design or something Nvidia-flavored (Denver or whatever replacement Nvidia is teasing?).
The GPU is performant, can be put in a portable factor, and generally coexists as a development target with GCN architecture in other markets.
Nvidia's own tablet system work and software resources could likely tip the balance against other IP vendors, especially if that other work has fed into Nintendo's platform.

I am curious how much of that foundational work is sourced from Nintendo or outside.
AMD's power efficiency probably weighed heavily against it in Nintendo's hybrid vision, and if Nintendo leveraged Nvidia's separate development efforts and feature exploration that's something AMD's divided attention with Nintendo competitors would have had less value-add. Nvidia's efforts as a stand-alone system developer would put it above AMD in that scenario as well, since much of what makes GCN so great in the console space is frequently bound up in the specific platforms and toolsets of Sony and MS. There are multiple complaints about AMD's terrible code generation in the PC space when Sony and MS aren't doing its work for it, and that's just within the limited realm of GPU software.

 

[snc]

Oh tegra x1, looks like fail, so this console is on ps3, xbox 360 level.

 

[MrFox]

That 25GB/s will need extremely compressed pixels, those are not the best kind of pixels.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Since this is also the API thread, I'm bit disappointed that the development API isn't Vulkan. Though I wonder how much of this NVN is actually a fork of Vulkan with an added set of instructions.
Why else would Nintendo be involved in Vulkan as a contributor?

AMD's power efficiency probably weighed heavily against it in Nintendo's hybrid vision, and if Nintendo leveraged Nvidia's separate development efforts and feature exploration that's something AMD's divided attention with Nintendo competitors would have had less value-add.

To be honest, I think lack of available manpower weighed a lot more than whatever architecture-driven power efficiency differences you can observe in the PC market.

Oh tegra x1, looks like fail, so this console is on ps3, xbox 360 level.

1 - Tegra X1 is not on PS360 level. It's safely 2x more powerful at least on compute throughput (or more, if you count a possible boost from FP16 at twice the rate).
2 - Where did you see it was using a Tegra X1? That wouldn't make much sense.

 

[fehu]

At least are organic pixels

 

[snc]

Since this is also the API thread, I'm bit disappointed that the development API isn't Vulkan. Though I wonder how much of this NVN is actually a fork of Vulkan with an added set of instructions.
Why else would Nintendo be involved in Vulkan as a contributor?



1 - Tegra X1 is not on PS360 level. It's safely 2x more powerful at least on compute throughput (or more, if you count a possible boost from FP16 at twice the rate).
2 - Where did you see it was using a Tegra X1? That wouldn't make much sense.

Tegra based on maxwell is basically tegra x1. And yes, this is ps3 xbox360 level. Flops will be higher but very poor bandwidth will limit this soc(also cpu is slow). Yes, there is no much sense in this as they should used pascal

 

[Karamazov]

vita is still producing better games than mobile phone, if it's something between 500Gflops to 1TF with a 720p screen and 4GB of ram it should look great for nintendo games, of course XB1/PS4 games will suffer, at least if played on the TV.

 

[AlNom]

Since this is also the API thread, I'm bit disappointed that the development API isn't Vulkan. Though I wonder how much of this NVN is actually a fork of Vulkan with an added set of instructions.
Why else would Nintendo be involved in Vulkan as a contributor?

I figured it'd just be Vulkan + extensions. Nintendo says they are trying to consider the future at the same time, so it'd be in their interest to be somewhat cross-platform compatible.

 

[3dilettante]

Since this is also the API thread, I'm bit disappointed that the development API isn't Vulkan. Though I wonder how much of this NVN is actually a fork of Vulkan with an added set of instructions.
Why else would Nintendo be involved in Vulkan as a contributor?

Microsoft and Sony provide both a high-level and lower-level API, which Vulkan on its own provides half of.
NVN might be a variant of Vulkan as well as additional wrapper (or OpenGL extensions?) for developers that don't need the performance.

Another consideration is how closely Vulkan can hew to existing targets.
Sony's shader language also tried to keep near to HLSL for the purposes of simplifying development, which NVN might help with. There's recent and upcoming work for HLSL and SPIR-V that looks make it easier to bridge this gap, which NVN might be used to finalize for use now.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Tegra based on maxwell is basically tegra x1

Again: where/who does it say it's a Maxwell GPU?

And yes, this is ps3 xbox360 level. Flops will be higher but very poor bandwidth will limit this soc(also cpu is slow).

This is sounding like a discussion not worth having, but just to be clear the X360 has 512MB at 22.4GB/s + 10MB EDRAM (limited to framebuffer IIRC) and a 10 year-old GPU unified architecture rated at 240GFLOPs. The Tegra X1 has definitely more than 1GB at 25.6GB/s and a 3 year-old GPU architecture with lossless color compression, plus 512 GFLOPs FP32 or 1TFLOPs FP16.

 

[Esrever]

Why A57s. That makes no sense, everything else is believable.

 

[I.S.T.]

that seems to be Skyrim remaster, which is going to appear on PS4 and XB1 soon. And it looks fine to me.

I wonder if Switch can compete with the most powerful gaming table in the market, the Razor Edge Pro.

http://www.razerzone.com/gaming-systems/razer-edge-pro

that one looks awfully similar to the Linx Vision 8 tablet

This is a nearly 4 year old tablet. Is it still the fastest?

 

[snc]

Again: where/who does it say it's a Maxwell GPU?


This is sounding like a discussion not worth having, but just to be clear the X360 has 512MB at 22.4GB/s + 10MB EDRAM (limited to framebuffer IIRC) and a 10 year-old GPU unified architecture rated at 240GFLOPs. The Tegra X1 has definitely more than 1GB at 25.6GB/s and a 3 year-old GPU architecture with lossless color compression, plus 512 GFLOPs FP32 or 1TFLOPs FP16.

Rumors says maxwell and when nvidia write custom gpu it doesn't sound like newest architecture iteration(why are they so misterious?). I think nvidia making the same fail as when they provided obsolete gpu for ps3. This 10mb edram has 256 GB/s bandwidth and that make a difference. Also comparing cpu wouldn't be brilliant for tegra x1. So as I said before, if it is tegra maxwell variation its in level on last gen cosnoles (better in shader performance but lacking in bandwidth and cpu speed).

 

[Goodtwin]

I think the fact that Bethesda is willing to port Skyrim to NX speaks volumes. They have made comments that if the hardware was there, and it made sense, they would support it. Well here we are with footage of Skyrim. Nvidia says its a custom Tegra chip, and I'm thinking more Tegra Parker than Tegra X1. Perhaps Nvidia's API maximizes the ability to use FP16 efficiently in gaming. Unlike last time with Wii U where the CPU was often noted as the biggest bottleneck for developers, the A57 and possible Denver cores rate very favorable compared to the Jaguar CPU in the PS4/X1. I think it will likely be up to developers to leak the actual specs, I doubt Nintendo will every divulge more than "custom Nvidia Tegra."

 

[dogen]

Zlatan on the anandtech forums is saying it's pascal based.

https://forums.anandtech.com/thread...wered-by-nvidia.2481278/page-22#post-38530757

I think he meant 540p here though.

The memory bandwidth is extremely weak compared to the standard desktop consoles. Most titles will render 504p which is the minimum requirement from Nintendo.

I can say that this is an SoC with a Pascal GPU. It's fast compared to other mobile products, but nowhere near as good as the Xbox One SoC. But hey, it consumes a lot less power. It is a very good product for the mobile market.

Yes. The bandwidth is important, especially when most engines use a more classical form of deferred shading. Tiled Resources is another bandwidth killer feature, and the engines starting to use it. But VR and Switch might force a change, and the users will get more modern renderers. Forward+ would be very good for Switch, and for VR, and it works for PC/consoles.
I'm currently researching a forward texture space shading implementation.

If he's right about pascal, it wouldn't surprise me if it's using something newer than a57's, but who knows.

 

[snc]

Good if its pascal but quote from this anandtech forum bandwidth is still very low and console is like 3x times slower than xbox one.