Updated Switch 2 hardware rumor thread.
- Thread starter John Elden Ring
- Start date
Its going to be interesting to see what Nintendo does.
Will they carry on staying 2 generations behind. Making something slightly stronger than the Switch. Like the Wii was to Gamecube, Wii U to Wii and Switch wasnt much stronger than Wii U.
Or is something like Steamdeck specs, a generation behind basically more likely?
Some of the rumours seem like they are gonna push hard and make something stronger than the Steamdeck and something a bit closer to current gen.
Nintendo will struggle if they go Home Console only. Its going to be a big effort to make current gen games for them after being so use to making stuff like they have for the Wii/ Wii U/ Switch etc. And not many Remasters left from previous generations which filled alot of the Switch library.
If they do another Hybrid and play it safe they will be fine and maybe more
Will they carry on staying 2 generations behind. Making something slightly stronger than the Switch. Like the Wii was to Gamecube, Wii U to Wii and Switch wasnt much stronger than Wii U.
Or is something like Steamdeck specs, a generation behind basically more likely?
Some of the rumours seem like they are gonna push hard and make something stronger than the Steamdeck and something a bit closer to current gen.
Nintendo will struggle if they go Home Console only. Its going to be a big effort to make current gen games for them after being so use to making stuff like they have for the Wii/ Wii U/ Switch etc. And not many Remasters left from previous generations which filled alot of the Switch library.
If they do another Hybrid and play it safe they will be fine and maybe more
If it's stronger than steam deck even if it releases next year I'm all over it (even though I used my Switch for a week then dropped it and have never touched it again). If it's weaker than steam deck and two generations behind I won't buy it. I'm tired of wasting my money.
D
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All I hope for is Series S specs. Anything to get Nintendo back into full-third party support with modern titles. The dream will continue to be a viable alternative to increasingly Microsoft Lite Sony's Playstation, since Microsoft Xbox is no alternative at all.
I think with the recent rumours, the specs seem stronger than Steamdeck right?
Ill buy one regardless just for the 1st party games. But I always play on TV, I literally used the switch once or twice in handheld mode lol
There is a lot of mistakes here.
The frequency listed is only possible for CPU… GPU is max 1.3Ghz.
Orin with 2048 SPs can’t be used in portables.
They will use the 1024 SPs variant like Orin Nano because there is no tech for more than that in portable form.
The frequency listed is only possible for CPU… GPU is max 1.3Ghz.
Orin with 2048 SPs can’t be used in portables.
They will use the 1024 SPs variant like Orin Nano because there is no tech for more than that in portable form.
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They specs (in the OP) are stronger than PS5.
The guy is mistaking what he read.
2048 SPs at 2.6Ghz gives you 10.6TFs.
The actual 2.6Ghz is probably CPU and Orin is capped to 1.3Ghz… 2048 SPs won’t be possible for a portable.
So the best scenario here is:
1024SPs at 1.3Ghz docked: 2.66TFs
Half of that in portable mode.
But like Tegra X1 Nintendo won’t go max clocks… that means they will stay around 1Ghz docked that gives you around 2TFs.
Series S is about 4TF. There is no way Nintendo pays Nvidia to package that much power in a handheld.
A 1.5 TF handheld with 16GB of RAM is
the most we can hope to get. RAM is the most important factor IMO.
A 1.5 TF handheld with 16GB of RAM is
the most we can hope to get. RAM is the most important factor IMO.
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Why are people assuming this is for a Tegra SoC, let alone the T239?
It wouldn't make much sense for a mobile chip to only be tested at a single frequency, unlike e.g. a server GPU.
It's still a platform that will give the Steam Deck a run for its money when optimized to the metal, but by the time it's out we'll already have Strix Point APUs in handhelds which will be some 3-4x faster.
It wouldn't make much sense for a mobile chip to only be tested at a single frequency, unlike e.g. a server GPU.
I would look at the Orin NX (CPU 8x A78@2GHz, GPU 1024SP @ 918MHz 1.88TFLOPs, 128bit LPDDR5) as best case scenario in docked mode.
It's still a platform that will give the Steam Deck a run for its money when optimized to the metal, but by the time it's out we'll already have Strix Point APUs in handhelds which will be some 3-4x faster.
They can, and I think they will, go for a hybrid again, but where they also have a dock that has additional GPU compute in it. So when the system is docked, you're probably going to get Series S-level performance. When undocked, maybe something closer to the Steam Deck.
The key being, Nvidia tech like DLSS 3.2 (or better) and NVLink, allowing the GPU compute in the portable and the dock to run simultaneously. I know Nvidia have basically abandoned that concept on the high-end desktop GPU market, but there's a chance Nvidia and Nintendo have been doing something with it.
For example, I can see the portable component having the CPU (obviously), a weaker GPU component, 6 GB RAM (LPDDR5), some storage. It'd run at lower clocks in this mode of course, to hit a good TDP. Some form of DLSS, or something for frame generation more so than resolution image boosting. This setup would be for those who want to play games at Switch levels, with a bit of boost for free resolution bumps and framerates.
Then the dock itself would have a more powerful GPU; TF-wise it'd probably be less than Series S but the more important thing is that the pixel and texture fillrate is comparable. DLSS 3.2 (or better), 8 GB GDDR6, decent PSU allowing for higher TDP, and clocks. Pixel & texture fillrates on par with Series S when the dock is used. GPU RAM same amount and similar bandwidth as Series S. With DLSS 3.x, can enable comparable or better framerates and resolution than Series S games, but this will depend somewhat on how good the CPU is.
Thinking about it now, the NVLink stuff wouldn't be required in this setup; when docked the GPU in the portable itself would just disable or only be used for OS shell stuff. The LPDDR5 RAM could be used for the OS and various background tasks, and non-graphics game logic. The dock's GPU would be used for games, its RAM for game graphics data, etc. The interconnect would probably need to be Thunderbolt 4.0-based, though, and since it's Nintendo likely with a proprietary connection and some type of additional encryption for data transmission.
Then they could do 2 SKUs; one with the dock and one without. $249 without the dock, $399 with it. Meanwhile they'll probably sell the dock separately for $199. If Nintendo did this, they'd basically squeeze the Series S out of the market in terms of any real relevance, but that might ironically make Microsoft just fully open up about dropping the parity clause, so less games or delayed games for the Series S and more Series S customers moving over to Series X (or PS5, or Switch 2, but in this case most to Series X if they already have Game Pass and a lot of Xbox games).
However, this could also put a lot of pressure on Sony, especially in places like Japan. A lot of Japanese 3P AAA games Sony either gets priority on by default or easy exclusivity deals on (because the only other viable option was Xbox), will suddenly start equally prioritizing Nintendo, and in some cases make it a lot more competitive between Sony and Nintendo to get exclusivity on some of those games. This could really make things tough for Sony in markets like Japan, where they already have an uphill battle vs. the Switch, though PlayStation Portal looks promising enough to help offset some of that potential trouble.
And again, my theory about the Orin comes ever closer to being true. Some people are eating crow.
What theory would that be? Asking because I probably didn't get a chance to read it, or might've forgotten.
Twittershpere of leakers is claiming 8x Cortex A78 + 1280x Ampere cores.
However, it seems the process node is Samsung's 8nm, so to reach those 5W TDP we'll be looking at very low clocks in handheld mode, probably lower than the 1.5GHz CPU / 625MHz GPU the Orin Nano uses for 5-10W TDP on a similar process.
I would assume 500MHz tops on the GPU, meaning it would do 1.28 TFLOPs in that mode.
And I doubt Nintendo will put more than 8GB RAM in there, to be honest.
This is not the Steam Deck killer that people are hoping to be.
However, it seems the process node is Samsung's 8nm, so to reach those 5W TDP we'll be looking at very low clocks in handheld mode, probably lower than the 1.5GHz CPU / 625MHz GPU the Orin Nano uses for 5-10W TDP on a similar process.
I would assume 500MHz tops on the GPU, meaning it would do 1.28 TFLOPs in that mode.
And I doubt Nintendo will put more than 8GB RAM in there, to be honest.
This is not the Steam Deck killer that people are hoping to be.
Nintendo Switch 2 Hardware Speculation
Aight guys, Let's start your predictions on what you think will be in the next iteration of Nintendo Switch. State them and then provide a reason why you think such silicon can be in a mobile unit. Hopefully you aren't too crazy with your specs like the next-gen console threads were (HINT...
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Digital Foundry claims mid-generation Switch hardware refresh was once planned, but no longer happening and next-gen is next
source Rumors of a more powerful Switch – often dubbed by fans as the Switch Pro – have persisted for years. The thought was that Nintendo would come out with a new piece of hardware that isn’t quite a successor, but would be a step up from what we have now. Presumably this theoretical device...
icon-era.com
I've been beating this drum for a while.
I assume Nintendo will want to keep their prices at similar Switch prices and to sell it at a profit, so I don't think that they'll be able to compete against Steamdeck in horsepower, in the same way they won't be able to compete regarding catalog (even if I assume it will be Switch BC).
In addition to this, pretty likely in a year or two Valve may release a Steamdeck 2 with higher hardware, which also would make it outdated. So they may decide to go outdated anyway since the start, Nintendo didn't care about it during generations.
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The Steam Deck uses a SoC that could have been released in 2020. It was a semicustom order from Microsoft for a device the Surface team was going to release in early 2021. The Switch 2 is going to release almost 4 years later.
Nintendo just goes for hardware that is 3 notches below the conservative estimates. It usually goes well - as it happened with the Switch and the Wii, but sometimes it goes horribly wrong like what happened with the Wii U.