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StarTopic Future Nintendo Hardware & Technology Speculation & Discussion |ST| (New Staff Post, Please read)

So you think that for instance Nate could be wrong about 8nm, but in same time you think he accurate about time frame release?
Makes sense to me that one would be known/understood/shared by plenty more people. I wonder how many people working at game companies would even know what Switch uses currently.
 
There is good news for those among us who want to see DLSS in portable mode. According to Igors' Lab experiment (I didn't know the source but the tests seem sensible), running Shadow of the Tomb Raider using DLSS actually saves energy per frame rendered:

2022-03-2510_39_16-wia0k73.png


In this example, the savings amount to 20% power on each frame. That is substantial when we consider what impact on the battery life this can have. It's not gargantuan mind you, but this might have caught Nintendo's attention.

I should say though that all the caveats regarding DLSS in handheld mode still apply: we have less power at disposal compared to docked mode and because of this, DLSS will likely eat up a lot of the time budget per frame. However, if it consistently saves up energy, then it can increase the likeliness of Nintendo trying to make it work.

And of course, the power savings would scale up in docked mode as well.
Igor's Lab is a reliable site from someone who works in the components industry
 
So you think that for instance Nate could be wrong about 8nm, but in same time you think he accurate about time frame release?
I'm saying information about devkits being 8nm (seeing as how they're Ampere based this would be logical) may not mean that the final hardware is on 8nm. Not that the information itself was wrong, just that it doesn't necessarily say that final hardware has to be 8nm. For instance, if early Orin AGX chips were used as devkits they would likely be 8nm (Nvidia still hasn't confirmed this for some reason), so developers who are using the devkits but aren't privy to the final paper specs like Nintendo/Nvidia would assume the final hardware would also be 8nm.

Also it could easily still be 8nm for all we know. The size is questionable but nobody here really knows what the limitations would really be.
That really depends mostly from time, how long from initial time launch window left when they maybe decided to delay internal initial plan for Switch launch window, but also from costs, maybe they realised some time last year that that 8nm would made more costs in long run than they thought in 2020. and despite internal delay they could have less cost in long run with lower manufacture process.
Sure, last year they could've decided to delay it a few months. I'm not really disputing that.

I'm disputing the idea that they delayed it A) simply because the base unit continues to sell, or B) because of the war in Ukraine
I trying here to stay open minded for possible changes saying that nothing is certain until Nintendo announce new hardware,
on other hand you were 100% certain month ago that its 8nm process and now you are not so certain any more.
I've never been 100% certain about any of this, it's all rumors at the moment. Even the data breach I'm not treating as entirely ironclad, we could be reading a bit too much into some things with that.
 
This may be out of term from me, but I don’t get the fascination of wanting to beat the PS2 sales numbers as a reason to not release the switch 2 this year or next year.

Let go.

I’ve seen this sentiment across multiple sites already.


What is it with the PS2 that people want the switch to beat it so badly.
 
I'm saying information about devkits being 8nm (seeing as how they're Ampere based this would be logical) may not mean that the final hardware is on 8nm. Not that the information itself was wrong, just that it doesn't necessarily say that final hardware has to be 8nm. For instance, if early Orin AGX chips were used as devkits they would likely be 8nm (Nvidia still hasn't confirmed this for some reason), so developers who are using the devkits but aren't privy to the final paper specs like Nintendo/Nvidia would assume the final hardware would also be 8nm.
Also it could easily still be 8nm for all we know. The size is questionable but nobody here really knows what the limitations would really be.

Sure, last year they could've decided to delay it a few months. I'm not really disputing that.

I'm disputing the idea that they delayed it A) simply because the base unit continues to sell, or B) because of the war in Ukraine

I've never been 100% certain about any of this, it's all rumors at the moment. Even the data breach I'm not treating as entirely ironclad, we could be reading a bit too much into some things with that.

You didnt answer my question, last year Nate also said that he heard its 8nm,
do you think that Nate could be wrong about 8nm, but in same time you think he accurate about time frame release?

Point that current Switch units still was selling great could easily effect decision about possible delay, alongside other reasons that I mentioned.
Yeah, Ukraine war is bad example, it started 1 month ago, so yeah that couldn't effect past decisions, only current ones.

I am pretty sure you were sure about 8nm, because at that time all rumors suggested that and you believe that and you wasnt open for possibility that maybe is not 8nm.
And thats point, things are changing with every new rumor, nothing is certain until Switch is officially announced and people should act like that.
Now you saying that maybe is not 8nm because from start wasnt 8nm, but its also possible that Nintendo changed plans along way.
 
You didnt answer my question, last year Nate also said that he heard its 8nm,
do you think that Nate could be wrong about 8nm, but in same time you think he accurate about time frame release?
Nate reports what he is told. It's possible everyone is right: devs are working on early kits that were built on 8nm, but final hardware was always intended to be on a different node. We just won't know completely until the product is revealed
 
You didnt answer my question, last year Nate also said that he heard its 8nm,
do you think that Nate could be wrong about 8nm, but in same time you think he accurate about time frame release?
I did answer your question, he could easily be wrong about the final product being 8nm but also right that this is what developers believe and have heard. A lot of people tend to not even attempt to understand how inside information comes about in the first place, and in this case most of what developer sources will know is based on devkits and documentation/messaging from Nintendo relating to those devkits. Nintendo likely gave people a rough idea of the final specs and the devkit itself, and neither of those pieces of information would confirm what process node the final hardware is being fabricated on. So developers, seeing Ampere (8nm for Ampere PC cards and likely for Orin) would assume that the final hardware will be similar enough, so likely 8nm.

So what I'm saying, is that Nate hearing 8nm can be correct (as in, developers really said that to him or his source) while not being accurate to the final product. So yes, Nate could be wrong that the final hardware is 8nm (also not sure if that's something he explicitly said) but accurate about release timing. Nothing we've seen so far suggests he is wrong about the latter.
Point that current Switch units still was selling great could easily effect decision about delay.
Yeah, Ukraine war is bad example, it started 1 month ago, so yeah that couldn't effect past decisions, only current one.
Switch selling well cannot cause them to decide to delay it. That would be extremely foolish. What it could do is, if they had another reason for considering a delay, like lack of software or poor hardware yields or other complications, then Switch units currently selling well can reassure them that a delay wouldn't hurt them too badly.

But the idea of "they don't need to release it because it's selling well" completely ignores how hardware development and production works, they can't just flip a switch and start production the second they see sales start to slide.
I am pretty sure you were sure about 8nm, because at that time all rumors suggested that and you believe that and you wasnt open for possibility that maybe is not 8nm,
things are changing with every new rumor, nothing is certain until Switch is officially announced and people should act like that.
Now you saying that maybe is not 8nm because from start wasnt 8nm, but maybe Nintendo changed plans along way.
I have never even been "100% sure" this product exists. I don't know where you're getting this from.

I have been confident that it was 8nm, and to be honest I still am. The only reason it's now open for debate is that the leaked specs present a chip that might be a bit too big to fit in the same form factor at 8nm.

There is zero evidence that Nintendo changed from 8nm to 5nm, the fact that the same chip number that we saw tied to 8nm (T239) is still being referred to in the NVN2 documentation strongly indicates that there has been no major redesign of that chip. If it's not 8nm then it never was.
 
I just read that the leaks apparently also included 4MB of L2 cache for the Drake chi. That's rather gigantic considering the RTX3080 runs on 5MB of L2 cache, and the RTX3050 has only 2 MB of L2 cache. Wasn't this one of the reasons that was cited as to why Ampere FLOPS were less efficient than Turing FLOPS (I think you mentioned this @Thraktor but I might remember the exact quote and context wrongly)? I wonder if that is one of the things they tackled in Orin's design to improve performance. If that is true, then I wonder if that means that the per-FLOP performance of Drake is better than what we saw for the RTX 30 series 🤔
 
This may be out of term from me, but I don’t get the fascination of wanting to beat the PS2 sales numbers as a reason to not release the switch 2 this year or next year.

Let go.

I’ve seen this sentiment across multiple sites already.


What is it with the PS2 that people want the switch to beat it so badly.
I don’t think it’s about PS2. It’s about the fact that PS2 ist the best selling console of all time and if Switch could beat it it could also claim this title. Apparently there a people who want a Nintendo console sitting on top of that list.

That said I couldn’t care less. As someone who bought a Switch day one and updated to a Switch OLED immediately after release I can’t wait for a Switch Pro or Switch 2. The sooner they announce it the better.
 
Apparently Moore's Law Is Dead has stated on his recent episode that he knows of a few devs having their switch Pro dev kits confiscated by Nintendo with no reason given, hinting at a possible cancellation.

How reliable is this insider and what is everyone's thoughts?

I don't see it as being very likely this far along, would be a nightmare for Nintendos reputation plus all of the fab space would be reserved by now along with all of the other manufacturing capacity being reserved, would be bad business all round.
 
Nate reports what he is told. It's possible everyone is right: devs are working on early kits that were built on 8nm, but final hardware was always intended to be on a different node. We just won't know completely until the product is revealed

Absolutely agree.
Nate reports what he hears, but things that he heard can be changed later internally and he ending it with old information.
 
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Igor's Lab is a reliable site from someone who works in the components industry
Thanks. I was afraid I was potentially quoting a wrong information.
Apparently Moore's Law Is Dead has stated on his recent episode that he knows of a few devs having their switch Pro dev kits confiscated by Nintendo with no reason given, hinting at a possible cancellation.

How reliable is this insider and what is everyone's thoughts?

I don't see it as being very likely this far along, would be a nightmare for Nintendos reputation plus all of the fab space would be reserved by now along with all of the other manufacturing capacity being reserved, would be bad business all round.
I have never heard of another case in which a console maker confiscates dev kits. Do you have the source?
 
I have never heard of another case in which a console maker confiscates dev kits. Do you have the source?
ShaunSwitch mentioned Moore's Law is Dead, which is a YouTube channel, as the source. And quite frankly, I consider Moore's Law is Dead to be a very dubious source, so take what Moore's Law is Dead says with a heavy grain of salt.
 
Apparently Moore's Law Is Dead has stated on his recent episode that he knows of a few devs having their switch Pro dev kits confiscated by Nintendo with no reason given, hinting at a possible cancellation.

How reliable is this insider and what is everyone's thoughts?

I don't see it as being very likely this far along, would be a nightmare for Nintendos reputation plus all of the fab space would be reserved by now along with all of the other manufacturing capacity being reserved, would be bad business all round.
AFAIK MLID is not a very reliable source for most things.
 
Switch selling well cannot cause them to decide to delay it. That would be extremely foolish. What it could do is, if they had another reason for considering a delay, like lack of software or poor hardware yields or other complications, then Switch units currently selling well can reassure them that a delay wouldn't hurt them too badly.
But the idea of "they don't need to release it because it's selling well" completely ignores how hardware development and production works, they can't just flip a switch and start production the second they see sales start to slide.

I have never even been "100% sure" this product exists. I don't know where you're getting this from.
I have been confident that it was 8nm, and to be honest I still am. The only reason it's now open for debate is that the leaked specs present a chip that might be a bit too big to fit in the same form factor at 8nm.
There is zero evidence that Nintendo changed from 8nm to 5nm, the fact that the same chip number that we saw tied to 8nm (T239) is still being referred to in the NVN2 documentation strongly indicates that there has been no major redesign of that chip. If it's not 8nm then it never was.

I didnt said they maybe delay it only because Switch was is selling great, but that could effect decision of delay or changing process node alongside other reasons like different process node having better costs in long run, having chip shortages, having rise of cost...

Well you were very confident about 8nm and arguing that is 8nm, while now you are much more open mind about possibilite is not 8nm,
based on your posts.
 
Devkits being confiscated "out of nowhere" strikes me much more as a countermeasure against leaks (or a reaction to leaks) than it does as a result of cancelling hardware.

Assuming MLID's info is accurate which I'm personally not assuming.
I didnt said they maybe delay it only because Switch was is selling great, but that could effect decision of delay or changing process node alongside other reasons like different process node having better costs in long run, having chip shortages, having rise of cost...
Yeah, that could have happened last year at some point. Who knows.
Well you were very confident about 8nm and arguing that is 8nm, while now you are much more open mind about possibilite is not 8nm,
based on your posts.
Like I said I still am confident about 8nm.

But rumors being rumors when new information is presented I'm happy to change my position on something. In this case 12SMs on an 8nm chip might be too big, so it's possible it's not 8nm. The amount of SMs is a lot more reliable info than the process node.
 
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my point of contention with TSMC 5nm is one of cost and just how much production would be dedicated to Drake. much like AMD splitting their 7nm between two consoles, HPC CPUs, consumer CPUs, APUs, and GPUs for consumer and HPC, Nvidia will have to do the same. granted, they won't be making 3 large APUs for consoles, but one APU for a tablet
 
8nm still strikes me as significantly more likely than 7nm or 5nm, even if the chip is larger. Nintendo's generally not one to use bleeding-edge nodes.

It's not a coincidence that the PS5 and XSS/X adopted TSMC N7 in the same year Apple moved their latest products from TSMC N7 to TSMC N5, freeing up tons of 7nm capacity and making that node cheaper. I don't think any game system, especially a Nintendo one, is going to jump to N5 until Apple starts moving in a big way to N3, and it seems like a large portion of Apple's products this year are still going to be on N5.
 
8nm still strikes me as significantly more likely than 7nm or 5nm, even if the chip is larger. Nintendo's generally not one to use bleeding-edge nodes.

It's not a coincidence that the PS5 and XSS/X adopted TSMC N7 in the same year Apple moved their latest products from TSMC N7 to TSMC N5, freeing up tons of 7nm capacity and making that node cheaper. I don't think any game system, especially a Nintendo one, is going to jump to N5 until Apple starts moving in a big way to N3, and it seems like a large portion of Apple's products this year are still going to be on N5.
Yeah, I agree with this. 8nm made a lot of sense due to availability, which is something Nintendo will absolutely want to prioritize above all else for this product.

The only reason we're now a bit more open to the idea of another node is the size of 12SMs on 8nm, which is not something any of us can really even guess that closely anyway. 8nm seems exceedingly likely still.
 
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8nm still strikes me as significantly more likely than 7nm or 5nm, even if the chip is larger. Nintendo's generally not one to use bleeding-edge nodes.

It's not a coincidence that the PS5 and XSS/X adopted TSMC N7 in the same year Apple moved their latest products from TSMC N7 to TSMC N5, freeing up tons of 7nm capacity and making that node cheaper. I don't think any game system, especially a Nintendo one, is going to jump to N5 until Apple starts moving in a big way to N3, and it seems like a large portion of Apple's products this year are still going to be on N5.
This might be semantics, but I wouldn’t call those bleeding edge. I mean Apple is already on round two so to speak with 5nm as they started with this back in 2020 on the 12 lineup for the A14. It’s not like they just switched from 7nm to 5nm on the 13 line with the A15 chips.
 
Apparently Moore's Law Is Dead has stated on his recent episode that he knows of a few devs having their switch Pro dev kits confiscated by Nintendo with no reason given, hinting at a possible cancellation.

How reliable is this insider and what is everyone's thoughts?

I don't see it as being very likely this far along, would be a nightmare for Nintendos reputation plus all of the fab space would be reserved by now along with all of the other manufacturing capacity being reserved, would be bad business all round.
MLID is only semi-reliable for Intel info. For AMD he is hit and miss and for Nvidia he's usually wrong 90% of the time.
8nm still strikes me as significantly more likely than 7nm or 5nm, even if the chip is larger. Nintendo's generally not one to use bleeding-edge nodes.

It's not a coincidence that the PS5 and XSS/X adopted TSMC N7 in the same year Apple moved their latest products from TSMC N7 to TSMC N5, freeing up tons of 7nm capacity and making that node cheaper. I don't think any game system, especially a Nintendo one, is going to jump to N5 until Apple starts moving in a big way to N3, and it seems like a large portion of Apple's products this year are still going to be on N5.
The probability of Nintendo using TSMC N5 node is slim to none. What most people argue when they say 5nm is Samsung 5nm/5LPE, which has tons of allocation available due to customers moving from Samsung to TSMC.
Translation?

inspection equipment development engineer:

hardware and software development of inspection equipment used in mass production processes

- characteristic inspection device of game machine i/o device

- inspection device for checking the operation of finished game consoles

- inspection device for checking the operation of accessories for game consoles

person in charge of hardware development project management:

project management of hardware product development

in product development projects, work to promote product development projects by collaborating with members who perform specification determination and design practices and performing the following tasks

- planning of project practical plans

- schedule management, task management, problem management

- promote problem solving of projects

- information organization, analysis and information development

- coordination and coordination of opinions with internal and external parties

- creating a (development) environment suitable for projects

support for hardware product development and technology development

work to support and promote hardware development by carrying out the following tasks

- led and implemented prototypes of hardware technology (including outsourcing)

- contract negotiation and conclusion with affiliated companies, support for contract-related operations

- operation and promotion of design reviews and risk assessments

- standardization of project management operations

- maintenance, maintenance and operation of hardware development environment and equipment

- technical coordination related to product specification changes under mass production

- improvement and development of mechanisms to advance the above operations

electronic circuit designer:

electronic circuit design of nintendo products

 
I didnt said they maybe delay it only because Switch was is selling great, but that could effect decision of delay or changing process node alongside other reasons like different process node having better costs in long run, having chip shortages, having rise of cost...

Well you were very confident about 8nm and arguing that is 8nm, while now you are much more open mind about possibilite is not 8nm,
based on your posts.

So just on the topic of process node that people should consider is that Nintendo gets their chips from Nvidia and Nvidia deals with the chip fabs. Kopite definitely stated 8nm was the process but recently has put a question mark on this as the leaked information came out. Nvidia has yet to confirm Orin's manufacturing process and much of this might be because of Ampere's rocky life on Samsung's process and them failing to greatly improve yields over time...

my point of contention with TSMC 5nm is one of cost and just how much production would be dedicated to Drake. much like AMD splitting their 7nm between two consoles, HPC CPUs, consumer CPUs, APUs, and GPUs for consumer and HPC, Nvidia will have to do the same. granted, they won't be making 3 large APUs for consoles, but one APU for a tablet
The recent talks about increasing cost of wafers actually pushes me more towards a smaller and more efficient (plus better yield producing node). The Switch is a device that the initial investment is the most expensive but has the benefit of enjoying a long manufacturing life where the end justifies the means.

Currently Samsung is in a very bad place because what customer wants to pay for wafer cost if the yields are so low (unless Samsung promises to eat those poor yields themselves). I do believe Thraktor did an amazing breakdown showing the comparison across the board and how TSMC's 5nm vs Samsung's 8nm doesn't prove to be that different in cost when all things are aligned.
Also of interesting note is whether the H100 just announced is maybe a sign for Lovelace being on the same process and does that leave that 5nm space originally procured for Lovelace as a fit for Drake and possibly mid-range to lower end cards on 5nm while the top end cards are 4nm(just a theory and I'm not sure if TSMC views both 5nm and 4nm as the same family of process)...
 
The idea that new hardware could ever be cancelled at the stage where you've sent out devkits already is so stupid it's not even worth discussing to me.
I just read that the leaks apparently also included 4MB of L2 cache for the Drake chi. That's rather gigantic considering the RTX3080 runs on 5MB of L2 cache, and the RTX3050 has only 2 MB of L2 cache. Wasn't this one of the reasons that was cited as to why Ampere FLOPS were less efficient than Turing FLOPS (I think you mentioned this @Thraktor but I might remember the exact quote and context wrongly)? I wonder if that is one of the things they tackled in Orin's design to improve performance. If that is true, then I wonder if that means that the per-FLOP performance of Drake is better than what we saw for the RTX 30 series 🤔
It's either 1 MB or 4 MB. 4MB is what Orin has, so it's possible the places that indicate 4 MB for Drake are just places where GA10F isn't sufficiently distinguished from GA10B. Can't say conclusively either way.
 
I don’t think it’s about PS2. It’s about the fact that PS2 ist the best selling console of all time and if Switch could beat it it could also claim this title. Apparently there a people who want a Nintendo console sitting on top of that list.

That said I couldn’t care less. As someone who bought a Switch day one and updated to a Switch OLED immediately after release I can’t wait for a Switch Pro or Switch 2. The sooner they announce it the better.
It’s that I’ve read enough of it to see the same basis, “switch is selling so well, they don’t need to release a switch 2 now. It has the best chance to outsell the PS2, but a switch 2 would cut that very short.”

Which is weird.

Apparently Moore's Law Is Dead has stated on his recent episode that he knows of a few devs having their switch Pro dev kits confiscated by Nintendo with no reason given, hinting at a possible cancellation.

How reliable is this insider and what is everyone's thoughts?

I don't see it as being very likely this far along, would be a nightmare for Nintendos reputation plus all of the fab space would be reserved by now along with all of the other manufacturing capacity being reserved, would be bad business all round.
Perhaps it was a presilicon devkit being replaced with a new devkit. Do you have a time stamp?
 
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8nm still strikes me as significantly more likely than 7nm or 5nm, even if the chip is larger. Nintendo's generally not one to use bleeding-edge nodes.

It's not a coincidence that the PS5 and XSS/X adopted TSMC N7 in the same year Apple moved their latest products from TSMC N7 to TSMC N5, freeing up tons of 7nm capacity and making that node cheaper. I don't think any game system, especially a Nintendo one, is going to jump to N5 until Apple starts moving in a big way to N3, and it seems like a large portion of Apple's products this year are still going to be on N5.
Again Nintendo buys their chips from Nvidia and if Nvidia wants to go with TSMC because they get more product for their dollars, the end results looks the same to Nintendo. Samsung dropped the ball royally with both Nvidia and Qualcomm by not heavily investing into sorting out their issues while they had both contracts secured...
 
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This might be semantics, but I wouldn’t call those bleeding edge. I mean Apple is already on round two so to speak with 5nm as they started with this back in 2020 on the 12 lineup for the A14. It’s not like they just switched from 7nm to 5nm on the 13 line with the A15 chips.
N5 is absolutely bleeding edge for Nintendo. I would be extremely extremely surprised if Nintendo released a product built on the N5 process before, like, AMD.

Apple seems like they're going to use a lot of TSMC's N5 capacity for a good while yet; this isn't going to be like N7 where they moved the bulk of their use to N5 after two years. The newest rumor is that the base iPhone 14 is going to actually keep using the A15 and only the iPhone 14 Pro is going to get the new chip. But even if that doesn't come to pass, Apple has a lot more products based on N5 than they ever did on N7 because now the Mac uses Apple silicon too. We know the M2 is going to be a somewhat minor improvement over the M1, not going to TSMC N3 or anything like that.

IMO 8nm is still by far the most likely node for this product, TSMC N7 is perhaps possible in the case of a truly disastrous failing by Samsung, and TSMC N5 is a WUST-level dream.
 
N5 is absolutely bleeding edge for Nintendo. I would be extremely extremely surprised if Nintendo released a product built on the N5 process before, like, AMD.

Apple seems like they're going to use a lot of TSMC's N5 capacity for a good while yet; this isn't going to be like N7 where they moved the bulk of their use to N5 after two years. The newest rumor is that the base iPhone 14 is going to actually keep using the A15 and only the iPhone 14 Pro is going to get the new chip. But even if that doesn't come to pass, Apple has a lot more products based on N5 than they ever did on N7 because now the Mac uses Apple silicon too. We know the M2 is going to be a somewhat minor improvement over the M1, not going to TSMC N3 or anything like that.

IMO 8nm is still by far the most likely node for this product, TSMC N7 is perhaps possible in the case of a truly disastrous failing by Samsung, and TSMC N5 is a WUST-level dream.

I'm so tired of WUST level concern drive by postings, it doesn't add much positive or constructive criticism to even further where we're already at...
3 months ago 8SM's was WUST level pipe dreams of wishing, so if people are giving you detailed facts of why 5nm could be a very real possibility it shouldn't be argued just by because of Nintendo or that's just too cutting edge for Nintendo!
If we list pros and cons for 5nm vs 8nm, the pros for 5nm would vastly outweigh the possible low cost of 8nm.

I have to give kudos and credit to everyone that has taken their own time to do valid research on why and how these things are affected on such a macro level up and down the manufacturing chain to further our collective conversations here...
 
Hm, actually would Nintendo be the ones to confiscate the devkits themselves or would it be by someone else as proxy?

Like with the supposed devkits that were reported on and Nintendo refuted to which I think Gibson said Nintendo technically doesn’t package devkits but a company by the name of Silicon something does that.


Would that also apply in this case? I’m not familiar with this.
 
I'm so tired of WUST level concern drive by postings
I didn’t realize a three-paragraph post with reasons why I thought 5nm was unlikely counted as a “drive by posting.”

But fine, I won’t participate in this discussion, since I guess I’m just not allowed to disagree with you without it being a “drive by”
 
my point of contention with TSMC 5nm is one of cost and just how much production would be dedicated to Drake. much like AMD splitting their 7nm between two consoles, HPC CPUs, consumer CPUs, APUs, and GPUs for consumer and HPC, Nvidia will have to do the same. granted, they won't be making 3 large APUs for consoles, but one APU for a tablet
And Nvidia doesn't offer consumer CPUs.

The probability of Nintendo using TSMC N5 node is slim to none. What most people argue when they say 5nm is Samsung 5nm/5LPE, which has tons of allocation available due to customers moving from Samsung to TSMC.
I wouldn't necessarily say the probability of TSMC's N5 process node being used by Nintendo and Nvidia is slim to none, considering China Renaissance Securities analysts believe that a large chunk of TSMC's increased CapEx spending is dedicated to increasing the capacity for TSMC's N5 process node. However, I still personally think Nintendo and Nvidia are not as likely to use TSMC's N5 process node as much as TSMC's N6 process node for the fabrication of Drake, assuming TSMC is the semiconductor foundry company of choice for Nintendo and Nvidia.

This might be semantics, but I wouldn’t call those bleeding edge. I mean Apple is already on round two so to speak with 5nm as they started with this back in 2020 on the 12 lineup for the A14. It’s not like they just switched from 7nm to 5nm on the 13 line with the A15 chips.
To play devil's advocate, TSMC's N5 process node's still considered a cutting edge process node to companies that aren't in the smartphone market, considering smartphone companies (e.g. Apple) are usually the first ones to use the latest process nodes. Nvidia's rumoured to use TSMC's N5 process node for the fabrication of all Ada GPUs. And AMD mentioned using an optimised version of TSMC's N5 process node for Zen 4.
 
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It's not a coincidence that the PS5 and XSS/X adopted TSMC N7 in the same year Apple moved their latest products from TSMC N7 to TSMC N5, freeing up tons of 7nm capacity and making that node cheaper. I don't think any game system, especially a Nintendo one, is going to jump to N5 until Apple starts moving in a big way to N3, and it seems like a large portion of Apple's products this year are still going to be on N5.
I just don't think 8nm lines up for 12 SM Ampere though. If we are getting 12 SMs with +3 TFLOPs performance in docked, with up to 20-25 watts max supported on the chip, I'm expecting a smaller node.
 
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I am trying to find the timestamp where MLID stated Dev kits were confiscated, but his latest video seems to just confirm 2022/2023. Not sure if the video was pulled or the person who told me this is telling porkies.
 
To address @Gay Bowser , I don’t think 5nm is slim to none, but I think the only nodes that would make sense are the ones that NVidia is officially on right now.

8nm and 5nm are possible candidates as NV are expending a lot of resources.

However I see what you mean about it, the supply would be pretty low for such a product and it would be competing with other products that sell upward of like 40-60M a year.

Nintendo would be a small stack in that pie, but they are also one of the largest revenue for NVidia. So they are a special key client for nVidia I think.

I don’t think cost is necessarily a reason here, they can go with the lower R&D for 8nm but the cost per chip would be much higher and they produce less than the 5nm per wafer. If on 5nm TSMC that is.

I doubt 5nm Samsung, because we would have heard about it this business expense already by now. Business expenses like this get the rounds very fast, it’s how we found out about NVidia spending 7B dollars to secure capacity at TSMC 5nm. And the yields at Samsung are really bad, sure they’re improving but a less than 50% yield rate even for Qualcomm’s chips doesn’t exactly paint a good picture. And SEC is in its own kerfuffle with its own nodes and foundries at the moment.


7nm could exist, but the Ampere at that isn’t quite like the Ampere in Drake. While Lovelace does follow a lot of the similarities to Drake in cache setup, Cuda core, tensor core, etc.

I’d say that the chance of 8nm is like 80-90%, and 5nm is 10-20%.


I think that the only reason PS5 and Series consoles are on 7nm is only because AMD is still on 7nm and remained there until further notice.

Edit: seems like Apple is prepping to jump to 3nm this year

 
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"Inspection equipment development engineer" is the smokiest one of these I think I've seen. Though, as with "Marketing Director", they could just need to replace someone etc.
One of my partners is in HR. Jobs being posted together doesn't mean that they go together, but jobs that go together - part of the same overall project, reporting to the same manager - tend to post together. These three jobs being posted together heavily imply a new console - not necessarily a new Switch. These same requirements would be if Nintendo were building, say, a N64-mini, though the Electronic Circuit Designer is suggestive as hell that it's not

Electronic circuit designer: Specifically looking for someone with 5 years expierience with "Wireless communication including high frequency circuit antenna" who has "knowledge about wired / wireless communication between devices based on various standards and within devices." This is not just for prototypes, they want someone who can design ASICs. Seems like work on a wireless controller primarily, but it's definitely for console-like hardware, they need experience with analog circuitry like "power supply, audio, various sensors, display devices, etc." This could just be for a new kind of controller for the existing Switch, which Nintendo has made many of, certainly.

Hardware development project manager: This is someone to oversee the build of a "mass-produced product" starting with "leading and executing hardware prototypes." Again, this could be game and watches, or a retro Game Cube controller

Inspection equipment development engineer: This is for someone specifically to build hardware and software to do automated QA on a new console. Note that it's building a device "for game console input / output devices, for checking the operation of finished game consoles, checking the operation of accessories for game consoles." Assuming this translation is accurate (and it might not be!) "finished game consoles" implies this is an assembly line toolset, not a toolset for, say, repair shops to inspect damaged hardware.

Collectively this says "nintendo is making a new console" but console could be a very fuzzy term, including bespoke minis and handhelds. But whatever it is, it's past the core chip design, and into the tooling that turns finalized internals into a complete console
 
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Hm, actually would Nintendo be the ones to confiscate the devkits themselves or would it be by someone else as proxy?

Like with the supposed devkits that were reported on and Nintendo refuted to which I think Gibson said Nintendo technically doesn’t package devkits but a company by the name of Silicon something does that.


Would that also apply in this case? I’m not familiar with this.
it's not impossible. third parties repoing shit is kinda the norm for other things, why not this. though if Nintendo wanted an alibi, they can always say they confiscated "hardware" for whatever reason, implying it could just be switch dev kits. they don't have to commit to what the hardware even is
 
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This may be out of term from me, but I don’t get the fascination of wanting to beat the PS2 sales numbers as a reason to not release the switch 2 this year or next year.

Let go.

I’ve seen this sentiment across multiple sites already.


What is it with the PS2 that people want the switch to beat it so badly.
I think at the core, people love a good underdog story. Going from the WiiU to the best selling system of all time? It's like the Moneyball of video game consoles.
 
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I also think there's the assumption that introducing something new is a risk. What if new thing isn't as popular, but still has the effect of hurting demand for the old thing, for a net loss? But that's only really a problem if you're screwing up the new thing, which is going to be a bad idea at any time.
 
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I don't think job listings mean much of anything with regards to new hardware or when it's coming.
Business Description
Hardware and software development of inspection equipment used in mass production processes
  • Characteristic testing equipment for game console input/output devices
  • Inspection equipment for checking the operation of finished game console products
  • Inspection equipment for checking the operation of accessories for game consoles
 
Business Description
Hardware and software development of inspection equipment used in mass production processes
  • Characteristic testing equipment for game console input/output devices
  • Inspection equipment for checking the operation of finished game console products
  • Inspection equipment for checking the operation of accessories for game consoles
Again this doesn't exactly tell you when mass production will begin or when the "game console products" (which don't necessarily need to be consoles themselves) are finished.
 
Business Description
Hardware and software development of inspection equipment used in mass production processes
  • Characteristic testing equipment for game console input/output devices
  • Inspection equipment for checking the operation of finished game console products
  • Inspection equipment for checking the operation of accessories for game consoles
This is interesting. I didn't know a new line-up of Game & Watch was on the horizon.

;-)
 
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