Switch 2 Speculation

[Seanspeed]

USF would be good vs SDD for power consumption and probably cost?

Carts/SD cards being able to keep up with internal storage might be an issue. Insist on installs from carts and offer a USF card storage expansion.

Like Xbox's SSD cards but even poorer value.

Dont see any other option unless they just add a huge internal storage w/no expandability. And they're not gonna do that.

I get the feeling Switch 1 will be the very last sort of real 'plug and play' console. Yea, it still requires updates and everything, but they're always ultra fast due to the super light OS, and even game updates tend to be very brief thanks to smaller game file sizes. Plus with Nintendo 1st party titles, they tend to come out the box much more polished and so are still typically highly playable even without any updates. It really has such minimal friction compared to Xbox/Playstation.

 

[milk]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1706280924990623762

I think that could be an easy differentiator to make switch 2 stand out feature-wise. A screen that can be rotated 90° within the built in grip for vertical content as a standard built-in feature.

 

[arandomguy]

Wouldn't that be problematic if they want to continue to market it as both a portable and home console? Games/content optimized for that format wouldn't work very well when docked and connected to a TV.

 

[neckthrough]

Wouldn't that be problematic if they want to continue to market it as both a portable and home console? Games/content optimized for that format wouldn't work very well when docked and connected to a TV.

On a TV a vertical game would just be letterboxed. There’s still enough real estate to make it enjoyable. Not so while handheld, where rotation would be awesome.

 

[Seanspeed]

There’s still enough real estate to make it enjoyable.

If you're sat close or have a huge TV maybe.

For a 55" 16:9 TV, flipping and squishing a 9:16 aspect ratio onto such a screen effectively turns it into a 31" vertical display. That's a massive reduction in effective display size(68% less area). Would feel really bad, in my opinion.

Visual TV Size Comparison : 55 inch 16x9 display vs 31 inch 9x16 display

Visual size comparison of a 55 inch 16x9 display vs 31 inch 9x16 display

www.displaywars.com

I know it's just a sort of spitball idea, but I dont like it as a gimmick personally. Especially as somebody who plays my Switch docked 95% of the time. I dont want them to make games built around this functionality(as you know Nintendo's 1st party would). Let's leave that to mobile games.

 

[cheapchips]

DF Rich said that he's working on a potential Switch 2 performance video, using a downclocked RTX2050. That'll be interesting I think.

 

[Rangers]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1706280924990623762

I think that could be an easy differentiator to make switch 2 stand out feature-wise. A screen that can be rotated 90° within the built in grip for vertical content as a standard built-in feature.

For what the 8 geriatric guys who love vertical schmups? LOL.

 

[milk]

For what the 8 geriatric guys who love vertical schmups? LOL.

And the obligatory smaller 1st party launch game that will make extensive use of the feature, and all the mini games all nintendo games will include to sell the concept for the next 3 years.

Also: DS & 3DS emulation.

 

[Khalid]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1706280924990623762

I think that could be an easy differentiator to make switch 2 stand out feature-wise. A screen that can be rotated 90° within the built in grip for vertical content as a standard built-in feature.

I thought of the idea before with the addition of a foldable screen that folds and adds a black border then you have a switc/DS hybrid.

 

[neckthrough]

If you're sat close or have a huge TV maybe.

For a 55" 16:9 TV, flipping and squishing a 9:16 aspect ratio onto such a screen effectively turns it into a 31" vertical display. That's a massive reduction in effective display size(68% less area). Would feel really bad, in my opinion.

Visual TV Size Comparison : 55 inch 16x9 display vs 31 inch 9x16 display

Visual size comparison of a 55 inch 16x9 display vs 31 inch 9x16 display

www.displaywars.com

I know it's just a sort of spitball idea, but I dont like it as a gimmick personally. Especially as somebody who plays my Switch docked 95% of the time. I dont want them to make games built around this functionality(as you know Nintendo's 1st party would). Let's leave that to mobile games.

Yeah I was thinking more about retro shmups, I wouldn't want any new games to be designed around a vertical aspect for sure. We have enough vertical video-itis on social media as it is.

 

[milk]

Yeah I was thinking more about retro shmups, I wouldn't want any new games to be designed around a vertical aspect for sure. We have enough vertical video-itis on social media as it is.

Why is that a bad thing in your opinion?

 

[techuse]

Latest DF Direct mentioned the former Activision CEO said performance will be around PS4 level. Would be consistent with the 10 year power gap of mobile tech relative to consoles.

 

[Frenetic Pony]

And the obligatory smaller 1st party launch game that will make extensive use of the feature, and all the mini games all nintendo games will include to sell the concept for the next 3 years.

Also: DS & 3DS emulation.

So yeah basically another terrible gimmick. Also a complete mechanical nightmare in terms of reliability over long use, Nintendo would be suicidal to try it.

Moving on from terrible gimmicks, the magnetic controller patent looks like it might provide force feedback for the sticks themselves. Which is a cool concept that has been floating around prototypes for years but has yet to make it into production. Still, I like the better haptic feedback and triggers in the Dualsense, so bring on more of this stuff! At the very least people that like fishing mini games are going to love it.

 

[neckthrough]

Why is that a bad thing in your opinion?

Are you asking about games being designed around vertical orientation, or my distaste for vertical (non-gaming) media? If it's the former I think @Seanspeed gave the answer -- it's a poor fit for the living room TV form factor.

If it's the latter -- it's complex. The first reason is similar to the gaming reason -- I am an old dinosaur that still prefers to create and consume content on high-quality landscape displays (OLED TV, color-calibrated monitor, etc.), and so my first-order annoyance against near-universal vertical content is that it's a poor fit for my display devices.

But it's deeper than that. There are of course photographic compositions that warrant portrait or 1:1 orientations (such as the eponymous "portraits"), which don't match my display, but I'm 100% ok with those because the orientation fits the composition. However, with smartphone cameras people tend to use portrait orientation *all* the time, even when it's an awful fit -- e.g., a landscape or a group of people, where a portrait orientation results in 80% of the photo/video being an empty sky, roof, lawn or floor with the relevant content (the interesting landscape or the people) being a thin strip down the middle. It's hilarious and infuriating at the same time to see people stepping back further and further to fit a large group of people seated at a table into a vertical frame when they could have just rotated the damn phone.

 

[Newguy]

What I think Nintendo will do:
[...]

• 128GB/256GB eMMC storage because it's cheap, one SKU unless they're digital only. Hoping for UFS 2.x because it's a lot faster but is more expensive, Nintendo thinking "why spend more for the same capacity" is on brand

KIOXIA Introduces Next Generation e-MMC Ver. 5.1-Compliant Embedded Flash Memory Products | KIOXIA - United States (English)

americas.kioxia.com

Kioxia's next gen eMMC 5.1 announced yesterday:

The new products integrate a newer version of the company’s BiCS FLASH™ 3D flash memory and a controller in a single package, reducing processor workload and improving ease of use. Both 64 and 128 gigabytes (GB) products will be available.

The new KIOXIA e-MMC devices improve sequential and random write performance by 2.5x and random read performance by 2.7x over previous generation devices5*. Additionally, terabytes written (TBW)6 is improved by 3.3x over previous generation devices5*, in correspondence with an enhanced area setting7 for the whole e-MMC area.

KIOXIA is now sampling its next-gen e-MMC devices, with mass production expected in 2024.

Nintendo used Kioxia (previously Toshiba) eMMC for the Switch, same thing but a bit faster and more of it will at least be considered. Fingers crossed for UFS but expecting eMMC 5.1

 

[JoeJ]

It's hilarious and infuriating at the same time to see people stepping back further and further to fit a large group of people seated at a table into a vertical frame when they could have just rotated the damn phone.

When the iPhone came out, i was fascinated from rotating the phone and the image rotated with it. It baffled me more than the touch screen even.
5 years later, everybody had a smartphone.
And they show me videos. Then i say it's too small - can't you turn your phone? Then those people are often just as baffled is i was back then. It's like they indeed don't know that's possible.
Maybe a failure of marketing? Telling people what the phone can do, but not what people can do with the phone?

But now that i think of it, the true reason might be something else.
If you rotate your phone, you increase the risk it slips out of your hands...
... and then - phone broken, fired from job, divorced, under the bridge. You know that happens once your phone breaks.

That's why people want to hold their phone upright. Because their life depends on it.

No more 1942

 

[BitByte]

I've heard a lot of talk about DLSS being a great benefit for Switch 2 but realistic speaking, is it even going to make a difference? This chip is coming on Samsung 8nm process which is not efficient to say the least. It's going to have a low tdp rating right? How much die space can they dedicate to tensor cores? Nvidia claims DLSS "runs" on tensor cores but realistically speaking, how many tensor cores would a switch GPU have? Would it even be enough to be useful? The same applies to RT cores as well? Realistically speaking, how many would it have? Its a low tdp mobile chip so I can't imagine them wasting die space?

 

[Frenetic Pony]

I've heard a lot of talk about DLSS being a great benefit for Switch 2 but realistic speaking, is it even going to make a difference? This chip is coming on Samsung 8nm process which is not efficient to say the least. It's going to have a low tdp rating right? How much die space can they dedicate to tensor cores? Nvidia claims DLSS "runs" on tensor cores but realistically speaking, how many tensor cores would a switch GPU have? Would it even be enough to be useful? The same applies to RT cores as well? Realistically speaking, how many would it have? Its a low tdp mobile chip so I can't imagine them wasting die space?

The "8nm" thing appears to be more leaker bullshit, going from an actual looking leak of a LinkeIn profile whole thing is just an unsurprising Ada + whatever ARM cores on some sort of 4nm, don't know if it's Samsung or TSMC.

Regardless upscaling is already super prevalent down onto the Series S. So all DLSS is going to do is be somewhat better than current FSR in motion. It'll still be a "60fps on Series = 30fps on Switch 2" kinda deal, at least in mobile/undocked mode.

 

[Samwell]

I've heard a lot of talk about DLSS being a great benefit for Switch 2 but realistic speaking, is it even going to make a difference? This chip is coming on Samsung 8nm process which is not efficient to say the least. It's going to have a low tdp rating right? How much die space can they dedicate to tensor cores? Nvidia claims DLSS "runs" on tensor cores but realistically speaking, how many tensor cores would a switch GPU have? Would it even be enough to be useful? The same applies to RT cores as well? Realistically speaking, how many would it have? Its a low tdp mobile chip so I can't imagine them wasting die space?

A complete redesign of the SMs would cost much more than the small bits the tensor cores need. It makes no sense to leave them out, especially if it's based on Orin. They will have the same Tensor Core ratio as the other GPUs of the hardware gen they choose. Nvidia can probably scale DLSS Inference requirements down. A bit worse quality, but less time needed. Especially for 30 FPS thats not a problem, 60 FPS and higher will be more of a problematic. but i can't imagine Nintendo targeting high framerates.

 

[Seanspeed]

I've heard a lot of talk about DLSS being a great benefit for Switch 2 but realistic speaking, is it even going to make a difference? This chip is coming on Samsung 8nm process which is not efficient to say the least. It's going to have a low tdp rating right? How much die space can they dedicate to tensor cores? Nvidia claims DLSS "runs" on tensor cores but realistically speaking, how many tensor cores would a switch GPU have? Would it even be enough to be useful? The same applies to RT cores as well? Realistically speaking, how many would it have? Its a low tdp mobile chip so I can't imagine them wasting die space?

Even on the smallest GPU utilizing the first gen tensor cores(RTX2060), DLSS is perfectly viable with near enough the same cost in performance as any other RTX part. I think it shows that DLSS on its own is really not that demanding from the tensor cores.

And if you're choosing an affordable old process like Samsung 8nm, going with a larger die size in general for a bigger GPU should be viable.

I can see it all making sense. I still dont like the idea of it being on such an old process, but Nintendo doesn't tend to go too ambitious on hardware so definitely think it's possible.