• Hey everyone, staff have documented a list of banned content and subject matter that we feel are not consistent with site values, and don't make sense to host discussion of on Famiboards. This list (and the relevant reasoning per item) is viewable here.

StarTopic Future Nintendo Hardware & Technology Speculation & Discussion |ST| (Read the staff posts before commenting!)

Reader mode
So an early March reveal would be pretty awesome to me. The last game announcements/releases excepting a few exceptions were pretty lacking to me and it was pretty obvious they would not reveal new big games until the next gen, so the last year and a half has been a dragging to me.

That said, it’d would depend if the reveal is just a press letter ala 3DS announcement, a teaser trailer ala Switch reveal with minimal footage or a truly complete and meatier unveil with actual gameplay, price and launch roadmap… if its one of the two first options, meh… I’m so ready to jump ship :p please release this H1…
 
Has this been posted?



Seems it's from the most recent DF podcast, but I just saw it. Anyway, Rich seems more and more certain that the switch 2 will be on 8 nm cause the screen is bigger than expected.
 
Hidden content is only available for registered users. Sharing it outside of Famiboards is subject to moderation.
 
bmfrosty said:
This is very true.

One of my wants for the Switch 2 ecosystem is for it to be a bit more modular maybe? I don't necessarily need a new Dock, and if I can knock $50 off the price by not buying another dock, I'd be fine with that. This goes double if it can just work in general with any USB-C Docking station that provides video out. I would like that very much. Would go with my Covert Dock 2.

EDIT: Another want I have is for there to be USB-C ports on both the top and bottom. It would be nifty if I could use the same dock for either a Steam Deck or a Switch 2.
Click to expand...
It doesn’t actually cost Nintendo 50$ for cheap plastic and a simple usb c 4K dock with a usb connector, it probably cost them 15-20$ to make them in the millions, even a 4K HDMI 2.0 USB C dock is 15-20$ on Amazon. So for Nintendo it will probably cost like 17-20$ to make a custom motherboard with all the things they added to it. I would be in shock if it cost Nintendo more than 25-33$ to make the switch oled dock with it’s crappy low speed usb 2.0 Ethernet chip and HDMI 2.0 supporting chipset.
 
ILikeFeet said:
it kinda does. 1x 12GB chip for games and 1x 2GB chip for the OS

Series does this, but this is better balanced like the Series X
Click to expand...
This would be a terrible idea as it means not utilising the full bus width. If it's only a 128 bit bus, then the scenario you describe means that entire 12GB chip is limited to 64 bit (and therefore can only max out at 50Gbps).

Smarter way to do it would be to take a page out of the Series X* book, and combine the assymetrical chips together on the same bus such that you at least get the 4GB of memory spanning the full width. That would still suck though, as you'd be left with 10GB of slow memory. Given that strategy, the ideal mix would be a 6GB chip and an 8GB chip. That way you can get 12GB at full bus width and 2GB at half width, which is perfect for the game/os split you have in mind.

*Off topic, but weirdly enough Microsoft only employs this assymetrical chip strategy on the Series X. The Series S has 5 identical 2GB chips but split across a 128 bit bus and seperate 32 bit bus for no discernible reason. I have no idea why MS and AMD didn't just combine them all into a single 160 bit bus and get 25% boost to bandwidth. The only advantage I can think of to having a split bus is that, in theory, two different threads on the SOC could be accessing each bus simultaneously.
 
kingman said:
Has this been posted?



Seems it's from the most recent DF podcast, but I just saw it. Anyway, Rich seems more and more certain that the switch 2 will be on 8 nm cause the screen is bigger than expected.
Click to expand...

We have heard someone from DF say Nintendo went with bigger screen because it’s 8nm, yes. Not sure if it’s the same person (Rich)

But that logic is faulty. It’s not how it works. You design chip for the device, not the other way around
 
Langstonboy said:
It doesn’t actually cost Nintendo 50$ for cheap plastic and a simple usb c 4K dock with a usb connector, it probably cost them 15-20$ to make them in the millions, even a 4K HDMI 2.0 USB C dock is 15-20$ on Amazon. So for Nintendo it will probably cost like 17-20$ to make a custom motherboard with all the things they added to it. I would be in shock if it cost Nintendo more than 25-33$ to make the switch oled dock with it’s crappy low speed usb 2.0 Ethernet chip and HDMI 2.0 supporting chipset.
Click to expand...
I've learned to not underestimate the cost of decent electronics. To be fair though, I was including the cost of a decent power brick.

Lower quality electronics I end up spending money to replace.

Try pairing a decent steam deck dock with a good 40ish watt usb-c charger. Anker at least paired with jsaux maybe.
 
BreakAtmo said:
The thing about 8nm isn't just that it would be very inefficient and require a bigger battery, it would also require heavier cooling and also be more expensive than 4N. It does not make sense on any real level, especially since T239 was taped out at the same time as other 4N chips. "But it's Ampere and Ampere was 8nm!" Yeah, and Maxwell was 28nm. I don't remember a 28nm Switch.
Click to expand...
I have a better question, why don't John visit this board?
Serif said:
Mario Wonder seemed to have blurry interpolation, it's a native 1080p game so it should look better on a 1080p screen. It's possible the screen is higher res, like 1440p or 4K, and there's basic upscaling done by the display. There was a Tweet earlier in the thread about the screen possibly being higher res. But I didn't get a great look.
Click to expand...
Ok, my line of thoughts were that they upgraded to 4K screens in prep of the Switch 2
necrolipe said:
Joy-Con not going anywhere... all this discussion are based on predictions?
Click to expand...
Honestly, I think it is a red herring instead of a honest prediction. Just to throw people off. If* MVG is working on a switch 2 game, there's not much Nate can say or else he would get MVG in trouble or at least hassle send his way. The only thing Nate can do is conform March as that was something is not connected to MVG.


*And for the lurkers, that is an If. I don't anything.
 
bmfrosty said:
I've learned to not underestimate the cost of decent electronics. To be fair though, I was including the cost of a decent power brick.

Lower quality electronics I end up spending money to replace.

Try pairing a decent steam deck dock with a good 40ish watt usb-c charger. Anker at least paired with jsaux maybe.
Click to expand...
I agree, but there’s no way that it cost Nintendo close to 50$ to make a oled dock.
 
darthdiablo said:
We have heard someone from DF say Nintendo went with bigger screen because it’s 8nm, yes. Not sure if it’s the same person (Rich)

But that logic is faulty. It’s not how it works. You design chip for the device, not the other way around
Click to expand...
Apple is increasingly their displays this years iPhones so that means they’re going back to 5nm right?

Honestly, DF should stay out of Switch 2 speculation.
 
omniryu said:
I have a better question, why don't John visit this board?

Ok, my line of thoughts were that they upgraded to 4K screens in prep of the Switch 2

Honestly, I think it is a red herring instead of a honest prediction. Just to throw people off. If* MVG is working on a switch 2 game, there's not much Nate can say or else he would get MVG in trouble or at least hassle send his way. The only thing Nate can do is conform March as that was something is not connected to MVG.


*And for the lurkers, that is an If. I don't anything.
Click to expand...

Nintendo NDA’s are serious business. The podcast was a bit….weird but still fun to listen to. Speculating on this sort of thing on a predications based episode seems super silly but…. IF there is some red herring stuff going on…your theory is on point.
 
kingman said:
Has this been posted?



Seems it's from the most recent DF podcast, but I just saw it. Anyway, Rich seems more and more certain that the switch 2 will be on 8 nm cause the screen is bigger than expected.
Click to expand...

This is weird flawed logic when it comes to trying to guess the manufacturing process of an SoC.
The Lenovo Legion GO has an 8.8" LCD uses the Ryzen Z1 extreme APU, the ROG ally has the same chip in one of its models but with a 7" LCD screen.

What if the opposite is true and T239 on 4N net such better TDP that Nintendo decided to go with a larger screen to take advantage of the higher resolutions? Maybe they are really aiming for 1080p in handheld and an 8" display was the cheaper solution to obtain that from their manufacturers?
 
I'm kind of thrown off to hear this prediction, like I think the idea here is to be like "the Joycons are terrible, so they should get rid of them." But it's just such a weird thing. Regardless of whether the controllers are built into the system or not, that isn't what's going to determine whether they drift or not, the manufacturing process will. I mean other than that? I guess some don't like the slight flimsyness of how they feel in handheld mode, but that has never caused me a single issue personally. So, taking into account that, would Nintendo sacrifice what is essentially the brand association that tells the consumer they are playing "a Switch" just for the flimsyness concern that has barely been brought up whatsoever? And on top of that, sink the extra cost of including a pro controller in the box? It's just such a bizarre idea to me lmao, I think I'm done discussing it.

Edit: Something else I'll add, though, is that it's true that Nintendo has been known to kinda toss an idea out after trying it once, without ever really improving on it any. You could make the argument that they kinda did this with motion controls I think. Like, they still existed on the Wii U and they still exist with the Switch, but they haven't really made the effort to improve them (well, beyond Wii Motion Plus I guess) go forward. Actually, you could argue that Wii like motion control is worse on Switch. But anyway, the point is they haven't really advanced this technology in the same way that say VR equipment was constantly upgraded over time. So, with that said, I would like to see them actually improve on a hardware concept for once. The Joycons and the Switch in general have tons of incredibly obvious flaws that could be completely ironed out, would be nice to see them take the Joycons and use the next generation to refine that idea rather than leave it dead in the water and only sort of working. Alright, I swear I'm done talking about it now.
 
Last edited:
darthdiablo said:
That was what I was thinking too until the tweet mentioned San Francisco..

Last time ambassadors traveled like this it was to NYC for the Super Mario Wonder event
Click to expand...
There's probably some kind of themed promo shoot they want to do in San Francisco. Could be for MvDK, who knows.

Nintendo might fly out influencers for some kind of hardware event in the not-too-distant future, but that would only happen after the hardware is announced.
 
karmitt said:
For 2, I can agree that the majority of time later in the Switch’s life I used the Pro Controller after docking, but that’s totally anecdotal - just as it was for John. My nephew and niece don’t own a Pro Controller, and regularly use Joycons. If they include a Pro Controller in the package that solves the single player situation, but not the multiplayer one. And I’d have assumed this would be more expensive, basically doubling the controller parts shipped in the base product.
Click to expand...
Anecdata: I've never even seen a Pro Controller in real life. I play handheld 80% of the time. 5% of the time I'm playing on the TV with the included whatsit that lets you slide in the Joy-Con, and the remaining 15% of the time I'm playing Mario Kart with my partner, and we're both using sideways Joy-Con.

I play Mario Kart semi regularly with a medium sized group of Switch owners who are friends for non-gaming related reasons. I am the only majority handheld player. None of them use Pro Controllers. I am aware of one friend who owns one... but doesn't own a Switch! He only uses the Pro Controller when going to other people's houses to play Mario Kart!

There are something like 50 million people for whom the Switch is their only console. These folks aren't buying Pro Controllers.

darthdiablo said:
But that would mean Switch 2 is no longer a handheld.

I think this is pretty much a non-starter, not a scenario that's realistic.
Click to expand...
I think the scenario described is that it is a handheld, just like Steam Deck, but that docking would require a separate controller.

...or docking would require a device that plays on the TV via streaming, but I am highly dubious of that for myriad reasons that have nothing to do with streaming itself


fwd-bwd said:
Judging from these rumors, and the latest Furukawa comment on the importance of multiplayer experience (quote below), it’s hard to believe that Nintendo would abandon the Joy-Con concept.
Click to expand...
Agreed. Though I think Furukawa's comment was somewhat in the context of "getting households to buy multiple devices as a driver of hardware sales". Though I think having Switch support adequate multiplayer out of the box is what leads to buying the sorts of games that make you think man, I should get a second device.

Dizzle said:
Do the joycon haters not play in handheld mode? That's the main way I use the switch.
Click to expand...
I am a Joy-Con hater, and I play in handheld mode most of the time. I think they're neat little devices, but playing the steam deck, I'd much rather just have a single body, with no rail that can fail, or wiggle.

But I'm also leaving tomorrow on an international flight, and as much as I'd love to finally dig into Death Stranding, I'm taking the much smaller, easier to pack Switch (where the detachable Joy-Cons are a huge win) and Skyrim, which I only just started playing (thank you for your comments).
NineTailSage said:
If the math checks out A78 @ 2.2Ghz should be pretty = to Zen 2 @ 3.5Ghz PPC
Click to expand...
Or we could just directly compare them on a benchmark. Looks like that gap doesn't scale all the way to those two core configurations
CoreGeekbench 6 Single Core Geekbench 6 Multicore
8x A78AE @ 2.19Ghz10015449
8x Zen 2 @ 3.6Ghz13958240
Percent difference71.8%66.1%
Note: The AE cores definitely underperform the C core (the one in T239) when it comes to multicore. I expect the CPU to clock beneath this (personal estimate is closer to 2Ghz, maybe as low as 1.75?), but their isn't anything to sneeze at when it comes to 75% of a PS5's CPU crammed into a tablet.
 
I think Switch 2 has the potential of becoming the console with games that feature the most consistent frame-times if not the lowest frame-times (which is less likely). I’m thinking of so many games on the PS5/Series X that are CPU-limited and struggle to maintain 60FPS that can target and maintain 30FPS on Switch 2. I’m thinking of so many games on the PS4/Xbox One that are CPU-limited and struggle to maintain 30FPS that can target and maintain 30FPS on Switch 2.

30FPS might not be so bad after all, especially considering it’s the only way a game with the graphical fidelity of something like Horizon Zero Dawn, God of War, and Death Stranding can be played on what is essentially the go with the option to dock to a bigger, higher-resolution display. And I’m sure there will be a bevy of games, especially first-party ones, that maintain a 60FPS target.

Frame-time consistency for Nintendo EPD-developed Switch games has been pretty good so far, with mainly GPU-related dips in titles such as Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild.
 
Dizzle said:
Do the joycon haters not play in handheld mode? That's the main way I use the switch.
Click to expand...
I actually like the Idea of the joycon, but I hate the official ones provided by Nintendo.
Poor sticks, buttons too close to said sticks and most of all, They have a such a terrible grip that it hurts my hands if I hold my switch for too long and it was one of the primary reasons rarely played in handheld mode (and I am sure I don't need to mention the drift problem). I bought a Pro controller at launch and never used them in docked mode.
When mine eventually started to drift, I bought a third party pair and last year I also bought a Gamecube shaped pair, They both are so much better it's not even funny, and I actually started to play a lot more in handheld mode even though I don't really bring the Switch outside of my house.

I really hope They improve the ergonomics of the Joycon on the Switch 2, as I would rather not have to buy at third party ones again.
 
Last edited:
karmitt said:
I find it incredibly odd that both John and Nate came to the conclusion that they’ll remove the Joycons. It makes me wonder if it’s informed speculation, because it’s genuinely the least intuitive outcome I’d have thought possible, yet they both raised it.

I would have thought, especially with the 8” screen, that tabletop mode would be more appealing than ever. It’s still a suitable travel size and being able to have an all-in-one multiplayer experience is so good in a pinch.

It seems like the argument against them keeping the concept was:
  1. The fragility of the Joycons, and
  2. The admittedly uninformed belief that they weren’t used by many people
For 2, I can agree that the majority of time later in the Switch’s life I used the Pro Controller after docking, but that’s totally anecdotal - just as it was for John. My nephew and niece don’t own a Pro Controller, and regularly use Joycons. If they include a Pro Controller in the package that solves the single player situation, but not the multiplayer one. And I’d have assumed this would be more expensive, basically doubling the controller parts shipped in the base product.

As for 1, they’d have had the last 7+ years to refine how Joycons are built and how they function. It’s bizarre to humor the flaws of the current controllers as being relevant to the new system.

If it happens, it probably won’t impact me personally. The new device would feel sturdier and more compact. But it’s definitely something I’d have otherwise never seen coming.
Click to expand...
It's probably just a bubble thing. Probably both of them are the type that basically never detach their Joy-Cons from their Switch, using Pro Controllers for all their docked mode purposes. It's certainly a valid way to use the system, but obviously not the only one.
 
It's absolutely nuts how a bit of throwaway speculative discussion that bounced between the pros and cons of continuing with the joycon setup and basically ended at "eh, I dunno" has sent this thread into such a spiral. Not to mention the fact that it seems blatantly obvious a majority of the people here didn't even bother listening to it.

omniryu said:
I have a better question, why don't John visit this board?
Click to expand...

That's an insane question lol
 
Erika said:
Welcome Doctre81 (I think you are the real Doctre81)

You are one of the best Switch2 detective!

What do you mean by
Click to expand...
Hi thanks. Yes It's me lol. The last video I posted (and deleted) was based on some info already posted here but I couldn't see due to not being a member so I decided to join to avoid that happening again.
 
I had a really weird dream last night. In that dream, people in this thread were suggesting that they weld the joy-cons to the device so that you can't remove them, and then subsequently they suggested that Nintendo not ship another controller with the system! Crazy stuff, I mean, we are talking about the Switch, here, right? Its USP is being able to play in handheld AND docked mode, not just play in handheld and then dock it and have it look pretty without a way to control it. Locking one of the two main modes of play behind a (rather expensive, I might add) purchase of an additional controller is an absolute non-starter.
 
The questions around shipping with or without an extra controller, in the scenario of non-removable joycons, feel a bit moot if existing Switch 1 controllers are compatible.
 
Reader mode
You must log in or register to reply here.
Please read this staff post before posting.

Furthermore, according to this follow-up post, all off-topic chat will be moderated.
Last edited:


Back
Top Bottom