Nintendo Switch Tech Speculation discussion

[Deleted member 13524]

We had an actual technology thread before with the DevKit but too much polution by the diehard wishful thinking fanboys reverted it back into speculation mode. We will be issuing reply-bans if this thread devolves into blind wishful thinking by those unwilling to accept reality.

Eurogamer's news piece of today is still speculation until the console is formally revealed or the specs are confirmed by either a developer, nvidia or Nintendo. Eurogamer has been wrong before.
Unless this thread is called "let's discuss Eurogamer's specs and nothing else" or deviations from Eurogamer's specs are allowed, then maybe the thread shouldn't exist either.

 

[BRiT]

At this point the specs are what they are, so that's what the sane world is going to discuss. Feel free not to discuss the TECH in the Tech area and to remain in the Speculation thread.

 

[bunnybug]

Eurogamer's news piece of today is still speculation until the console is formally revealed or the specs are confirmed by either a developer, nvidia or Nintendo. Eurogamer has been wrong before.
Unless this thread is called "let's discuss Eurogamer's specs and nothing else" or deviations from Eurogamer's specs are allowed, then maybe the thread shouldn't exist either.

dude this is not speculation, eurogamer has the leaked specs from multiple trusted sources/developers. other wise, they would never publish the article, showing detailed specs. it would ruin the there rep. nintendo doesn't reveal specs, and i'm sure nvidia and developers are under strict NDA, so you're never gonna get those to reveal anything, eurogamer is the best you're gonna get, and they are pretty damn solid.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

You're suggesting a 2 year-old SoC for tablets made on 20nm is getting the same performance/power as what a fully custom gaming-oriented 16FF SoC with a recent architecture would get.

No. No idea what you're reading. I'm saying that regardless of all our fancy talk, N's choice is to preserve battery life and be cheap, clocking lower rather than using fancy cooling and docking solutions to et more power.

 

[bunnybug]

No. No idea what you're reading. I'm saying that regardless of all our fancy talk, N's choice is to preserve battery life and be cheap, clocking lower rather than using fancy cooling and docking solutions to et more power.

i think both of us said this is why they would use maxwell months ago, it's been the nintendo way now for 3 generations.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

dude this is not speculation, eurogamer has the leaked specs from multiple trusted sources/developers. other wise, they would never publish the article, showing detailed specs.

Eurogamer did not publish detailed specs. A lot of what is in the eurogamer article is speculation.
I think folks should go back and re-read eurogamer's article, because it really only tells two things:


1 - "sources inform us that Nintendo continued to brief developers with a spec that is uncannily similar to this Twitter leak that actually surfaced before the official reveal"

2 - CPU, GPU and DRAM clocks for docked/mobile


Everything else in that article is speculation. They don't say which areas are uncannily similar to the twitter leak (which BTW is flawed as the fillrate numbers don't match up and even eurogamer says so).
And some twitter specs are actually in complete mismatch with eurogamer's own info. For example, the twitter leaks suggest the Cortex A57 can go up to 2GHz whereas eurogamer's own clock leaks point to 1GHz.
So from here, we already know that the "uncannily similar" does not mean 100% equal, and in this case it's a very big way too (half the CPU clock).

Sure, it's just a single number being changed, but change one more number (e.g. CUDA core amount, memory amount, core count amount) and you get a completely different console and performance potential.
And I don't even mean this in a strictly hopeful/wishful way. Other small differences could point to e.g. only 2GB RAM or 128 CUDA cores.


If you guys want to discuss these speculated specs then by all means do so. But these are still speculation and eurogamer's article acknowledges it as such.

 

[cheapchips]

The 40% of power when undocked headlines have started, which I suppose is the clickbait version of the specs reveal.

Going for the most straightforward docked / undocked performance profile makes sense.

Is the portable profile going to offer much more than the WiiU performance wise though? (Obviously much better as a development platform)

 

[Karamazov]

this console won't shine on big HD TVs for sure, but portable games that look a least as good as PS3,X360, surely even better, something we still don't see on recent phones, and with Nintendo exclusives, i may be interested.

 

[MrFox]

Now there's a real possibility of a $199 price point. It could sell very well?

 

[Deleted member 13524]

No. No idea what you're reading. I'm saying that regardless of all our fancy talk, N's choice is to preserve battery life and be cheap, clocking lower rather than using fancy cooling and docking solutions to et more power.

I know perfectly well what I quoted, and I did so because you didn't mention price, only battery life. At least in that sentence and paragraph.
Had you mentioned price and I would be agreeing with you 100%

Regardless, we know there's a fan. If there's a fan there's probably a heatsink too, otherwise the fan alone would have made less sense than just a more elaborate heatsink.
I don't see where people suggested bank-breaking cooling solutions. A heatpipe and a heatspreader plate were the most exquisite things suggested and those are/were hardly going to be bank-breaking.

So we're down to Nintendo using either a state-of-the-art SoC using an updated manufacturing process or an old SoC using an old process.

 

[bunnybug]

Eurogamer did not publish detailed specs. A lot of what is in the eurogamer article is speculation.
I think folks should go back and re-read eurogamer's article, because it really only tells two things:


1 - "sources inform us that Nintendo continued to brief developers with a spec that is uncannily similar to this Twitter leak that actually surfaced before the official reveal"

2 - CPU, GPU and DRAM clocks for docked/mobile


Everything else in that article is speculation. They don't say which areas are uncannily similar to the twitter leak (which BTW is flawed as the fillrate numbers don't match up and even eurogamer says so).
And some twitter specs are actually in complete mismatch with eurogamer's own info. For example, the twitter leaks suggest the Cortex A57 can go up to 2GHz whereas eurogamer's own clock leaks point to 1GHz.
So from here, we already know that the "uncannily similar" does not mean 100% equal, and in this case it's a very big way too (half the CPU clock).

Sure, it's just a single number being changed, but change one more number (e.g. CUDA core amount, memory amount, core count amount) and you get a completely different console and performance potential.
And I don't even mean this in a strictly hopeful/wishful way. Other small differences could point to e.g. only 2GB RAM or 128 CUDA cores.


If you guys want to discuss these speculated specs then by all means do so. But these are still speculation and eurogamer's article acknowledges it as such.

it's maxwell and the clock speeds are confirmed at this point, that tell's us enough about the system's performance. games have to be able to run in portable mode, so nintendo and developers are gonna be limited to wiiu 1.5 in portable mode, and in docked mode we should just expect higher resolution.

 

[MrFox]

Who's proposing bank-breaking cooling solutions? Anyone referencing the surface 4 pro.

Not now that we know it's not going to be a 15W SoC after all.

The patents show roughly the heatsink size, and I don't expect that heat sink to be any deeper than a few millimeters.

 

[Karamazov]

they should allow for higher clock mode even in potable mode when the console is plugged in.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

it's maxwell and the clock speeds are confirmed at this point, that tell's us enough about the system's performance.

Tegra X1 and the GTX 980 Ti are both maxwell and their clock speeds differ by 30%.
So the 980 Ti should be about 30% faster than Tegra X1.
Got it.

 

[bunnybug]

Tegra X1 and the GTX 980 Ti are both maxwell and their clock speeds differ by 30%.
So the 980 Ti should be about 30% faster than Tegra X1.
Got it.

Obviously I meant tx1 maxwell, anybody with common sense knows what to expect at this point. I guess you just wanna keep your wishful speculation alive .

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Obviously I meant tx1 maxwell, anybody with common sense knows what to expect at this point. I guess you just wanna keep your wishful speculation alive at this point.

From the post you quoted above:

Sure, it's just a single number being changed, but change one more number (e.g. CUDA core amount, memory amount, core count amount) and you get a completely different console and performance potential.
And I don't even mean this in a strictly hopeful/wishful way. Other small differences could point to e.g. only 2GB RAM or 128 CUDA cores.

 

[mpg1]

It's clear to me that this thing was designed to be a handheld first that also has the option of being plugged into the TV.

This will be an extremely risky move by Nintendo as they are trying to make portable/console hybrid that might appeal to neither Japan (were it might be seem to big/not portable as a handheld) and neither North America (where handhelds are not as popular and it is too "weak" as a console)

 

[bunnybug]

From the post you quoted above:

Yet there isn't even a rumor of such modifications, thing you don't realise is Nintendo will go the cheapest route, to me it sounds like wishful speculation, been hearing for 3 generations now.

from the eurogamer article

This leaked spec actually appeared on Twitter before Nintendo's official reveal. Thought by many to be out of date or fake, we can confirm that Nintendo has briefed developers recently with the same information. One source tells us that the 4K30 aspect of the spec was not part of the developer presentation, but everything else was. We can assume that the clock-speeds are theoretical maximums, and not the 768/307.2MHz combo we've confirmed as locked in retail hardware.

• CPU: Four ARM Cortex A57 cores, max 2GHz
• GPU: 256 CUDA cores, maximum 1GHz
• Architecture: Nvidia second generation Maxwell
• Texture: 16 pixels/cycle
• Fill: 14.4 pixels/cycle
• Memory: 4GB
• Memory Bandwidth: 25.6GB/s
• VRAM: shared
• System memory: 32GB, max transfer rate: 400MB/s
• USB: USB 2.0/3.0
• Video output: 1080p60/4K30
• Display: 6.2-inch IPS LCD, 1280x720 pixels, 10-point multi-touch support

 

[mpg1]

Looking at the hardware if I were Nintendo I would be encouraging/helping developers to port some of the bigger games from Xbox 360/PS3 generation. GTA 5, Skyrim (seemingly happening), Red Dead Redemption ..latest Call of Duty/Assasins Creed games that were released on Xbox 360/PS3...

 

[eastmen]

I'm disappointed by the clock speeds I was hoping for a bit more. However I would still be happy with this as it will replace my 3ds and not my xbox one / pc. However I would hope it would land closer to $200 than $300 . Higher than $300 and I don't see the point. New Surfaces will release in the spring (according to rumors) and I rather put that money towards a surface that will play xbox 360 era games just as well if not better and even some more recent pc games