1. Is critically flawed because the only thing better than an Orin-derived SoC (Dane) is an Altan Derived SoC which Altan isn't out until 2025, so no go there.
2. Based on what we can tell from the A78s and Ampere, we can extrapolate a range of processing power for the Dane SoC.
- CPU
- 8 A78Cs is the most likely configuration, but the thing is we have no actual benchmarks for A78Cs so we have to use A78s for reference, but even then A78s at 1.5Ghz is over a 4 times increase in Single-threaded CPU performance over OG Switch and an over 9 times increase in multithreaded performance over OG Switch.
- For reference versus other consoles
- (Note comparisons between x86 and is a bit messy, but I am using Geekbench values for this, so some systems that don't have Geekbench 5 scores will use values derived from closer CPUs we can get % values to compare against them)
- OG Switch
- Xbox One CPU (8 Core Jaguar)
- Dane @ 1.5Ghz (Calculated based on A78s, A78C could bring these values way up)
- PS5 CPU
- Dane will find itself sort of in the gap between the Last and Current gen Consoles if they go for 1.5Ghz, having roughly half the CPU power of the PS5, but that should be taken with the context that Dane's CPU still is more than twice as powerful as the last-gen CPUs, and immensely more powerful than the OG Switch's CPU.
- And that's only with data from A78s, the A78Cs should perform even better with the extra cache they have.
- GPU
- We can actually extrapolate this decently as there is a Ampere GPU in the 6-12SM range in existence at the moment, the NVIDIA A2.
- Even though the A2 is 10SMs and I say the general expectations for Dane's GPU has settled on 8SMs, there is a major factor we have to consider
- Orin isn't Ampere.
- What i mean by this is that we now know what makes Orin different than Ampere GPU-wise in most regards, the main thing being a boatload of extra cache which as we can see with AMD's Infinity Cache, can make a huge difference in the power of the GPU.
- As for the specific increase, 50% more L1 Cache, and Double The L2 Cache, which because those are very fast cache types, the boost can somewhat equate to the L3 Cache addition that Infinity Cahce is for RDNA2 (So to make it simpler, imagine Ampere but with Infinity Cache, but it's scalable with the SM count)
- So I say it would be fair to say that 8SMs of Orin would perform the same as 10SMs of Ampere when set to the same clocks.
- The question then is, where does the A2 fall?
- Well, the A2 surpasses the GTX 1050Ti at 1.7Ghz boost clock, by roughly 9%.
- For reference of where the 1050Ti is, that is at worst 75% of the PS4 Pro's GPU assuming it's equal to an RX470.
- Docked Dane likely will be clocked a fair bit lower than that, but Ampere seems to be fairly inflexible on its GPU Clock ranges, not gaining as much as previous uArchs, so I say that the range for Dane's GPU falls between the GTX 960 and the 1050Ti itself.
- The GTX 960 is 47% faster than the PS4's GPU by the way, and even if the range is 1050 to 1050Ti, the GTX 1050 is 27% faster
- So with the above, comparing GPUs to the closest approximation to the current Switch's GPU (The 920mx)
- Xbox One: 1.24x
- PS4: 1.9x
- Bottom-End Dane Pre-DLSS (1050): 2.68x
- Upper-End Dane Pre-DLSS(1050Ti): 3.6x
- PS4 Pro: 5.1x
- Bottom-end Dane Post-DLSS: 5.36x
- Series S: 5.5-6x?
- One X: 6.5x
- Upper-End Dane post-DLSS 7.2x
- PS5: 13x???
- And comparing Dane itself to other systems to get numbers more in line.
- PS4 Pro is 1.6x as powerful as the Lower-end estimate for Dane, and only 1.33x as powerful as the upper-end.
- The One X is 2x as powerful as lower-end Dane but 1.6x as powerful as the higher-end one.
- The PS5 is 3.7x as powerful as lower-end Dane, but only 3x Upper-end Dane.
- DLSS makes these margins even smaller on output.
So TL;DR?
- CPU:
- Immensely more powerful than the current Switch and over double the power of last-gen CPUs, but highly hinges on clock speed and how close it is to PS5/Series S|X CPU-wise depending on A78C's improvements and the final clock.
- GPU:
- 3-4x as powerful as the current Switch, while being a decent bit ahead of the OG PS4 before DLSS, jumping ahead of the Pro-Consoles post-DLSS.
I say that system with DLSS, RT that would likely beat the Series S's RT capability, would be fully capable of getting modern ports as a lot of the excess processing power in the PS5/Series X is mostly going to render native 4k, and/or compensating for AMD's lackluster Ray Accelerators, problems Dane wouldn't have because DLSS covers for resolution, meaning they only need to hit 720p to get 4K output with DLSS ultra Performance, and the RT cores are far better than AMD's Ray Accelerators.
mynintendonews.com
