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Nintendo NX – let's try to understand about the power possibilities

BDGAME

Member
obs: if any number, analysis or conclusion is wrong, please tell me and I will fix it. Thanks.
Lnyc6Io.jpg

mockup create by ChrisRo

It's a little funny that a few months ago we are speculating about how powerful the NX will be when compared to Ps4 or XBOX One. Back there, are rumors that telling that NX will be more powerful than Ps4, using Polaris and have an amazing power to show... but them the Eurogamer's rumor come and, what no one expect, it's just a portable machine.

To start, why is everyone accepting the Eurogamer's rumor as true? Because, many other sites confirmed what say they:


So, right now, the safest we can assume is what Eurogamer tell:
- high-powered handled console with its own display.
- two controller sections on either side of screen, which can be attached or detached as required.
- A base unit, or dock station, is used to connect the brain of the NX on TV
- NX will use 32 GB game cartridges
- development kits currently using the Tegra X1 chip found in the Shield Android TV
- relatively lower level of performance compared to the existing current-gen machines
- Tegra X1 in the NX development hardware is apparently actively cooled, with audible fan noise.

In the EG's article they speak very clearly that NX is not at the same level in performance if compared to the Ps4 or even XBOX one. That MCV article tell us that NX is between Ps3 and PS4 in power, what don't help much.

Other thing to notice is the actively cooled Development Kit, what indicate an overclock Tegra X1 on it. Lets talk about the possibilities of this.

About Tegra X1


For who don't know Tegra X1 is not ideal as a handled/smarthphone chip. It was created to machines like the shield TV, that can use more power. In fact, the Tegra X1 alone can consumes 10W ( The Shield TV uses 20W while gaming). Compare this with other machines:

- NDS: 0.2 W
- 3DS: 4 W
- Vita: 5W
- IPhone6: 5W
- GPD: 10W
- iPad Pro: 10W
- Wii U: 33W

It's definitively more than any handled machine until know. Of course Nintendo can Underclock it to obtain a balance between performance and power consumption. Looking this article, the previous Tegra Chip, the K1, uses less than 11 watts and have a performance of 26SP GFlops Per Watt . The X1 have 2x the performance per Watts. This means 52 GFLOPS per watts at 1 GHz.

If tegra on NX has the same performance per watts we have:
- 260 GFlops at 1.5 Watts and 500 MHz (VITA's GPU uses 2 watts and have 27 GFLOPS)
- 512 GFLOPS at 10 watts and 1000 MHz

If Nintendo insist in make a portable with the X1, it will be, basically a Wii U. But when asked for Nintendo if NX will be the successor of 3DS, they say:

However, Nintendo wants to put this theory to rest. Nintendo CEO Tatsumi Kimishima has said that the NX “won’t simply replace” the Wii U or the 3DS. This according to a tweet by Takashi Mochizuki, a Tokyo-based reported for the Wall Street Journal.

If they make a home console, it will replace the Wii U, if they make a Handled, it will replace the 3DS, but what can be enough different to not simply replace both? A tablet.

A 20 Watts tablet can utilize the full power of that chip, and not directly replace the 3DS or Wii U.
But, why they are utilizing a overclock X1 on the development kit?


Tegra N1 – the Pascal


Tegra X1 is a amazing chip, it supports all major graphics standards:
- Unreal Engine 4
- DirectX 12
- OpenGL 4.5
- CUDA
- OpenGL ES 3.1

It lunches in 2015, but even for today, it is one of the more powerful tablet's chips every create. Can this chip Run modern games? I believe the answer is yes. For a comparison, look this gameplay of Witcher 3 on a PC with a Geforce GT 635 (that is weaker than X1):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKxaTUNLAE8

But, if you compare it with machines like the PS4 or even the XBOX one, it is very weak. Look:

WiiU: 0.17 TFLOPS + fixed functions
GT635: 0.33 TFLOPS
X1: 0.51 TFLOPS at FP32 (1.02 at FP16, but its not used in console games that gen)
XOne: 1.23 TFLOPS
Ps4: 1.84 TFLOPS
Remember that TFlops in Nvidia is roughly 30% better performance than AMD devices.

Shaders:
- Wii U: 160 shaders @ 550 GHz
- X1: 256 shaders core @ 1 GHz
- Xone: 768 shaders from 12 compute units @ 800 GHz
- Ps4: 1152 shaders from 18 CU @ 800 GHz

And if you compare the memory bandwidth the things get worse:
- WiiU: 12.8 Gb/s (1 GB for gaming 2 GB total)
- X1: 25.6 Gb/s (2 GB)
- GT635: 28.5 Gb/s (2 GB)
- Xone: 68 GB/s (5 GB for gaming – 8 GB total)
- Ps4: 176 Gb/s (4.5 GB for gaming – 8 GB total)

CPU:
- WiiU: 3 cores “latte” PPC
- X1: 4 cores ARM Cortex-A57 + 4 cores ARM cortex-A53
- Xone: 1.75 GHz X86-64, with 8 cores, 1 thread each – 8 threads total
- Ps4: 1.6 GHz X86-64, with 8 cores, 1 thread each – 8 threads total

In CPU Tegra is OK since A57 is faster than Jaguar on Xbox and Ps4. But the shaders are very low (3 Tegras X1 don't have the same shader power of a xbox one)

One thing we can't forgot that it's a mobile chip vs desktop chips. More than that, if NX is a tablet, it will probably be a screen with a 540p or 720p resolution. Its is a lot less pixels for the GPU process than the 900p or 1080p that XOne and Ps4 have. But there is an important information that we can't forgot: the possibility to plug it on TV.

If they want to put a 6 - 8” tablet with a 540p display, OK, but that kind of resolution is not OK for TV. They need more power to give, at least, 720p (or 1080p to make everyone happy)

That when enter in scene the new Tegra chip that Nvidia is creating, with a new architecture: the pascal: http://wccftech.com/nvidia-pascal-gpu-gtc-2015/
- 4X the mixed precision performance
- 2X the performance per watt
- 2.7X memory capacity
- 3X the memory bandwidth of Maxwell.

A machine using Pascal can consumes as low as 10 Watts, what can be done in a handled format. More mixed precision can be useful utilize the FP16 and give GFLOPs that get closer the XBOX one.

If NX is really using that kind of solution, then, say can build a true hybrid machine. One with power to show games on TV with the minimum accept quality.

And, of course, we can't forgot the API that NX will use.

Vulkan – the DirectX 12 for NX


Anybody remember how MS is telling the advantages of DirectX 12 will bring to Xbox One? Things like lower CPU overhead and more advanced GPU features, what can improve the overall performance of the console.

Of course NX will not use DX 12, but it will use the direct competitor of that API: The Vulkan. How can we know that? Because Nintendo joins the group that is creating the Vulkan.

You can know more of that API here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvioALNs_Bc



The dock and Supplementary Compute

One last thing to talk is about the Dock mode, when we plug the machine on TV to play games.

Some people are talking about the possibility of that Dock increase the power of the machine to give us a high resolution when plug on TV.

One thing is need to be clear, that idea is not in any rumor I can found. So, why people are discussing that as a possibility? It's because that patent: http://www.extremetech.com/gaming/2...s-nx-console-is-like-nothing-weve-seen-before

According to that patent, Nintendo is creating 2 ways to increasing the power of their machine: Local and Remotely.

Remotely can work like Streaming, already used in Shield TV, but instead of a super computer of them processing and send the image, the idea here is everyone machine can help each other.

And stop to think about the power necessary for different resolution:
- 240p: 352 x 240 = 84.480 pixels (3DS resolution with 3D active- 800x240p with 3D off)
- 540p: 960x540 = 518400 pixels ( 5x the number of pixels of upper screen of 3DS)
- 720p: 1280 x 720 = 921.600 pixels (1,7x the number of pixels of 540p)
- 900p: 1600 x 900 = 1.440.000 pixels (1,5x the pixels of 720 or 2,7x the 540p)
- 1080p: 1920 x 1080 = 2.073.000 pixels (2,2 x the pixels of 720p or 4x the 540p)

Increase from 540p to 1080p is not the double, but instead, is 4x more pixels to a GPU compute. It's not a easy task. Even 900p is hard to archive.

So, particularly with digital downloads now and the idea that you're downloading the right to play a game, that opens up the ability to have multiple platform digital downloads where you can download on one and download on another. Certainly from a development standpoint there is some challenge to it, because if you have two devices that have different specs and you're being told to design in a way that the game runs on both devices, then that can be challenging for the developer—but if you have a more unified development environment and you're able to make one game that runs on both systems instead of having to make a game for each system, that's an area of opportunity for us."
http://kotaku.com/miyamoto-can-imagine-nintendo-making-hybrid-console-han-1594989023
 

ozfunghi

Member
If your argument about resolution relates to power and not perceived sharpness, then the 3DS resolution is double of what you claim.
 

z0m3le

Banned
There is a lot of inaccuracy in your post.

X1 is more than just a GPU, your power consumption scale is wrong by many factors. For instance, we know that X1's Maxwell GPU consumes 1.5watts @ 500mhz giving 256GFLOPs.

The CPU in the X1 is 8 cores, 4 A57 cores and 4 A53 cores. The 4 A57 cores run at 1.9ghz and blow away jaguar cores. I mention this because it is assuming Nintendo will use the dated A57 cores when A72 cores cost nothing more to implement and are much more energy efficient, if we are talking about possibilities, well, it's complex but you are basically looking at a 250 to 300 gflops maxwell handheld ~5watts, or a 400 to 500 gflops pascal handheld at 5watts.

The X1 chip is 20nm while whatever is in the NX would almost certainly not be. (20nm is an abandoned process node and no new custom Nvidia chips would use it, it's also more expensive than 16nm process)
 

Pif

Banned
Despite the post being accurate or not:

How many of yoy are gonna wait for a Volta architecture inevitable update for the New NX in 2018?
 

Log4Girlz

Member
Wii U + power. If it plays Wii U games at 1080, I would be ecstatic. That's my personal ceiling of power expectation. I'm also expecting 540 p screen, but hey could be wrong. Perhaps it'll be 720 HH 720 TV for simplicity's sake. That's fine too.
 

Oxn

Member
Despite the post being accurate or not:

How many of yoy are gonna wait for a Volta architecture inevitable update for the New NX in 2018?

It better not.

Besides power i wonder if the nx will get limited edition systems.

We know the nintendo consoles get little to none, while the handhelds get wayyyyyy too many.
 

BDGAME

Member
There is a lot of inaccuracy in your post.

X1 is more than just a GPU, your power consumption scale is wrong by many factors. For instance, we know that X1's Maxwell GPU consumes 1.5watts @ 500mhz giving 256GFLOPs.

The CPU in the X1 is 8 cores, 4 A57 cores and 4 A53 cores. The 4 A57 cores run at 1.9ghz and blow away jaguar cores. I mention this because it is assuming Nintendo will use the dated A57 cores when A72 cores cost nothing more to implement and are much more energy efficient, if we are talking about possibilities, well, it's complex but you are basically looking at a 250 to 300 gflops maxwell handheld ~5watts, or a 400 to 500 gflops pascal handheld at 5watts.

The X1 chip is 20nm while whatever is in the NX would almost certainly not be. (20nm is an abandoned process node and no new custom Nvidia chips would use it, it's also more expensive than 16nm process)

The 8 cores is what I write, no? When I search about the A-57, I only found people saying it is close in power of the Jaguar. If you have a Link to show me otherwise, I can change my text.

Where I can find that 1.5watts @ 500mhz that you talk?
 

Oxn

Member
Wii U + power. If it plays Wii U games at 1080, I would be ecstatic. That's my personal ceiling of power expectation. I'm also expecting 540 p screen, but hey could be wrong. Perhaps it'll be 720 HH 720 TV for simplicity's sake. That's fine too.

Give me zelda at 1080p 60fps with more details and im good.
 
I'm getting to old to support stagnating graphics in this industry. I love Nintendo but I want progress. Unfortunately, I'm fairly certain I'm not alone in this.

I'll buy it, of course, as will the rest of us old Nintendo fans, but unless their mobile market buys in as well, it won't get off the ground. They sure as hell aren't getting the living room market with this, if this is what the NX is.
 
Fuck man i don't even care anymore i just want to see it. I just want to know it's real. Shit has me suffer sleepless nights of anguish and shivers. It's really taking a toll on my body.
 

Genio88

Member
Don't care about graphics on a Nintendo Handheld console, PC and Xbox and Playstation are already enough, i'm perfectly fine with their choice, also the Tegra chip will guarantee enough power to deliver stunning mobile games.
What i really hope is that Nintendo won't mistake with the battery, something like a tegra needs a big battery at least 3000mah, my Xiaomi Mi5 has a 3000mah battery and it's 7.3mm thin and weighs 159 grams, so i think Nintendo has the space to put a good battery on NX, also it's 2016/17 so i hope they'll also dismiss their actual DS and 3DS charging solution in favor of a Type C quick charge solution, it's so wrong that my 1300mah 2DS battery takes about 3 hours to fully charge while the 3000mah of my Xiaomi Mi5 fully charge from 0 to 100% in about one hour thanks to Type C and quick charge 3.0, not asking for the highest end mobile CPU/GPU out there, but i hope Nintendo will use the newer technology overall for this console
 
In terms of power, the X1 is reported to be around 2-3x Wii U with a modern feature set. 2-3x the RAM and CPU would be pretty nice as well. On the optimistic side maybe the X1 is downclocked while in handheld mode to run at 540p while it runs at 1080p while on a dock though there's no rumor pointing to the dock doing anything.
If it can play Zelda on the handheld with slightly better visuals and performance even at 540p I think that would be enough for me. It would look loads better than 720p on Wii U.
 

Chittagong

Gold Member
I still think the dock may be misunderstood. The common understanding is that you put the brains of the device (the handheld) to the dock.

However Nintendo has a lagless solution that allows you to stream gameplay wirelessly, the Wii U tech.

So the theory I find interesting is that the NX dock is as dumb as a Wii U pad, simply receiving the lagless stream from the handheld unit. A reverse Wii U, like someone described it.

Simpler to develop for - just one power level.
 

Hedgey

Member
Why did I think this article was about the portable's battery life?
Hopefully it's more than two hours, though.
 

Genio88

Member
At this point I'd rather just wait a month....

Rather than what? We are just talking/speculating about this console a bit, something that is usual on forums, of course we all know that we'll have to wait for Nintendo official announcement for the details, i hope it'll really arrive in a month
 

Genio88

Member
Speculation is speculation.

Yes indeed, also about the speculations, what i really want to turn to be true is the price one, "NX will be cheaper than most people think" my first thought after the leaks was 250$, than this price rumors came out, so now i'm really thinking that 199$ is a real possibility, and that would be huge, also Nintendo's console don't cut their price easily, unlike other console, for example WiiU is still as expensive as an Xbox One right now i think, so a low starting price could only be good for them to attract people and families
 

udivision

Member
Rather than what? We are just talking/speculating about this console a bit, something that is usual on forums, of course we all know that we'll have to wait for Nintendo official announcement for the details, i hope it'll really arrive in a month

Rather than "try to understand about the power possibilities" because he probably thinks it's a waste of time at this point. It's lost some appeal, I guess.
 
First of all, I appreciate you on making a thread to consolidate the estimated specs of the NX and to compare them to the other systems.

Having said that, you do have some errors. I will attempt specify them in another post.

One major thing you should know is that clock frequency and power usage usually don't scale linearly. That's why your Tegra X1 power list is a bit off.
 
I still think the dock may be misunderstood. The common understanding is that you put the brains of the device (the handheld) to the dock.

However Nintendo has a lagless solution that allows you to stream gameplay wirelessly, the Wii U tech.

So the theory I find interesting is that the NX dock is as dumb as a Wii U pad, simply receiving the lagless stream from the handheld unit. A reverse Wii U, like someone described it.

Simpler to develop for - just one power level.

Exactly what I expect.

But what is the possibility to include some kind of processing power in the dock, that the handheld and dock can communicate and the handheld can delegate some tasks there. Something like what MS promised but in a local environment. This is what the patent sounds like. It does not have to be plugged to take advantage.
 

MDave

Member
It won't use only FP32. It's not as simple as FP16 not being precise enough for games. PS3 developers used FP16 whenever possible, to get every last drop of performance they could out of it. Mobile games use it whenever possible too.
 

MacTag

Banned
Nintendo are the absolute last company that would waste battery life for the sake of some better AA.
Wii U renders 720p and downsamples that to 480p on the Gamepad for off-tv. If they stick with one resolution 1080p would make sense the same way if the power envelope can accomodate it.
 

Chittagong

Gold Member
Exactly what I expect.

But what is the possibility to include some kind of processing power in the dock, that the handheld and dock can communicate and the handheld can delegate some tasks there. Something like what MS promised but in a local environment. This is what the patent sounds like. It does not have to be plugged to take advantage.

I think splitting the tasks (eg. handheld does CPU, dock adds better GPU) is too complex and bandwidth wise impossible.

What could happen, however, is that the streaming tech is now two way - so a super powered dock might have its own APU + RAM, at which point the handheld at home becomes a dumb Wii U style game pad.

I think supporting multiple powet levels out of the gate is too complicated for Nintendo, but that could work further down the road, a Neo style update where the dock gains brains.
 

BDGAME

Member
First of all, I appreciate you on making a thread to consolidate the estimated specs of the NX and to compare them to the other systems.

Having said that, you do have some errors. I will attempt specify them in another post.

One major thing you should know is that clock frequency and power usage usually don't scale linearly. That's why your Tegra X1 power list is a bit off.

Thanks.
Please, give me the right numbers with a source and I will fix.
I want to change and increment this thread until it perfectly accurate.


Wii U renders 720p and downsamples that to 480p on the Gamepad for off-tv. If they stick with one resolution 1080p would make sense the same way if the power envelope can accomodate it.

You forgot that Wii U is a desktop machine and don't need to worry with power consumption like the NX will have.
 
If tegra on NX has the same performance per watts we have:
~104 GFLOPS at 2 watts (VITA's GPU uses 2 watts and have 51 GFLOPS)
~208 GFLOPS at 4 watss
~416 GFLOPS at 8 watts
512 GFLOPS at 10 watts (full power)


I don't think its directly linear like that...
 

Otnopolit

Member
My question is, last I kept up on this was a couple weeks ago and all we knew about the chip was that it was Tegra. I don't remember seeing anything from the sources detailing what kind of Tegra. Maybe I'm being forcibly optimistic via tunnel vision because of what I want?
 

Lucifon

Junior Member
I feel like we'll almost certainly see the chip down clocked in hand-held mode then clocked back up to full power when in dock mode.

Which tegra Nintendo decide to use is the big factor here. I feel like the x1 would be pushing it from a power perspective and a Pascal tegra would be almost perfect in theory, but Nintendo rarely use the latest chips which makes me think it's unlikely...
 

King_Moc

Banned
Wii U renders 720p and downsamples that to 480p on the Gamepad for off-tv. If they stick with one resolution 1080p would make sense the same way if the power envelope can accomodate it.

Yes, but it renders it on the home console, then sends the 480p signal to the gamepad.
 
obs: if any number, analysis or conclusion is wrong, please tell me and I will fix it. Thanks.


It's a little funny that a few months ago we are speculating about how powerful the NX will be when compared to Ps4 or XBOX One. Back there, are rumors that telling that NX will be more powerful than Ps4, using Polaris and have an amazing power to show... but them the Eurogamer's rumor come and, what no one expect, it's just a portable machine.

To start, why is everyone accepting the Eurogamer's rumor as true? Because, many other sites confirmed what say they:



So, right now, the safest we can assume is what Eurogamer tell:
- high-powered handled console with its own display.
- two controller sections on either side of screen, which can be attached or detached as required.
- A base unit, or dock station, is used to connect the brain of the NX on TV
- NX will use 32 GB game cartridges
- development kits currently using the Tegra X1 chip found in the Shield Android TV
- relatively lower level of performance compared to the existing current-gen machines
- Tegra X1 in the NX development hardware is apparently actively cooled, with audible fan noise.

In the EG's article they speak very clearly that NX is not at the same level in performance if compared to the Ps4 or even XBOX one. That MCV article tell us that NX is between Ps3 and PS4 in power, what don't help much.

Other thing to notice is the actively cooled Development Kit, what indicate an overclock Tegra X1 on it. Lets talk about the possibilities of this.

About Tegra X1



For who don't know Tegra X1 is not ideal as a handled/smarthphone chip. It was created to machines like the shield TV, that can use more power. In fact, the Tegra X1 alone can consumes 10W ( The Shield TV uses 20W while gaming). Compare this with other machines:

- NDS: 0.2 W
- 3DS: 4 W
- Vita: 5W
- GPD: 10W
- Iphone6: 12W
- Ipad Pro: 35W
- Wii U: 75W

It's definitively more than any handled machine until know. Of course Nintendo can Underclock it to obtain a balance between performance and power consumption. Looking this article, the previous Tegra Chip, the K1, uses less than 11 watts and have a performance of 26SP GFlops Per Watt . The X1 have 2x the performance per Watts. This means 52 GFLOPS per watts at 1 GHz.

If tegra on NX has the same performance per watts we have:
~104 GFLOPS at 2 watts (VITA's GPU uses 2 watts and have 51 GFLOPS)
~208 GFLOPS at 4 watss
~416 GFLOPS at 8 watts
512 GFLOPS at 10 watts (full power)

If Nintendo insist in make a portable with the X1, it will be, basically a Wii U or even weaker than that. But when asked for Nintendo if NX will be the successor of 3DS, they say:



If they make a home console, it will replace the Wii U, if they make a Handled, it will replace the 3DS, but what can be enough different to not simply replace both? A tablet.

A 20 Watts tablet can utilize the full power of that chip, and not directly replace the 3DS or Wii U.
But, why they are utilizing a overclock X1 on the development kit?


Tegra N1 – the Pascal



Tegra X1 is a amazing chip, it supports all major graphics standards:
- Unreal Engine 4
- DirectX 12
- OpenGL 4.5
- CUDA
- OpenGL ES 3.1

It lunches in 2015, but even for today, it is one of the more powerful tablet's chips every create. Can this chip Run modern games? I believe the answer is yes. For a comparison, look this gameplay of Witcher 3 on a PC with a Geforce GT 635 (that is weaker than X1):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKxaTUNLAE8

But, if you compare it with machines like the PS4 or even the XBOX one, it is very weak. Look:

WiiU: 0.17 TFLOPS + fixed functions
GT635: 0.33 TFLOPS
X1: 0.51 TFLOPS at FP32 (1.02 at FP16, but its not enough precise for games)
XOne: 1.23 TFLOPS
Ps4: 1.84 TFLOPS

Shaders:
- Wii U: 320 shaders @ 550 GHz
- X1: 256 shaders core @ 1 GHz
- Xone: 768 shaders from 12 compute units @ 800 GHz
- Ps4: 1152 shaders from 18 CU @ 800 GHz

And if you compare the memory bandwidth the things get worse:
- WiiU: 12.8 Gb/s (1 GB for gaming 2 GB total)
- X1: 25.6 Gb/s (2 GB)
- GT635: 28.5 Gb/s (2 GB)
- Xone: 68 GB/s (5 GB for gaming – 8 GB total)
- Ps4: 176 Gb/s (4.5 GB for gaming – 8 GB total)

CPU:
- WiiU: 3 cores “latte” PPC
- X1: 4 cores ARM Cortex-A57 + 4 cores ARM cortex-A53
- Xone: 1.75 GHz X86-64, with 8 cores, 1 thread each – 8 threads total
- Ps4: 1.6 GHz X86-64, with 8 cores, 1 thread each – 8 threads total

In CPU, the difference is minimal, since A57 run very close in performance to Jaguar. But the shaders are very low (3 Tegras X1 don't have the same shader power of a xbox one)

One thing we can't forgot that it's a mobile chip vs desktop chips. More than that, if NX is a tablet, it will probably be a screen with a 540p or 720p resolution. Its is a lot less pixels for the GPU process than the 900p or 1080p that XOne and Ps4 have. But there is an important information that we can't forgot: the possibility to plug it on TV.

If they want to put a 6 - 8” tablet with a 540p display, OK, but that kind of resolution is not OK for TV. They need more power to give, at least, 720p (or 1080p to make everyone happy)

That when enter in scene the new Tegra chip that Nvidia is creating, with a new architecture: the pascal: http://wccftech.com/nvidia-pascal-gpu-gtc-2015/
- 4X the mixed precision performance
- 2X the performance per watt
- 2.7X memory capacity
- 3X the memory bandwidth of Maxwell.

A machine using Pascal can consumes as low as 10 Watts, what can be done in a handled format. More mixed precision can be useful utilize the FP16 and give GFLOPs that get closer the XBOX one.

If NX is really using that kind of solution, then, say can build a true hybrid machine. One with power to show games on TV with the minimum accept quality.

And, of course, we can't forgot the API that NX will use.

Vulkan – the DirectX 12 for NX



Anybody remember how MS is telling the advantages of DirectX 12 will bring to Xbox One? Things like lower CPU overhead and more advanced GPU features, what can improve the overall performance of the console.

Of course NX will not use DX 12, but it will use the direct competitor of that API: The Vulkan. How can we know that? Because Nintendo joins the group that is creating the Vulkan.

You can know more of that API here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvioALNs_Bc



The dock and Supplementary Compute

One last thing to talk is about the Dock mode, when we plug the machine on TV to play games.

Some people are talking about the possibility of that Dock increase the power of the machine to give us a high resolution when plug on TV.

One thing is need to be clear, that idea is not in any rumor I can found. So, why people are discussing that as a possibility? It's because that patent: http://www.extremetech.com/gaming/2...s-nx-console-is-like-nothing-weve-seen-before

According to that patent, Nintendo is creating 2 ways to increasing the power of their machine: Local and Remotely.

Remotely can work like Streaming, already used in Shield TV, but instead of a super computer of them processing and send the image, the idea here is everyone machine can help each other.

And stop to think about the power necessary for different resolution:
- 240p: 352 x 240 = 84.480 pixels (3DS resolution with 3D active- 800x240p with 3D off)
- 540p: 720x540 = 420.620 pixels (almost 5x the number of pixels of 3DS)
- 720p: 1280 x 720 = 921.600 pixels (2x the number of pixels of 540p)
- 900p: 1600 x 900 = 1.440.000 pixels (1,5x the pixels of 720 or 3,4x the 540p)
- 1080p: 1920 x 1080 = 2.073.000 pixels (2,2 x the pixels of 720p or 5x the 540p)

Increase from 540p to 1080p is not the double, but instead, is 5x more pixels to a GPU compute. It's not a easy task. Even 900p is hard to archive.


http://kotaku.com/miyamoto-can-imagine-nintendo-making-hybrid-console-han-1594989023

Ok, I will help:

- The power unit for the Wii U can handle up to 75W, but IIRC, it often runs at less than 40W

- The PSVITA is not at 51 GFLOPS because it GPU is underclocked. It is more like 27 GFLOPs

- The parts about X1's wattage is off. If you want to display some good info about the power consumption vs clockspeed of Tegra, I would reference you to use Thraktor's posts on that topic.

- Comparing shader cores and TFLOPS of different architectures can't really be done one-to-one due to several factors. I believe general consensuses is that Nvidia's performance can be around 30% better than AMD's GPU at same "listed" TFLOPS, but it's more complicated than that. I would recommend reading the discussions about them in the other threads. They are very educational. I will try to find them later when I have the time.

- FP16 can be used for gaming, though it wouldn't look so well if you exclusively used it for a console display. UE4 just uses FP16 for mobile hardware, so using both fp16 and fp32 will be beneficial if the NX is using Tegra hardware.

The memory system of the XB1 and Wii U are a bit more complicated than what you described.

I'm sure I missed more, but I hope that helps. :) Most of what you said during the second half of the post appears to be speculation.
 
I really hope NX doesn't use Tegra X1 after reading about how the dev units have to be actively cooled with audible fan noise (Eurogamer dev sources). That's all sorts of levels of backwards for a portable device. Apple's A9X launched a year ago and beats Tegra X1 for CPU performance and then some, while also matching its Maxwell-based GPU, and consuming under 5 watts of power.

Since X1 is also actively cooled in the Shield console (while also consuming much more power) the only feasible option for Nintendo to maintain that level of performance in a fanless, thin form factor is to adopt the next Tegra. Here's hoping that they do that, though I'm not holding my breath given the original SemiAccurate report, which appears to be based on information from Nvidia employees, claims that Nintendo got a good price on the X1 chips. Which also makes sense given how Nvidia will have to fulfill their wafer commitment to TSMC after previous devices shipping with X1 (Shield TV, Pixel-C) sold poorly commercially.

NDS: 0.2 W
- 3DS: 4 W
- Vita: 5W
- GPD: 10W
- Iphone6: 12W
- Ipad Pro: 35W
- Wii U: 75W

I always hate nitpicking, but this section would benefit from an edit: the A9X in the iPad Pro definitely doesn't consume 35W - it's beneath 5 watts like Intel's Core M (also fanless).

Wii U definitely consumes less than 75 watts in usage - it's closer to 35 watts playing games.

Otherwise I like the array of information collated here, good stuff!
 

mrklaw

MrArseFace
I still think the dock may be misunderstood. The common understanding is that you put the brains of the device (the handheld) to the dock.

However Nintendo has a lagless solution that allows you to stream gameplay wirelessly, the Wii U tech.

So the theory I find interesting is that the NX dock is as dumb as a Wii U pad, simply receiving the lagless stream from the handheld unit. A reverse Wii U, like someone described it.

Simpler to develop for - just one power level.

That's what I want - mainly because it allows you to use touch screen controls too. But it would limit the power to handheld levels on battery..
 

Peterc

Member
A new nx tech topic?

I've a galaxy s6. Performance wise against tegra x1, how strong is it when you compare both?
 
Quick question, but what is the controller supposed to look like when you dock the screen to play on a TV? Is there another piece I'm missing?
 

z0m3le

Banned
The 8 cores is what I write, no? When I search about the A-57, I only found people saying it is close in power of the Jaguar. If you have a Link to show me otherwise, I can change my text.

There were benchmarks in the eurogamer rumor thread that pinned Jaguar to ~1000 points and A57 cores at over 1500, obviously not every benchmark would be the same but it showed that A57 can indeed be much faster than Jaguar, and A72 is noticeably faster than A57 while using less power and can be done on 16nm without needing to shrink a chip.

Where I can find that 1.5watts @ 500mhz that you talk?

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8811/nvidia-tegra-x1-preview/3

"NVIDIA’s tools show the X1’s GPU averages 1.51W over the run of Manhattan. Meanwhile the A8X’s GPU averages 2.67W, over a watt more for otherwise equal performance. This test is especially notable since both SoCs are manufactured on the same TSMC 20nm SoC process."

The A8X is 230GFLOPs, or about half of X1's performance, so that is where the 1.5watts for "256gflops" comes from (half of X1's maxwell normal performance, or 500mhz vs 1ghz)

Remember that 16nm and Pascal see large deductions, and even without Pascal, 300gflops for ~1.5watts seems within reach of maxwell.
 
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