yohoopzcrazy
Cappy
In that note, I'd also like to add some of you folks in here are very knowledgeable and that I've learned quite a bit of hardware design and engineering, or at least some of the lingo that always would fly right over my head.
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StarTopic Future Nintendo Hardware & Technology Speculation & Discussion |ST| (Read the staff posts before commenting!)
- Thread starter Dakhil
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D
Deleted member 887
Guest
That would require redesigning Drake. If you're redesigning the chip, you can do whatever the hell you want to. Nintendo could make a PS5 rival if they wanted to. Drake just isn't a good chip for a TV only console
Most of us want a Switch. I think very few of us only play TV mode, and just as many only play handheld mode.
But it doesn't much matter what we want, we look at Drake and see a device that isn't good at being a TV console, and try to imagine what it would be instead - which looks like a really powerful Switch.
It's like looking at Series S and thinking it should be a handheld. I think a lot of folk would love that. But even the tiny Series S is not a mobile chipset. It's just too big. It's twice as big as the Steam Deck! If you asked for a Series S handheld, I don't think anyone would blame you, but I think you would not be seen as realistic
I want to make note that when comparing PCs (open) and consoles (closed), consoles do have various advantages. We already know about features like FDE, so why not in other aspects? With PC, you have countless configurations, all of which must maintain a low common denominator. Devs have to take that into account. With something like textures, while they are compressed in storage, they are decompressed when placed into VRAM because the architecture can vary heavily from one to another (Nvidia, AMD, Intel, etc), and decompressed textures are something they all can work with. With closed platforms like consoles, that sort of conflict is not nearly as bad.
For instance, the DS is capable of utilizing compressed textures in the S3TC format as-is, and tests by homebrewers have shown that it is quicker in processing that with the same texture that is uncompressed. It's a major benefit when you don't ever plan to alter the texture. The 3DS supports ETC1 (and ETC1 + Alpha), and the Switch supports ASTC. Granted, the majority of games nowadays that utilize these are from 1st-parties because 3rd-parties deal with multiplats, and are somewhat bound to the same sort of thing like when developing for PCs, unless they are willing to put in the extra effort.
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I hope so. This becomes a lot easier if the system is actually released when more of these days and dates happen.
Up until early last year, all we had were reports by publications and claims by insiders.
Last year, we got the Nvidia leak around April and the Linux commits in September, both reinvigorated this thread and gave us the first concrete evidence.
Going forward, I think we are entering the most exciting phase of a pre-launch, whether it takes 6 months or 1 year. We're gonna be scrutinizing everything Nintendo does and doesn't, interpreting every word multiple ways. There will be more dubious leaks that we will laugh at but that will give us hope. There will be more genuine leaks, either from factories, Linux commits or suppliers.
The next Direct will be very revealing, either by announcements or the lack thereof. I can't find any better place than this thread to speculate about it.
Last year, we got the Nvidia leak around April and the Linux commits in September, both reinvigorated this thread and gave us the first concrete evidence.
Going forward, I think we are entering the most exciting phase of a pre-launch, whether it takes 6 months or 1 year. We're gonna be scrutinizing everything Nintendo does and doesn't, interpreting every word multiple ways. There will be more dubious leaks that we will laugh at but that will give us hope. There will be more genuine leaks, either from factories, Linux commits or suppliers.
The next Direct will be very revealing, either by announcements or the lack thereof. I can't find any better place than this thread to speculate about it.
Sol
Moblin
Is there any hard consistent data on this across numerous games? The first 10 GB on the Series X runs at 560 GB/s and is generally treated as being all for the GPU. That means the Series X GPU is going to be using RAM that's ~25% faster than what the PS5's GPU has available to it. The remaining 3.5 GB that runs at 336 GB/s is for the CPU. So the GPU on the Series X isn't incurring a heavy penalty for trying to access the slower memory.
The CPU for PCs is usually accessing DDR4 and that's about ~65 GB/s, so the 336 GB/s the Zen 2 cores are using on the Series X seems more than adequate.
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ItWasMeantToBe19
Manakete
Highly doubtful. The leaked specs are for 2020 mobile hardware and will struggle to keep up with the Series S with regards to RAM and CPU and the Series S will likely be being pushed to its absolute limits by 2025.
Link_enfant
Fashion Dreamer
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Despite my lack of confidence for 2023 recently, it’s always a pleasure to see posts like this.
It’s kinda funny, in a way, that after all of those insider reports, leaks and other rumors, we have pretty much no idea of what’s happening regarding possible announcement or release timeframes.
And this is somehow getting exciting to be in the dark, while approaching an inevitable Nintendo Direct.
Even if nothing related to Switch 2 comes soon, I can’t wait for this next one!
struggle in what way?
and I have to disagree, I still don't think we're gonna see so many cpu limited games
Chijin_08
Tektite
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I hope this doesn’t sound rude as it’s a genuine question but what hints? Digital foundry and Nate are all saying 2024 and I would love for them to be wrong of course.
Does orin support 1080p 120hz through HDMI?
LiC
Member
"Saying 2024" just means their speculation/prediction. And the question has been asked more than once: what actual facts led to that speculation? The only facts we were presented with were, at one point some source(s) said hardware was planned for late 2022/early 2023, and then at another point some source(s) said there is no longer hardware planned for that window. Why should that mean hardware will happen in 2024 or later, instead of just being delayed further into 2023?
We haven't gotten an answer to that, so I don't agree with holding up the predicted release window from Nate or DF's members as evidence of anything. Despite being claimed in the same context as reporting on actual (alleged) facts about hardware development, those facts have not been used to justify it.
D
Deleted member 887
Guest
Show me a piece of mobile hardware released in 2020 that approaches Drake. Series S's RAM situation is bad. CPU I agree with you, though it's not a consensus.
Little, if for not other reason than it's hard to make apples to oranges comparisons. DF's recent Monster Hunter: Rise video is a good example
It's not a separate RAM/VRAM pool (IIUC), it's a single pool of memory, and the PS5 hypervisor limits the PS UI to the slower portion. Games have access to the whole area of RAM from both the CPU and GPU. And the "Series X penalty" seems marginal, readily explained by games that stress the system having inconsistent performance across memory, rather than a single flat behavior.
What's more interesting to me is that the two machines are nearly identical, but Series X has a 20% larger GPU and seems to get nothing for it - and if you average out the bandwidth per teraflop, Series X is actually behind PS5. The designs of the machines are so nearly identical, that in something like MH:R's uncapped frame rate mode, if the game were GPU limited Series X would pull ahead. But it doesn't. Those extra TFLOPS are sitting idle.
Paul_Subsonic
Être majestuatisant et subversif
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According to this https://developer.nvidia.com/embedd.../developer_kit_layout.html#displayport-output, Orin doesn't have HDMI but it does have DP and supports 4K120Hz, although I think I've seen somewhere in this thread that they cut the output capabilities of Drake.
Look over there
Bob-omb
Wait... people are usually running DDR4 at 4000 MT/s in Gear 1? By market share, I thought that the typical would be no higher than... 3600 MT/s (57.6 GB/s, assuming 128-bit) in Gear 1, with 3200 MT/s (51.2 GB/s, assuming 128-bit) being my other guess (and the highest that Intel and AMD would officially promise, given that's as high as JEDEC goes for DDR4).
Kise Ryota
Moblin
I remember Mark Cerny saying how easier it is to make full use of lesser CU's with higher clocks than the inverse. You have extra work with parallelism to get those 20% more CU's it seems. But I'm not saying the more complex memory structure isn't the problem in some games (everything that involves dedicating more time to optimize when you have to release a game in 6+ platforms will be a problem)
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I wonder if some third parties intentionally hold back their game releases because they see a benefit from a "second" launch with people double dipping on Switch, but realistically I would love if not only more games launched day and date with Switch but also consistently maintained cross-save progression.
I would have happily bought Monster Hunter Rise again on PC but no cross-save and especially no cross-play ensured I wouldn't spend more money to redo my progress, and I just resigned myself to knowing if I already had a tough time selling people on the game to play with me on Switch, I wasn't going to bother if they wanted to get it on their preferred console. I hope this is a consideration Capcom is taking seriously going forward.
CocaFormula
Cappy
While I agree that we shouldn't rely on what was clearly stated as speculation (new hardware in 2024 or beyond), I wanted to point out that both Nate and John clearly talked about a "cancelled hardware" multiple times, not only about the release window.
Not to call you out specifically, but I've already seen that we are trying to twist the information that was presented into something different, like they were only talking about devkits being pulled (it was mostly MVG), an hardware possibly delayed or rebranded or something along those lines.
As a matter of fact they unequivocally reported that the hardware that was developed on and reported on since 2021 was cancelled. I trust them to have used this phrasing with full understanding so I have no doubt this is what their sources have reported. We can doubt their sources or what their sources actually knew or understood, but we shouldn't twist this piece of information to fit a different narrative.
As I stand now, I don't believe a slight delayed or rebranded hardware can be mistakenly reported as cancelled. To me either this report is true and we'll eventually understand (or not) what caused this abrupt change of plans, or it's false (planted?) and previous evidence suggests we should see something sooner than later.
LiC
Member
Sol
Moblin
Yes, it's a shared pool of memory, but I believe the SDK for the Series X allows developers to allocate different data to the two groups of memory with different bandwidths, does it not? Otherwise it would be a hellish, randomized nightmare trying to develop games for the Series X if devs couldn't control which data were being accessed at 560 GB/s or 336 GB/s.
We are trying to "twist" the information because stating that the device was cancelled while still speculating about 2024 shows that they DON'T use that word with any kind of understanding. You can't go from cancelling a device in 2022 to launching a different one in 2024. It's not possible.
CocaFormula
Cappy
Yeah, that seemed damage control on his part after the backslash. He had a few weeks to get his message right and ultimately in the podcast he just said the hardware he had heard about was cancelled. Unfortunately it's pretty clear none of his sources ever gave any details on the SOC used so I don't believe he was or is in the position to say what role has Drake in any of this. Just my opinion of course.
I'd agree, but they don't need to "understand" an information that they are reporting nor this changes what the information was in the first place. I just want to make sure we don't play telephone with the few data points we have. It's perfectly fine to question the plausibility of this information or imagine how it could have been derived by a completely different scenario, but a cancellation was reported nonetheless.
Look over there
Bob-omb
To extend on the point of direct competition against the Playstation * and Series X:
We all agree that the Switch offers a separate area it participates/competes in by being able to be played handheld, tabletop, or hooked up to a display.
With it essentially being a tablet, it also carries with it a set of expectations that people would associate with tablet/mobile devices.
With tv-only boxes, because the PS5 and Xbox Series X exist, there already is a set of expectations to be met by such devices sold for $500 (or close to it) in the 2020's. Now, the Series S can get away with having less GPU grunt because it's in an entirely different price bracket. "Yea, it's the lesser Xbox, but a couple hundred bucks saved is a couple hundred bucks"
Btw fellas, don't lock your thinking into there being only two form factors; handheld and stationary TV-only boxes. There's a form factor in between that's been around for decades; laptops. And people intuitive know to some level that the laptop form factor has capabilities in between handheld and stationary big box. And correspondingly, have its own set of price to performance ratio expectations.
Yes, it's like the 3rd time or so I'm mentioning this. I'm gonna speak this into the existence eventually!
Now, I think that Nintendo should stick with the Switch form factor, so I'll keep this non-specific to any particular company:
Take a laptop, but remove the keyboard and mouse/touchpad. Maybe thicken it a bit, so it has enough depth such that you can have storage area(s) for controllers. 2 or 4 controllers, depending on size as well as the controllers themselves. For marketing, it's not a "Laptop" anymore. Now it's a "Party Box" or "Party Brick" (while emphasizing it dominating tabletop play but still having the option to hook up to a display). Hell, go even further; add a handle. Maybe add some latches to one side to be able to keep it closed more securely. Now it's a "Party Case".
Should be able to comfortably handle 192-bit or 256-bit of (insert latest DDR/LPDDR), depending on exact size and thickness. Hell, if you want a theoretical present day example: imagine Orin (the 32 GB variant), but drop the auto specific stuff and replace the 8 A78AE with 8 A78C, clocked up to maybe mid to high 2 Ghz on a N7 or N5 node (or should we even try to touch 3 Ghz? Hmm...)
More realistically though? Probably fast forward some years into the... let's say LPDDR6X era. Close to 2030, maybe? 192-bit LPDDR6X probably gets you to 409.6 GB/s; close to the PS5. 256-bit would be 546 GB/s. Add in a few generations of improvement to reconstruction techniques. A few more nodes. Further improved battery density. Imagine what one can do in the 28-35 watt bracket. Or the ~45 watt category. Or even that 'desktop replacement' 65 watt category.
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I don't think this is entirely true. It's been pointed out several times that dev kits were pulled, and that John's and Nate's stories lined up in that respect, but the way they speculate on 'what's next' tells us that they've no insight beyond that, and just that they personally don't expect anything this year.
If we look at the summary Dakhil graciously provided, it's filled to the brim with speculation that muddies the meaning of 'cancelled'. I've bolded pieces that demonstrate uncertainty or are even contradictory to an actual cancellation:
I think Nate's statement of 'may or may not come in 2023' is because despite what they they've heard, there's still a layer of obfuscation at play.
LiC
Member
Thanks for summarizing. I'm really trying to cut back and stop sinking deeper into this nonsense parade, but I still find myself typing walls of text.
Bottom line:
I do doubt this, because that would be actual clarity, and wouldn't merit hedging over whether 2023 is still possible, or speculation and debate in the podcast over different scenarios like everyone's still not sure what even happened.
D
Deleted member 887
Guest
I'm not saying it doesn't, I'm just saying that the net bandwidth per teraflop is lower than on PS5, and that it takes extra programming to ensure you don't have bandwidth drops. All likely reasons that on an otherwise identical architecture, games with identical settings and uncapped frame rates can't outpace PS 5 despite a 20% faster GPU.
A Switch has an electricity budget. While pushing it past 2.5 TF wouldn't be absolutely useless, it would be less useful than spending that budget on increase CPU performance, as bandwidth limitations would reduce the marginal utility of that last 500 GFLOPS.
Goodtwin
Like Like
When can we expect clarity? The recent podcast didn't make anything clear. We still have no idea if the cancelled hardware was intended to use Drake. Is the delay more of repositioning the new hardware as a successor rather than a Pro or an outright scrap of the product.
MVG mentioned dev kits coming in all sorts of configurations. Motherboards tied together type of thing screams very early development hardware. We're these dev kits simply Ampere based cards with similar target specs for Drake and Nintendo is looking for feedback from third party developers on how their games will run at that spec? MVG didn't seem to have knowledge beyond knowing some developers had development hardware for a more powerful Switch. While it's hard to believe he didn't pry for more details from these contacts, his comments lead the audience to believe that is all he knows.
Raccoon
Fox Brigade
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you got clarity on everything he knows. it's a safe assumption that the things that don't make sense to us don't make sense to him either
Goodtwin
Like Like
I think you are correct and that's very disappointing. I don't think anyone here was under the assumption that what these guys know was so limited. I suppose it shouldn't be a complete shock, the DF crew knew Switch was using a Tegra processor but didn't confirm it was the X1 till a few months before release.
Raccoon
Fox Brigade
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yeah, they hear bits and pieces. what we colloquially call "insiders" are more like "people who know insiders"
I wonder how much "devkit" actually means "sdk" in these discussions. since Drake didn't physically exist until around April 2022, then dev kits were either orins or slapped together ampere boxes. but given how soon the 11 devs and spices article was, who's to say Nintendo was right and those devs never had kits, but sdks? you can technically "recall" software by tell the devs to delete what they have while a new one is being prepped
OP
OP
I don't think those were even physical devkits.
NVN runs on Windows, for development purposes. Nvidia could have provided a SDK, as in libraries to link their games, and an application to configure a developer machine CPU/GPU (Turing onwards) clocks and cores to match the expected final hardware's expected performance as close as possible.
After Bloomberg's devkits report, Nintendo stated they never provided any 4K devkits. But maybe Nvidia did.
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Me too! And it wasn't one of my speculative ones, just a garden variety choco shitpost.
LiC
Member
Worth noting that Bloomberg never used the term devkit or said developers had hardware, just (in September 2021) "a software toolkit provided by Nintendo," and that 11 developers had "tools from Nintendo to make 4K Switch games." So that's one concrete mention of SDKs, and the 11 devs comment would obviously refer to the same thing.
Edit: While we're on the subject of SDKs, I personally believe there's a 0% chance that SDK materials wouldn't leak following a hardware cancellation.
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D36
#WOHOYHASAWAKENED
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Ain't this the same singer from the Tokyo Ghoul opening?
NateDrake
Chain Chomp
As we said, it seems Nintendo is targeting a full-on successor that is likely to come as early as 2024. There doesn't seem to be any plans for a 2023 hardware release -- be it a revision or successor -- to any of our knowledge.
My assumption is Drake will be the SoC of the successor. I only know the features & general spec range of the kits. Not the specific SoC of them.
Kenka
Like Like
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Do you have a broad idea of the CPU/GPU/memory clocks as well as battery life (if indeed a handheld)?
ItWasMeantToBe19
Manakete
I think any potential of a new Switch revision (On the level of the Lite or OLED) in 2023 is killed by the TotK OLED
If there was a new revision, you would want to launch it with your new big bundle.
Would be a little annoying to launch a big new Zelda bundle, and then 3 months later there's a new revision.
If there was a new revision, you would want to launch it with your new big bundle.
Would be a little annoying to launch a big new Zelda bundle, and then 3 months later there's a new revision.
Raccoon
Fox Brigade
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at the risk of splitting hairs too finely: what makes it seem that they're targeting a successor in 2024? is it the absence of anything planned for 2023, or some other indication you've been given?
OP
OP
I mean Nintendo UK did announce a limited edition Super Smash Bros Nintendo 3DS XL on 13 August 2014 with a launch date of 3 October 2014 in the UK relatively shortly before Nintendo Co. Ltd announced the New Nintendo 3DS and the New Nintendo 3DS XL on 29 August 2014 with a launch date on 11 October 2014 in Japan. So never say never.
NateDrake
Chain Chomp
Bit of both -- the latter I hope to get a better read on around GDC.
Raccoon
Fox Brigade
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