Conservative estimates put this at >2x Wii U in raw power when undocked, so I wouldn't worry about that.
Read the old Wii and Wii U tech threads. They are filled with rumors from "credible" sources about the power. How well did that turn out?
Conservative estimates put this at >2x Wii U in raw power when undocked, so I wouldn't worry about that.
Read the old Wii and Wii U tech threads. They are filled with rumors from "credible" sources about the power. How well did that turn out?
Care to elaborate?Even in the handheld space, the 3DS was underpowered compared to a PSP, so it's not like pulling this conversation into that space makes the precedent of Nintendo making underpowered systems too shocking. It's nice that they seem to be aiming for a really powerful handheld this time though, that's a favorable position, but the dedicated gaming handheld overall isn't a favorable position to begin with.
Read the old Wii and Wii U tech threads. They are filled with rumors from "credible" sources about the power. How well did that turn out?
Read the old Wii and Wii U tech threads. They are filled with rumors from "credible" sources about the power. How well did that turn out?
We didn't have credible, verified reports from a publication such as Eurogamer that the Wii or Wii U devkits were using a single SoC, the specs of which are available for anyone on the web to look up.
We know a lot more about what's in the Switch than we did about previous consoles.
Read the old Wii and Wii U tech threads. They are filled with rumors from "credible" sources about the power. How well did that turn out?
We know nothing. It's just rumors from "credible" sources, just like with the Wii and Wii U.
Based on thinking with your brain. If you know anything about how this stuff works, it should be super obvious that the price/performance ratio of this device will suffer compared to if it had been designed as a pure home console like the PS4.
(That's not to say the PS4 isn't also designed with compromises, especially on the CPU side. But it would have been even more compromised had it been designed with portability in mind.)
We know nothing. It's just rumors from "credible" sources, just like with the Wii and Wii U.
It's very unlikely that Eurogamer got essentially everything else right about the NX but the actual devkit wasn't using the chip they reported. It's called Occam's Razor. What's more believable, that Eurogamer was right about all of the features, the shape, the entire concept, but was wrong about the devkit hardware, or that they were right about all of that?
Especially when Nvidia has officially confirmed they are developing a custom Tegra SoC based on "the world's top performing chips." There's pessimism and then there's ignoring reality.
The part that throws everyone is that "The high-efficiency scalable processor includes an NVIDIA GPU based on the same architecture as the worlds top-performing GeForce gaming graphics cards"
Maxwell was top performing and now Pascal is also top performing... so this is what actually throws people when they are discussing which Tegra they are going to use. Rather annoying lol.
Read the old Wii and Wii U tech threads. They are filled with rumors from "credible" sources about the power. How well did that turn out?
Its not just rumours though, its basic common sense as well. Even a super low clocked Tegra X1 can't fail to be more powerful than WiiU (even at 500Mhz its well above WiiU performance). That's if they don't use the newest Tegra, which they most likely will.
As far as the trailer goes. Do you really think they ran games on real Switch hardware in both modes (docked and handheld) then overlayed the docked footage onto the TV's and the handheld footage onto the Switch itself?, why would they do that?, its just a trailer. All of the footage will have been from the same hardware and they'll then have picked out parts they wanted to show on each mode. So looking at the handheld parts vs the TV parts for performance difference isn't going to tell you anything.
Plus didn't a guy one here analyze the footage and come to the conclusion that duplicate frames had been added to certain scenes in order to stretch the footage out during editing so that the footage lasted for the full trailer?
Last thing we needed in this industry is a 3rd wannabe PC console. It didn't help Nintendo to compete with Gamecube anyway. Based on thinking with your "brain" it should be obvious why N didnt go with a pure home console.
It all depends on which process node they are on and how much wattage they push in docked mode to go after higher clockspeeds.
If we take the Tegra X1 as a starting point, which was running hot in the devkits, let's assume it was pushing its full 512 GF, and that switching to Pascal would be used in portable with better power effeciency (60% according to Nvidia) to reach the same performance or aim a little lower and save even more power. They could in theory go for more performance (40% according to Nvidia) at the same power draw in docked mode, putting it at 700 GF or aim even higher and clock it higher still.
But let's take 700 hypothetical Gflops in fp32 for the Pascal successor to X1. According to an errr... source of mine here on gaf, improvements by going with fp16 where possible, might push performance anywhere between 20 and 50%. That means in a best case scenario, you could get over 1TF out of it (with clever use of fp16) or about 850 GF in other circumstances. I don't know how easy it would be to overclock the GPU and reach even better numbers maybe as a result of a further die shrink.
Just my opinion, I wouldn't doubt if those games were on targeted dev kit hardware.. or even running on Wii U as it's probably going to be the minimum baseline.
In regards to FP16/FP32 : I did some digging and found a few posts on beyond3d forums about it:
Picked the most relevant quotes:
I think this sounds really good for potentially squeezing as much performance as possible via the use of FP16 as Nvidia have obviously made it a focus in their Maxwell and Pascal architectures. Not to mention the tools and support they will have for Nintendo and other developers.
Its not just rumours though (which all point to either Maxwell or Parker BTW, not one to anything below), its also common sense as well. Even a super low clocked Tegra Maxwell can't fail to be more powerful than WiiU (even at 500Mhz its well above WiiU performance). Parker even more so.
If you're saying the Switch will focus on 4K, HDR, and VR, then obviously you're looking at it from the wrong crowd.
It's not rumours, don't you know in what thread you are? Read the article in the OP.
Do you have the actual retail version of the Nintendo Switch in your hands? No? Then... rumors.
Nvidia posting official news on their webpage does not constitute a rumor.
Nvidia posting official news on their webpage does not constitute a rumor.
I'm not talking about the manufacturer. I'm talking about the graphical capabilities.
I don't think you're ever going g to play Mario on a steambox.And for those of us who want to play Nintendo games without compromised tech in their home?
Let's put the speculation aside for a second and pretend that the device is out, it does 720p when docked of XB1 games at same frame rates and slight downgrade in graphics on the go, but only has a 3 hour max battery life. How do you feel about the device? I feel like that is a $299 device and that it will sell very fast.
I'm not talking about the manufacturer. I'm talking about the graphical capabilities.
Nintendo Switch is powered by the performance of the custom Tegra processor. The high-efficiency scalable processor includes an NVIDIA GPU based on the same architecture as the worlds top-performing GeForce gaming graphics cards.
The following information comes from Teut Weidemann, one of the first German professional game developers. He worked at Rainbow Arts, Microsoft USA, cdv Software Entertainment, Ubisoft and more. It does not seem that Mr. Weidemann is working on the Switch himself, but he is in contact with devs that have dev kits.
- Switch screen is a touchscreen that supports up to 10 points of interaction
- current dev kits are running on older hardware specs
- Switch may be based on the new Tegra X2, which is quite a jump from the X1
http://www.gamespodcast.de/2016/10/23/runde-81-ft-teut-weidemann-nintendo-switch/
The following information comes from Teut Weidemann, one of the first German professional game developers. He worked at Rainbow Arts, Microsoft USA, cdv Software Entertainment, Ubisoft and more. It does not seem that Mr. Weidemann is working on the Switch himself, but he is in contact with devs that have dev kits.
- Switch screen is a touchscreen that supports up to 10 points of interaction
- current dev kits are running on older hardware specs
- Switch may be based on the new Tegra X2, which is quite a jump from the X1
http://www.gamespodcast.de/2016/10/23/runde-81-ft-teut-weidemann-nintendo-switch/
The following information comes from Teut Weidemann, one of the first German professional game developers. He worked at Rainbow Arts, Microsoft USA, cdv Software Entertainment, Ubisoft and more. It does not seem that Mr. Weidemann is working on the Switch himself, but he is in contact with devs that have dev kits.
- Switch screen is a touchscreen that supports up to 10 points of interaction
- current dev kits are running on older hardware specs
- Switch may be based on the new Tegra X2, which is quite a jump from the X1
http://www.gamespodcast.de/2016/10/23/runde-81-ft-teut-weidemann-nintendo-switch/
The following information comes from Teut Weidemann, one of the first German professional game developers. He worked at Rainbow Arts, Microsoft USA, cdv Software Entertainment, Ubisoft and more. It does not seem that Mr. Weidemann is working on the Switch himself, but he is in contact with devs that have dev kits.
- Switch screen is a touchscreen that supports up to 10 points of interaction
- current dev kits are running on older hardware specs
- Switch may be based on the new Tegra X2, which is quite a jump from the X1
Another source calling it X2, however, I can understand why they would. The Tegra Parker was made for auto-driving cars, ergo it's name. So calling it X2 makes more sense, but it's probably the exact same thing as the Parker, albeit with custom assets for the Switch (more focus on GPU than CPU functions maybe?).(IT'S A CAR PUN!)
In almost all Nintendo hardware it was an improvement over the previous iteration. I have no doubt that the Switch is going to be a step above the Wii U easily (2 Wii Us duct tape together lol).
I mean it is obvious that while docked you will get better than Wii U graphics and while on the go you are going to get a step down.
I am sure in January they will talk about all the things the Switch can do better graphically. More foliage, more enemies on the screen, ice climbers, and so on.
Just as a minor aside, PS3 games that did pixel shading on the SPUs did so with fp32 precision.
Anyhow, fp16 is definitely a net win for performance. I'm surprised that Nvidia decided to gimp fp16 in the 1080 when all indications are AMD are looking to add double rate fp16 in their desktop cards.
Another source calling it X2, however, I can understand why they would. The Tegra Parker was made for auto-driving cars, ergo it's name. So calling it X2 makes more sense, but it's probably the exact same thing as the Parker, albeit with custom assets for the Switch (more focus on GPU than CPU functions maybe?).(IT'S A CAR PUN!)
"Worst" case scenario is it X1 as base with heavy customization, maybe that's why some devs are saying it's probably closer to X2, which wouldn't be a surprise since Nintendo went all out including active cooling, something I never thought they'd include.Another source calling it X2, however, I can understand why they would. The Tegra Parker was made for auto-driving cars, ergo it's name. So calling it X2 makes more sense, but it's probably the exact same thing as the Parker, albeit with custom assets for the Switch (more focus on GPU than CPU functions maybe?).(IT'S A CAR PUN!)
"Worst" case scenario is it X1 as base with heavy customization, maybe that's why some devs are saying it's probably closer to X2, which wouldn't be a surprise since Nintendo went all out including active cooling, something I never thought they'd include.
Interesting, as that conflicts with what the developers that worked on the PS3 in that forum thread were saying about pixel shaders on PS3? Or you mean that they could use FP32 if they used the SPU's for it and that is separate from the GPU doing pixel shaders in FP16?
Oh and I can tell you why Nvidia gimped FP16 in the 1080, as they want to sell those Titan cards as it was eating into those cards sales with the Maxwell 9XX series strong FP16 performance funny that it will be AMD that force their hand to include strong FP16 performance again in their 11XX cards.
The main issue with TX1 is that it was a stop-gap design on a stop-gap fabnode.The main issue with X1 is that it uses the 20nm fab process which is pretty much obsolete with everybody skipping it and go for 16nm.
Okay so if it using the X2 or something close to it and 16fp. What kind of performance are we looking at here in terms of TF?
Parker itself (the current official name for X2) gets 750GFlops in FP32, 1.5TFlops in FP16. It's unknown exactly how much game code can be FP16 (and it would vary wildly game to game), but speculation puts us at somewhere between 20%-50% being possible in FP16. I don't think that translates exactly to up to 1.12TFlops, but it should perform a decent amount better than the 750 number indicates.
Nice so we could be looking at something quite close to XB1 which is 1.3TF right?
I couldn't ask for much more from a handheld.In pure flops? No, that would be unlikely. It's possible in this type of form factor but it's likely too expensive for what Nintendo wants to charge.
But Nvidia typically has better tools and software that end up getting better performance out of their hardware, at least on PC (which is apparently where we get the whole "Nvidia flops are better than AMD flops). We don't know if that will be the case on a console though.
So we really don't know what the real world performance will be, but it's likely much closer to XB1 than Wii U.
I couldn't ask for much more from a handheld.