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

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ziggyrivers said:
I don’t get why there’s disagreement over the next Switch either being a mid gen or next gen upgrade (Pro vs. 2).

At this point in the Switch’s lifetime, a successor console is coming. The next gen device won’t immediately phase-out the previous gen, much like how the OLED is phasing out the older devices still.

Yes, the Switch 2 will coexist with the OLED and other two devices. Yes, we’ll have a crossgen period and Nintendo will release software for the Switch, but it won’t be permanent.
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Simple. For a mid gen upgrade normally increase performance around 2 - 3x (PS4 > PS4 Pro) & for a new gen upgrade normally increase performance to more than 5x or even more (PS4 > PS5). Switch already 7 years using the same performance profile, so it's more logical to release a new gen than a mid gen.
 
Hajeman said:
Simple. For a mid gen upgrade normally increase performance around 2 - 3x (PS4 > PS4 Pro) & for a new gen upgrade normally increase performance to more than 5x or even more (PS4 > PS5). Switch already 7 years using the same performance profile, so it's more logical to release a new gen than a mid gen.
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True, and that boost appears to be around 6X, which is quite reasonable for a new gen, I feel!
 
Lancelot said:
He's right, though? The chip goes way beyond that and it's not even close, pessimism should be called out when it's lacking a base.
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That doesn’t matter, oldpuck didn’t ask for that, he simply asked what it is that you want and to not judge others for what they say. That is all. Anyone can say anything they want.

Bellydrum is just satisfied with just that. He doesn’t need some grandstanding device that does a million things. He simply wants a device that is Backwards compatible (especially with physical), has at least an HD OLED screen, has enough performance for Dark Souls 3 in a portable device, and does at least 1080p (presumably docked because BD didn’t ask for 1080p OLED).

If it’s more, that’s completely fine for BD, but these are just his minimums/ or his wants.
 
Hajeman said:
Simple. For a mid gen upgrade normally increase performance around 2 - 3x (PS4 > PS4 Pro) & for a new gen upgrade normally increase performance to more than 5x or even more (PS4 > PS5). Switch already 7 years using the same performance profile, so it's more logical to release a new gen than a mid gen.
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Imo it's all marketing and positioning. There's no arbitrary performance multiplier that needs to be met.

Wii was a slightly better gamecube, One X is something like a 4,5x gpu boost over One S, Series S is a new gen in spite of in some ways being a downgrade over One X etc.
 
ItWasMeantToBe19 said:
I think it's somewhat possible the Switch 2 is really really weak and expensive just if mobile gaming hardware tech has stalled out.

But that would be pretty disappointing after 7.5 to 8.5 years on the Switch 1.
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I don’t understand how your train of thought landed on comparing the mobile offerings, things built with efficiency first and foremost, to a desktop style of GPU like Ampere, built for performance first and foremost, and coming to that conclusion.
 
0
Assuming Drake is fabbed on 4N (Which imo is the only node it can be fabbed on) perhaps Nintendo will do a Switch 2 Lite at launch? Or will they wait for Pokémon like always?

I ask because after 4N, there's not a ton of viable nodes for T239 be shrink in short-term. And 4N will provide enough perf/W for T239 to be reused on Switch 2 and the 2 Lite.
 
The Competition said:
I think this gives me the perfect chance to explain my problem with the whole Switch Pro shared library concept.
This will be nothing like going from black & white -> colour. Either the new system will be a big leap or it won't be, but either way this concept makes no sense:
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This has become an etymological debate, which makes the actual question "How does one define a "Pro" console".

Is it binary compatibility? Exclusive Software? Performance Jump? Marketing? Company definition?

Binary Compatibility: Redacted has NVN2 and games supporting NVN2 would have to account for NVN with a different build to support the OG Switch Note: this different than Redacted supporting Switch binaries.

Exclusive Software: We don't know, but PS4/5 XB1/XS have had massive cross generation periods. I don't think anyone would call PS5 or XSX pro editions of the prior consoles.

Performance Jump: 6X instead of 2-3X

Marketing: We don't know.

Company Definition: We don't know.

Realistically, it's going to have to be company definition.
 
Ghostsonplanets said:
Assuming Drake is fabbed on 4N (Which imo is the only node it can be fabbed on) perhaps Nintendo will do a Switch 2 Lite at launch? Or will they wait for Pokémon like always?

I ask because after 4N, there's not a ton of viable nodes for T239 be shrink in short-term. And 4N will provide enough perf/W for T239 to be reused on Switch 2 and the 2 Lite.
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A die shrink is a means to an end (reduce power consumption). Maybe they can sufficiently reduce power consumption by other means?

Upgrading from lppdr 5 to 5x (without adjusting speed), upgrading to more efficient screen tech, upgrading UFS version (without adjusting speed), stuff like that.

Idk, it probably wouldn't compare to the energy gains of a die shrink.
 
1UpMango said:
I just want the Activity Log back maaaaaaan. I don't wanna wait after a week of starting a game to know how much time I've put into playing it. I'm not a fan of play time in your Switch profile being only in increments of 5 hours. I don't want being informed about cool play time statistics to only be a once a year thing.

I want to know again how much time I played everyday
5qbfe38dlzd71.jpg


It was just cool how Nintendo presented your play time like this
GIh6j1k.jpg


and how you could know stuff like, how many times you opened an app/game
2.jpg
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Those are the little things in life that I miss.
 
Ghostsonplanets said:
Assuming Drake is fabbed on 4N (Which imo is the only node it can be fabbed on) perhaps Nintendo will do a Switch 2 Lite at launch? Or will they wait for Pokémon like always?

I ask because after 4N, there's not a ton of viable nodes for T239 be shrink in short-term. And 4N will provide enough perf/W for T239 to be reused on Switch 2 and the 2 Lite.
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The Lite version will wait. No reason to spin up multiple manufacturing lines when one will suffice.

If the first version of T239 is good enough for a Lite variant it will be launched when Nintendo thinks it best to drive additional sales. Likely Pokemon as you say.

The big question is what does the Switch hardware lineup look like after Redacted launches. I'm curious what the pricing spread will be.
 
Ghostsonplanets said:
Assuming Drake is fabbed on 4N (Which imo is the only node it can be fabbed on) perhaps Nintendo will do a Switch 2 Lite at launch? Or will they wait for Pokémon like always?
Click to expand...
I think they'll want to hold any revisions till they need to reinvigorate the flagging line, as they've done in the past. Especially if there is cross-gen, keeping the existing Lite around for another couple years makes sense to me.
 
oldpuck said:
First, thanks everyone who reached out privately. Ya'll are cool.

Second, let's do some speculating/wishing. What do ya'll want from the next console other than performance. Squishy triggers? A 1080p screen? A second screen? New colors? It can be literally anything.

The rules are - reply to this message directly, but no judging each other's picks. No telling folks why it's not possible, or what it's unlikely, or why the shouldn't want it. I just want people to say what they imagine the next thing might have. It's cool if it's a weird niche thing, it's cool if it's boring. Just let me know. I'm a little tired of this rut of "the same but better" and odds are Nintendo has one surprise cooking, and if it's yours, I want to celebrate that you get your weird niche thing!
Click to expand...

I've brought this up before, but two decent cameras on the back for AR would be my choice. It's a fairly cheap addition, and I think it's a really good fit for Nintendo, both because they've dabbled with it before on 3DS, but also because it allows them to create novel experiences on the new hardware without having to take anything away from what made the Switch successful.

I'd also say having AR experiences built around hardware as powerful as T239 would be vastly different than the kinds of things people are used to from the likes of the 3DS or smartphone apps. To put it in perspective, the Apple Vision Pro is running off an M2 which is reportedly capable of 3.6Tflops, and has to drive 23 million pixels worth of displays. The Switch NG in portable mode will probably somewhat less than half that in raw GPU performance, but will at most be rendering to a ~2 million pixel screen. Apple are undoubtedly relying on foveated rendering there, but Nintendo would be in a pretty good place in terms of graphical capability compared to the highest end AR hardware.

Perhaps more important is the tensor core performance. I strongly suspect that a good ML solution could not only do a more accurate (and more stable) job of depth estimation from the camera inputs than most current solutions, but would also be able to do a good job of extracting lighting information alongside it. Actually being able to track lighting conditions and apply them to the rendered objects in the scene is really the holy grail of good AR. People are used to using AR apps on their phone with Pokemon Go and the like, but no matter how high the resolution or how much rendering power is thrown at them, if the rendered elements aren't lit in a way that matches the environment around them they'll always look off, like they've been crudely green-screened and placed on top of a different video. AR games which can achieve accurate environment-matched lighting will be a much more immersive experience.

Finally, I think Nintendo would be well-placed to do shared-space AR multiplayer. One of the big issues with headset-based AR and VR is that they're not particularly well suited to local multiplayer, whereas handheld AR is a much better fit for those kind of experiences, which is obviously a speciality of Nintendo. I remember with 1-2 Switch one of the motivations for designing the game was to create a multiplayer game where players were looking at each other instead of staring at the TV. Multiplayer AR games could be another way to move in a similar direction.
 
Bring back Miiverse you cowards!

Miiverse would've been amazing with an install base of 125 million and even more possible accounts.

I am betting it was a moderation nightmare for Nintendo though lol.

I hope that guy who liked water in video games is doing alright. He was a legend of Wii U era Nintendo.
 
Z0m3le said:
Hey, I somewhat remember you. You had the whole thing where backwards compatibility couldn't happen on anything but maxwell right? -Not trying to bash you btw, welcome back. I could be wrong of course.

Anyways, I'm looking at the 'leak' which claims max power draws of 11w and 28.6w for portable and docked, that assumes the higher CPU clock is "turned on" IMO.
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Heh, yeah. Native BC isn't possible, but they appear to have figured out some type of BC layer/workaround. No clue how it works.
Thanks ^^

I suppose it really depends how the numbers were sourced (assuming they're real). If they came from some type of spec sheet they're gonna be without the OC.
If they were measured using a watt meter on a SDEV-like device (more likely IMO since 28.6 is very specific), those would automatically pull more power than a production device because they contain an entire FPGA + ARM combo daughter-board and OC would depend on the software being tested (edit: and if NG currently implements oe::SetCpuOverclockEnabled).
 
ZachyCatGames said:
Heh, yeah. Native BC isn't possible, but they appear to have figured out some type of BC layer/workaround. No clue how it works.
Thanks ^^

I suppose it really depends how the numbers were sourced (assuming they're real). If they came from some type of spec sheet they're gonna be without the OC.
If they were measured using a watt meter on a SDEV-like device (more likely IMO since 28.6 is very specific), those would automatically pull more power than a production device because they contain an entire FPGA + ARM combo daughter-board and OC would depend on the software being tested.
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Sorry but have you found some evidence for this in the firmware?

Also, welcome back.
 
Hermii said:
Imagine the ray traces water reflections on Drake.
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eh. I rather they not use it, RT reflections work best with metals and glass and what not, most RT effects (except for reflections tbh) just look about as good as just really good screenspace, i rather that performance go else where
 
ronf said:
Within-24-hours-of-the-First-Tuesday-in-July-Following-Independence-Day-in-the-US-#Team23 theory:
Wednesday, July 10th, 2019: Switch Lite Announced
Tuesday, July 6th, 2021: Switch OLED Model Announced
Tuesday or Wednesday, July 11th or 12th, 2023: ???
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I'm thinking two different things here. Since the Switch itself wasn't announced in July perhaps the Drake would fall outside this pattern? If it does not, that means if nothing happens this July... Then next July is a decent bet.

That also doesn't rule out a Fall announcement and reveal just like the Switch, but I think the odds of a 2024 reveal/announcement and release are pretty high (especially if we don't get either the next gen announcement or reveal this year).

AshiodyneFX said:
imagine we get a new switch OG model after switch 2 launches, ala 2ds xl, that would be hilarious.
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Holy fuck, I forgot about the 2DS. How did that thing even sell lol? I can totally see a $150-200 cheapo Switch model from Nintendo just to do it.
 
ronf said:
Within-24-hours-of-the-First-Tuesday-in-July-Following-Independence-Day-in-the-US-#Team23 theory:
Wednesday, July 10th, 2019: Switch Lite Announced
Tuesday, July 6th, 2021: Switch OLED Model Announced
Tuesday or Wednesday, July 11th or 12th, 2023: ???
Click to expand...
FIRE UP THE HYPE TRUSTERS BOYS!

I'm going to go outside and have a staring contest with the sun.
 
bellydrum said:
I meant 1440p, aka 2.5k.
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Honestly I have significant doubts Nintendo would ever support 1440p specifically as an output resolution. You don't really find native 1440p TVs and certain popular TV vendors (cough*Samsung*cough) have a history of not properly supporting it on their 4k TVs. I think the next step up from 1080p video output will probably just be 4k, regardless of what resolution they're targeting internally.
 
ronf said:
Within-24-hours-of-the-First-Tuesday-in-July-Following-Independence-Day-in-the-US-#Team23 theory:
Wednesday, July 10th, 2019: Switch Lite Announced
Tuesday, July 6th, 2021: Switch OLED Model Announced
Tuesday or Wednesday, July 11th or 12th, 2023: ???
Click to expand...
Tuesday or Wednesday, July 11th or 12th, 2023: "Second Development Update on Metroid Prime 4 for Nintendo Switch"
 
MadMarvainy said:
Bring back Miiverse you cowards!

Miiverse would've been amazing with an install base of 125 million and even more possible accounts.

I am betting it was a moderation nightmare for Nintendo though lol.

I hope that guy who liked water in video games is doing alright. He was a legend of Wii U era Nintendo.
Click to expand...
Miiverse my beloved
 
ronf said:
Within-24-hours-of-the-First-Tuesday-in-July-Following-Independence-Day-in-the-US-#Team23 theory:
Wednesday, July 10th, 2019: Switch Lite Announced
Tuesday, July 6th, 2021: Switch OLED Model Announced
Tuesday or Wednesday, July 11th or 12th, 2023: ???
Click to expand...
Excellent work...
 
AshiodyneFX said:
apparently it sold really well.
inb4 switch lite oled is real and comes out after drake
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Personally I think there's a decent chance of a "TV Only" mini-Switch coming out after Drake.

Like 2DS XL, it rips out the headlining feature (3D, switching), but still gives you a premium experience in the context of that console (NEW processor, TV Mode).
 
Gentle reminder:

The next piece of Nintendo hardware launches in 14 days. It's the Pokémon Go Plus+ Sleep Monitor and Pedometer, based on their QOL and earlier R&D that gave us the Wii Fit U Meter and Pokéwalker, as well as the 2015 patent on sonic sleep monitoring!

I will get it and report back. I'm a bit of a Pokémon-head. The only thing stopping me from getting a National Dex is being eepy, because I really do want one.

...So if anyone wants to trade Pokémon HOME friend codes and see if we can fill some gaps with touch trading?
 
Ghostsonplanets said:
Assuming Drake is fabbed on 4N (Which imo is the only node it can be fabbed on) perhaps Nintendo will do a Switch 2 Lite at launch? Or will they wait for Pokémon like always?

I ask because after 4N, there's not a ton of viable nodes for T239 be shrink in short-term. And 4N will provide enough perf/W for T239 to be reused on Switch 2 and the 2 Lite.
Click to expand...
Ins't Lite the worse device in selling? Why would they want to try that again?
 
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Foltzie said:
This has become an etymological debate, which makes the actual question "How does one define a "Pro" console".

Is it binary compatibility? Exclusive Software? Performance Jump? Marketing? Company definition?

Binary Compatibility: Redacted has NVN2 and games supporting NVN2 would have to account for NVN with a different build to support the OG Switch Note: this different than Redacted supporting Switch binaries.

Exclusive Software: We don't know, but PS4/5 XB1/XS have had massive cross generation periods. I don't think anyone would call PS5 or XSX pro editions of the prior consoles.

Performance Jump: 6X instead of 2-3X

Marketing: We don't know.

Company Definition: We don't know.

Realistically, it's going to have to be company definition.
Click to expand...
imo a pro model would be almost fully binary compatiable with minor exceptions that can be worked around easily while also being a modest jump in power in terms of graphics and nothing else, PS4 pro for example still has overall the same restrictions as PS4 in terms of cpu, memory, API, OS, etc.
 
0
Wouldn't it be odd for them to announce new hardware next week when they're busy promoting pikmin 4? If they did that, pikmin would lose a lot of mind share... understandably.
 
oldpuck said:
First, thanks everyone who reached out privately. Ya'll are cool.

Second, let's do some speculating/wishing. What do ya'll want from the next console other than performance. Squishy triggers? A 1080p screen? A second screen? New colors? It can be literally anything.

The rules are - reply to this message directly, but no judging each other's picks. No telling folks why it's not possible, or what it's unlikely, or why the shouldn't want it. I just want people to say what they imagine the next thing might have. It's cool if it's a weird niche thing, it's cool if it's boring. Just let me know. I'm a little tired of this rut of "the same but better" and odds are Nintendo has one surprise cooking, and if it's yours, I want to celebrate that you get your weird niche thing!
Click to expand...
Since this is wishes rather than predictions - same screen size and resolution as the OLED, but... 3d.

Yep, sequel to the 3ds, but without the second screen. I just love 3d visuals. And on a much bigger screen than what the 3ds had, like the Switch OLED's? The relative z-axis distance of everything would feel far greater and make it really worthwhile.

The main problem with the 3ds was that finding the "sweet spot" was too hard, but the "New 3ds" with the adaptive camera solution they came up with solved that. I'd love to have that back, even though the 3d feature would be wasted docked and you couldn't plan game design around it. Especially for golf games, 3d visuals are wonderful.

Other than that, just better joycons that feel more like real controllers and don't drift, and a new OS with some Nintendo charm.

EDIT: Also - an end to pushing online features to phone apps that they then georestrict in the country I live in. That is MASSIVE bullshit.
 
Concernt said:
The worst model sold the best and the best model sold the worst... Truly a cruel world...
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I go on a tangent on why the new 2ds xl is absolute dog shit whenever its mentioned its so overrated in a way that makes me question if the people that talk about it ever tried any other 3ds
 
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