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NX will launch in March 2017 globally, won't be at E3 (focusing on Zelda instead)

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What? What are you talking about?
I think he's confused. Sounds like there's still confusion through the midst of people explaining what it all means.

Also, if Nvidia is taking a loss that means Nintendo is making out good money in the end? Sorry, I'm not sure how to phrase it. Is Nvidia paying Nintendo?
 

Eolz

Member
I think he's confused. Sounds like there's still confusion through the midst of people explaining what it all means.

Also, if Nvidia is taking a loss that means Nintendo is making out good money in the end? Sorry, I'm not sure how to phrase it. Is Nvidia paying Nintendo?

No, that would mean Nintendo would buy stuff for cheaper than they should.
Getting a way better value out of a deal.
 

R00bot

Member
Except it seems like a bizarre business decision as the handheld market is shrinking rapidly and the console market isn't.

I think it's a bit silly to say the handheld market is shrinking rapidly considering the two handhelds we have now are the Vita, dead on arrival, and the 3DS, a console that launched at a price too high to be appealing at first, got much negative press for making people sick and being bad for children's eyes, and has only recently become appealing with a great library or games and cheaper options like the 2DS, however many people are now convinced it has a successor coming and aren't willing to buy into the 3DS family because of this.

I think, if a handheld like the DS had launched instead of the 3DS and received similar support then it would have sold close to as many systems as the DS did.
 
No, that would mean Nintendo would buy stuff for cheaper than they should.
Getting a way better value out of a deal.
Hmm. I see. That's great for Nintendo getting it cheaper than it usually would be. That should help the overall price of the system then. They could make it even cheaper maybe. If it uses cartridges too helps. It all adds up around.
 
So, we're thinking stronger than anticipated handheld and somewhat ho-hum console?

That's great for me if so. My 3DS gets way more play than my Wii U.

I'm thinking basically a handheld, but technically not in Nintendo's eyes because it's too big. Like, a game pad sized device that has either video streaming or HDMI out. Technically a Wii U replacement, will later be scaled down as a 3DS replacemwnt.
 

ozfunghi

Member
No, people are just talking about the X1 as it's the most recent Tegra chip. It could be the K1, it could be a custom chip (the N1, perhaps?) or it could even be the upcoming Pascal-based "Parker" SoC.

The reason I was talking about it there is that it would explain why Nvidia would be willing to make a loss on the deal. As a point of reference, AMD was penalised to the tune of $320 million when they pulled out of a wafer order commitment with Global Foundries a few years back. That's the kind of order of magnitude you'd be looking at if (and it's a bit if) Nvidia had committed to large 20nm purchases from TSMC and they had to renege on them due to poor sales of the Nvidia X1. They'd be desperate to make the sale to Nintendo, as Nintendo would be pretty much the only customer buying in the quantity necessary to cover their wafer commitments, so would be willing to offer Nintendo an absurdly good deal, even to the point of making a loss on each chip sold, as it would still be better than paying the penalty to TSMC.

I haven't seen Fourth Storm say anything about a specific chip, just that it's Tegra.
Seems that the conversation evolved from there. Likely a slightly custom chip from an existing design imo.

Ok, thanks. That's what i thought, and interesting hypothesis Thraktor.
 

Thraktor

Member
I think he's confused. Sounds like there's still confusion through the midst of people explaining what it all means.

Also, if Nvidia is taking a loss that means Nintendo is making out good money in the end? Sorry, I'm not sure how to phrase it. Is Nvidia paying Nintendo?

No, Nvidia would make a loss if they paid TSMC, let's say $4000 for a silicon wafer with 200 usable dies on it, but ended up selling each die to Nintendo for $18. Nvidia would be paying TSMC $4000 for something that only gets them $3600 back in sales.
 
What? What are you talking about?

You said that the handheld and home console could be using different architectures, but mentioned Cell and Xenon as a comparison. But those two were vastly different from each other iirc, and that difference led to a lot of the early porting difficulties from 360 to PS3.

Nintendo's already said they want a shared library between the two systems and it'd make sense for the architectures to be as similar as possible. That's why I figured Emily's dialog could be taken more at face value than some are taking it atm.

Not really expecting such a difference in the architectures to make the home console's "slightly more than XBO" performance suddenly blow well past that, but it's cool.
 

ModBot

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If you wish to discuss the Emily Rogers article, please make a new thread instead of using an old one.
 
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