Welcome everyone!
The purpose of this thread is to be the one and only place on ResetEra to speculate and discuss news and/or rumours that may or may not pertain to future Nintendo hardware and technology.
Disagreeing with other members is a normal and inevitable part of speculation and discussion. But please don't dismiss the opinions of other members when speculating and discussing. And the site rules apply to this thread, such as:
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Do you feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of speculation and discussion?
No worries! I'll be continuously updating this thread with any news and rumours coming from the speculation and discussion as quickly and as often as I possibly can.
It should be noted that any links to potentially relevant rumours from potential insiders will be hidden to people who at least do a couple of posts in order to protect potential insiders. But not all potentially relevant rumours involve potential insiders.
The newest news and rumours will be on the very top whilst the oldest will be on the very bottom.
Last updated: 3 May 2022 14:15 (UTC-07:00)
~May 2022~
Potentially relevant news:
3 May 2022 → Samsung via Twitter: Samsung announced the development of Samsung's UFS 4.0, which offers a speed of 23.2 Gbps per lane, which is 2x faster than Samsung's UFS 3.1, uses Samsung's 7th generation V-NAND technology and a proprietary controller, has a sequential read speed of up to 4.2 GB/s and a sequential write speed of up to 2.8 GB/s, is 46% more power efficient than Samsung's UFS 3.1 with a sequential read speed of 6 MB/s per mA, has a max dimension of 11 mm x 13 mm x 1 mm, and has capacities up to 1 TB. Samsung also announced mass production of Samsung's UFS 4.0 is planned to start at Q3 2022.
~March 2022~
Potentially relevant news:
21 March 2022 → Nvidia: Nvidia updated the Jetson AGX Orin technical briefing during GTC 2022 (Spring 2022), where the AI performance for the Jetson AGX Orin 32 GB module remains the same at 200 TOPS (INT8), but the AI performance for the Jetson AGX Orin 64 GB module has increased from 200 TOPS (INT8) to 275 TOPS (INT8). Nvidia has also increased the max CPU frequency for all Jetson AGX Orin modules from 2 GHz to 2.3 GHz. However, the Jetson AGX Orin 32 GB module only has 8 Cortex-A78AE cores instead of 12 Cortex-A78AE cores present in the Jetson AGX Orin 64 GB module. The max GPU frequency for the Jetson AGX Orin 32 GB module has decreased from 1 GHz to 939 MHz. But the max GPU frequency for the Jetson AGX Orin 64 GB module has increased from 1 GHz to 1.3 GHz. And the Nvidia Deep Learning Accelerators (NVDLA) present on the Jetson AGX Orin 32 GB module run at a max frequency of 1.4 GHz and at a max frequency of 1.6 GHz for the Jetson AGX Orin 64 GB module.
As for the Jetson Orin NX modules, the AI performance for the Jetson Orin NX 8 GB decreased from 100 TOPS (INT8) to 70 TOPS, and the AI performance for the Jetson Orin NX 16 GB module remains the same at 100 TOPS (INT8). The max CPU frequency for all Jetson Orin NX modules remains the same at 2 GHz. However, the Jetson Orin NX 8 GB module only has 6 Cortex-A78AE cores instead of 8 Cortex-A78AE cores present in the Jetson Orin NX 16 GB module. The max GPU frequency has decreased for all Jetson Orin NX modules, with the max GPU frequency of the Jetson Orin NX 8 GB module decreasing from 1 GHz to 765 MHz, and the max GPU frequency of the Jetson Orin NX 16 GB module decreasing from 1 GHz to 918 MHz. And the Nvidia Deep Learning Accelerators (NVDLA) present on all Jetson Orin NX modules run at a max frequency of 614 MHz.
The Orin Series SoC Data Sheet mentions that Orin's GPU has 4 Texture Processing Clusters (TPCs), with each TPC having 2 SMs, with each SM having a RT core, confirming that Orin has a RT core per SM. And the Orin Series SoC Data Sheet mentions that Orin's GPU features 2nd Generation RT cores.
Relevant news:
1 March 2022 → FamiBoards: The documentation present in "nvn2" mentions that GA10F, Drake's GPU, has 12 SMs in total, and 128 CUDA cores per SM, with GA10F having a total of 1536 CUDA cores.
1 March 2022 → Twitter: According to a picture provided by NWPlayer123, the codename for T239, which has been mentioned by kopite7kimi, is now called Drake, after Tim Drake, the real life alias of Robin, in the DC Comics universe. And the documentation in "nvn2" mentions that the T239's GPU's based on the Ampere architecture, supports DLSS 2.2, and supports RTX.
1 March 2022 → Twitter: The source code for DLSS has been illegally leaked. And based on a picture provided by TechPowerUp, there exists a folder named "nvn2"; and inside the folder, there are references to NVN, the Nintendo Switch's API, on the file names "nvn_dlss_backend.h", "nvndlss.cpp", and "nvn_dlss.cpp", very strongly implying that Nintendo and Nvidia are indeed working on a new SoC for new hardware.
~February 2022~
Potentially relevant news:
26 February 2022 → Phoronix: Nvidia introduced a new [Intel] High Definition Audio (HDA) driver set, which comes with a few patches that adds HDA driver support, and uses an Azalia controller, for Orin ("Tegra234") with Linux 5.18. Orin also supports DisplayPort Multi-Stream Transport (MST).
24 February 2022 → Kioxia: Kioxia announced the sampling of the next-generation UFS, which supports the MIPI M-PHY® v5.0 standard, utilise Kioxia's BiCS FLASH™ 3D flash memory technology, and is available in three capacities: 128 GB, 256 GB and 512 GB. Kioxia's next-generation UFS has a theoretical interface speed of 23.2 Gbps per lane (or 46.4 Gbps for two lanes) in HS-GEAR5 mode. And Kioxia's next-generation UFS with a 256 GB capacity has 90% and 70% improved sequential read and write speeds respectively, as well as 35% and 60% improved random read and write speeds respectively, in comparison to UFS 3.1 with a 256 GB capacity.
17 February 2022 → Creatures Inc: Creatures Inc mentioned in a job listing that technologies, such as ray tracing, and DLSS, could be indispensable. And Creatures Inc also mentioned paying attention to technologies introduced in game engines such as Unreal Engine 5.
13 February 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a senior embedded systems engineer who's responsible for developing new features that can be successfully deployed to massively used video game consoles, optimising solutions that are developed for performance and designed for scalability, and contributing to the architecture, design and maintenance of a Linux based system stack, and etc. A candidate for senior embedded systems engineer position is required to have 5+ years of software development experience, excellent C and C++ programming skills, solid understanding of multi-core SoC devices and low-level kernel software, good understanding of advanced game engine related subjects (e.g. 3D graphics, audio programming, etc.), experience with working with large open-source projects or maintaining large existing code bases, Windows and Linux for software development environments, & embedded systems for a multi-processor and/or multi-core system, and a BS degree in Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field, and a BS degree in Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field, with a MS degree preferred.
10 February 2022 → Nintendo: Shuntaro Furukawa talked about how maintaining and expanding the nearly 100 million annual playing users is important for Nintendo's next hardware platform when answering question #4 during the Q&A session for the financial results for the fiscal year ending on March 2022.
Potentially relevant rumour:
5 February 2022 → Twitter: Greymon55 mentioned that there's not much difference between the Lovelace architecture and the Ampere architecture.
~January 2022~
Potentially relevant news:
31 January 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a contract job listing for a wireless communications software engineer who's required to have 1-3 years of being a C/C++ software engineer, have experience with software development on Linux, and have knowledge on Wi-Fi and Bluetooth specifications, with knowledge of other wireless standards (e.g. LTE, 5G, Zigbee, SigFox, or LoRa), networking and WLAN protocols (e.g. TCP, UDP, IP, etc.), and Bash, Python and Git, being highly desirable.
24 January 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a senior shader compiler engineer who's required to have expertise in LSL and/or HLSL programming, knowledge of GPU hardware and software architecture, C/C++ programming skills in C/C++, excellent software design, problem solving, and debugging skills, and parallel and asynchronous processing experience, with open-source shader compiler solutions (e.g. glslang, DXC, etc.) and LLVM experience highly desired.
9 January 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a leader device driver software engineer who's responsible for designing and developing device drivers for current and future video game consoles, as well as implementing embedded software using C++ constructs, driving architecture definition and creating associated documentation, and leading development on major software subsystems.
8 January 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a senior multimedia engineer who's responsible for architecting, designing, and developing software to support multimedia use cases, developing new features capable of being successfully deployed in massively used gaming console, researching technical issues and providing expert guidance, communicating and collaborating effectively with other engineers, and driving software development activities in small team settings.
~December 2021~
Potentially relevant news:
11 December 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a CPU debugger software engineer intern who's available during summer 2022.
11 December 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a 3D graphics API software engineer intern who's available during summer 2022.
11 December 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, VA) posted a job listing for a Wi-Fi/Bluetooth software engineer intern who's available during summer 2022.
10 December 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a senior shader compiler software engineer who's responsible for working on Nintendo's shader tools, as well as critical features, performance tuning, and troubleshooting with internal teams and vendors.
~November 2021~
Relevant rumours:
9 November 2021 → FamiBoards: NateDrake mentioned that late 2020 devkits have limited RTX support, with RTX support being adjusted due to the power consumption. RTX support has been tested for handheld mode, but battery life has been impacted more negatively than anticipated.
Potentially relevant news:
9 November 2021 → Nvidia: Nvidia announced the Jetson AGX Orin, which is capable of 200 TOPS (INT8). The Jetson AGX Orin features 12 Cortex-A78AE cores running at a max frequency of 2 GHz and a GPU based on the Ampere architecture with 2 GPCs, 16 SMs, 2048 CUDA cores, 64 Tensor cores, and 8 RT cores, running at a max frequency of 1 GHz, which is capable of up to 131 Sparse TOPs of INT8 Tensor compute, and up to 4.096 FP32 TFLOPs of CUDA compute. Nvidia also announced that AGX Orin dev kits will be available on Q1 2022. Nvidia also announced the Jetson Orin NX, which is capable of 100 TOPS (INT8). The Jetson Orin NX features 8 Cortex-A78AE cores running at a max frequency of 2 GHz and a GPU based on the Ampere architecture with 1024 CUDA cores, 32 Tensor cores, and 4 RT cores, running at a max frequency of 1 GHz. Nvidia mentioned that Jetson Orin NX will be available on Q4 2022.
9 November 2021 → Samsung: Samsung announced the development of the industry's first 14 nm** based 16 Gb (2 GB) LPDDR5X DRAM, which has data processing speeds of up to 8.5 Gbps, which is 1.3x faster than LPDDR5's data processing speeds of 6.4 Gbps, whilst also using 20% less power compared to LPDDR5.
2 November 2021 (?) → LinkedIn: Nvidia posted a job posting for a senior game console developer tools engineer, where some of the duties mentioned being creating graphics profiler features for NVIDIA GPUs, enabling game developers to achieve higher and more consistent frame rates, implementing graphics debugging features by reading/writing GPU registers and memory, and by processing and manipulating GPU commands at the driver level, and working closely with internal and external partners, including other peer organizations within Nvidia.
~October 2021~
Relevant rumours:
13 October 2021 → Nate the Hate: NateDrake has heard from developer sources that large third party developers received devkits for the DLSS model* on late 2020, with smaller third party developers receiving dev kits for the DLSS model* on June 2021. The DLSS model*'s currently positioned to third party developers as a revision, similar to the Game Boy Color and the New Nintendo 3DS. Third party developers are developing games exclusive to the DLSS model*. And third party developers are targeting completing the development of games for the DLSS model* by late 2022. Nintendo has informed third party developers that Nintendo plans the release window for the DLSS model* to be around late 2022 to early 2023. The DLSS model* can output games in 4K using DLSS. And third party developers are excited about DLSS model*.
4 October 2021 → Digital Foundry: Digital Foundry believes a next-gen console exists and 4K dev kits are out there. Digital Foundry also believes a 2022 launch date for a next-gen Nintendo Switch is unlikely, but not necessarily due to the global chip shortage, since Nintendo probably has booked orders years in advance. And Digital Foundry believes it's unlikely the OLED model was originally planned to have 4K capability, but was ultimately canned, due to the sheer costs of creating in-development consoles, although there may be an outside chance, citing the Tegra variant of the Nintendo 3DS dev kits as an example.
Potentially relevant news:
25 October 2021 (?) → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) has posted an intern job listing for a GPU profiler/debugger software engineer.
19 October 2021 → Parade Technologies: Parade Technologies formally introduced the PS8830, a USB4, DisplayPort 2.0, and Thunderbolt 3.0 retimer chip that supports USB 3.2 tunnelling and DisplayPort 1.4a tunnelling, as well as support DisplayPort Alt Mode 2.0, which Parade Technologies said is sampling now.
6 October 2021 → ADATA: ADATA announced the ADATA Premier Extreme SDXC SD Express Card, a SD Express 7.0 card that's capable of sequential read and write speeds of 800 MB/s and 700 MB/s respectively.
~September 2021~
Relevant news:
30 September 2021 → Nintendo European Research & Development (NERD) via FreePatentsOnline.com: Nintendo European Research & Development (NERD) filed two patents (here and here) titled "Systems and Methods for Machine Learned Image Conversion" on 25 March 2020, which was published by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) on 30 September 2021.
30 September 2021 → Zynga via Kotaku: Zynga denies the Bloomberg report, mentioning that as the developer for Star War: Hunters on the Nintendo Switch, Zynga confirms that none of the devkits in possession or are in receipt are the 4K devkits.
29 September 2021 → Nintendo: Nintendo mentioned to investors that Bloomberg falsely claimed that Nintendo's supplying tools for developing games for a Nintendo Switch model with 4K support. And that Nintendo has no plans to release any other Nintendo Switch model other than the OLED model.
Relevant rumours:
30 September 2021 → Gamereactor Spain: Gamereactor Spain has learned that at least one third party developer company is working on a 4K game for a Nintendo console.
29 September 2021 → Twitter: Dave Gibson mentioned that Nintendo isn't lying to investors about:
Potentially relevant news:
27 September 2021 → IM Motors: IM Motors unveiled pictures of the Orin X prototype, which will be integrated into the electronic control unit (ECU) of the IM AD intelligent driving system. Orin X, which is fabricated using a 7 nm** process node, features a brand new Nvidia GPU and a 12 core Arm CPU, which is capable of delivering 254 TOPS, making Orin X 10x more performant than Mobileye's EyeQ5, and 3.5x more performant than Tesla's HW3.
21 September 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Development, Inc. (Redmond, WA) has posted a contract job listing for a software engineer for display technology and development, with mention of one of the duties being researching technologies and algorithms that's going to be used for post-processing images.
~August 2021~
Relevant rumours:
15 August 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake mentioned no third party developers have heard about the DLSS model* until late 2020.
Potentially relevant news:
25 August 2021 → JEDEC: JEDEC announces the publication of the standard for the XFM Embedded and Removable Memory Device (XFMD), a new universal data storage media that provides a NVMe to PCIe Express interface in a small, thin form factor.
10 August 2021 → Kioxia: Kioxia announced that Kioxia's 256 GB and 512 GB UFS 3.1 chips, which has 30% improved random read and 40% improved random write compared to the predecessors, are being sampled.
3 August 2021 → Parade Technologies: Parade Technologies announces that the PS195 and the PS196 DisplayPort 2.0 to HDMI 2.1 converters are sampling now.
~July 2021~
Relevant news:
19 July 2021 → Nvidia: Nvidia publicly released the Nvidia DLSS SDK 2.2.1, which adds a sharpening slider, support for Linux, and an auto-exposure option, as well as brings bug fixes & stability Improvements. Nvidia DLSS SDK 2.2.1 is meant to be directly integrated into custom/proprietary engines.
6 July 2021 → Nintendo & The Verge: Nintendo officially announces the Nintendo Switch (OLED model), which has 7-inch OLED display, 64 GB of internal flash storage, and a kickstand similar to the one on the Microsoft Surface products. And the Dock that comes included also features a built-in LAN port. Nintendo also confirmed in a statement to the Verge that the OLED model doesn't have a different CPU or more RAM compared to other previous models.
5 July 2021 → Nintendo via Nintendo Everything: Shuntaro Furukawa mentioned that Nintendo is continuously working on development of hardware, software, and accessories, but he cannot comment on any specific products currently under development, referring to the shareholder's question about reports on the new Nintendo Switch model.
Relevant rumours:
24 July 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi mentions that Orin and Dane are using Samsung's 8N process node and the GPU on Orin and Dane is based on the Lovelace architecture.
10 July 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake has heard from certain third party developers with access to the devkits with DLSS, which aren't the ADEV devkits, that Nintendo has touted the DLSS model* as a revision rather than next-gen hardware.
8 July 2021 → ResetEra: The reason why the DLSS model*'s SoC hasn't been taped out yet is because Nintendo's goals haven't been achieved in some way. (Multiple posts below post #15,590 have quoted the original post before it was redacted.)
Potentially relevant news:
28 July 2021 → JEDEC: JEDEC officially announces LPDDR5X, which has a speed extension of 8,533 MT/s, in comparison to 6,400 MT/s for LPDDR5.
~June 2021~
Relevant news:
29 June 2021 → 3DJuegos: Larian Studios Barcelona mentioned that Nintendo asked third party developers for feedback regarding potential future hardware upgrades. And Larian Studios Barcelona told Nintendo to bring out new hardware with more power and more memory, or risk having the new hardware become like the New Nintendo 3DS, being totally removed from the real world.
Potentially relevant news:
23 June 2021 → Lexar: Lexar announces the development of SD Express 7.0 and microSD 7.0 Express cards. Lexar's SD Express 7.0 and microSD 7.0 Express cards uses Silicon Motion's SM2708 controller chip, runs on the PCIe 3.0 interface, and can achieve up to 824 MB/s in sequential read speeds and 410 MB/s in sequential write speeds. The maximum capacity for Lexar's SD Express 7.0 and microSD 7.0 Express cards are 512 MB and 256 MB respectively. Lexar plans to launch the SD Express 7.0 and microSD 7.0 Express cards in 2022.
1 June 2021 → Micron: Micron announces that the company will be shipping the world's first 1α-node based LPDDR4X DRAM in volume on June 2021. Micron also announces the company is sampling 128 GB and 256 GB densities of Micron's 96-layer NAND for Micron UFS 3.1 for automotive applications. Micron UFS 3.1 offers 2x sequential read performance and 50% faster sequential write performance compared to Micron UFS 2.1.
Relevant rumours:
28 June 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi mentions that Dane, the codename for the DLSS model*'s SoC, is based on Samsung's 8 nm process node. And kopite7kimi mentions that Lovelace is roughly similar to Ampere, architecturally speaking.
11 June 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi reiterates that the GPU on the DLSS model*'s SoC is based on the Lovelace architecture.
10 June 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi claims that the DLSS model*'s SoC is a customised version of Orin, with the model number T239.
8 June 2021 → ResetEra: More developers are going to have access to the DLSS model*'s dev kits during the week of E3 2021.
~May 2021~
Relevant news:
6 May 2021 → Universal Display Corporation via Seeking Alpha: Universal Display Corporation mentions that there's a report about Nintendo using an OLED display for the "Nintendo Switch Pro". (Everything, except the "Nintendo Switch Pro" is true)
Relevant rumours:
28 May 2021 → Vandal: According to a manufacturer in Asia with access to the new Nintendo Switch model, the new Nintendo Switch model can output up to 4K when connected to the dock for TV mode. The size of the new Nintendo Switch model is also very similar to the Nintendo Switch, suggesting that the current Joy-Cons are compatible with the new Nintendo Switch model. The up to 7" touchscreen has no bezels, which is how the new Nintendo Switch model can be very similar in size with the Nintendo Switch. The touchscreen features an OLED display as rumoured by Bloomberg, which has a better image quality than the LCD display on the Nintendo Switch. The new Nintendo Switch model features a kickstand similar to the kickstand found in the Microsoft Surface Pro. The microSD slot is accessible on the side in the back on the new Nintendo Switch model as opposed to behind the kickstand on the Nintendo Switch. The dock for the new Nintendo Switch model is wider, has two USB 3.0 ports, and has a built-in Ethernet port. Whilst the new Nintendo Switch model is in final production process, the new Nintendo Switch model might not arrive in Europe until the end of November 2021, with a limited number of units compared to previous consoles. (Everything, except the 4K output, is true.)
27 May 2021 → Eurogamer: Eurogamer corroborates Bloomberg's report that Nintendo plans to reveal the "Nintendo Switch Pro" before E3 2021, so that third party publishers can announce games that support the "Nintendo Switch Pro" during E3 2021. (False)
27 May 2021→ ResetEra: NateDrake heard that Super Nintendo Switch was the name he has heard a couple of months ago. He doesn't know if Super Nintendo Switch will be the final name. (Unknown)
26 May 2021 → Bloomberg: Nintendo plans to begin assembly for the new Nintendo Switch model in July 2021 and release the new Nintendo Switch model on September or October 2021. The new Nintendo Switch model is likely to cost more than $299.99 and might be announced before E3 2021 to allow third party publishers to announce the full lineup of Nintendo Switch games at E3 2021. The new Nintendo Switch model will be sold alongside the Nintendo Switch Lite, with the Nintendo Switch being phased out over time. Assemblers will begin to ship the new Nintendo Switch model as early as July 2021, with production planned to ramp up to a peak at around October - December 2021. Suppliers are confident in fulfilling Nintendo's orders in spite of the global chip shortage due to the production lines being better prepared for a potential component shake-up, and the parts being used by Nintendo are subject to less competition than the parts used on Microsoft's and Sony's home consoles. Of course there's no guarantee Nintendo can meet consumer demand for the new Nintendo Switch model since shortages of display driver ICs and Bluetooth chips have caused Nintendo Switch production to halt, and then resume, several times. (Everything, except for the 4K output and faster Nvidia SoC, is true.)
26 May 2021 → Twitter: Emily Rogers reiterates that the Bloomberg article is accurate in saying that new Nintendo Switch model will have upgraded chips and a new screen; and Nintendo's aiming to release the new Nintendo Switch model at around September - October 2021. (The part about upgraded chips is false whilst everything else is true.)
26 May 2021 → ResetEra: Emily Rogers via NateDrake mentioned that a new hardware announcement might happen a couple weeks before E3 2021 or a couple of weeks after E3 2021. (True)
2 May 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake mentions that as recently as a month ago that the SoC wasn't finalised as aspects of the SoC still being tweaked and altered to achieve certain performance goals.
2 May 2021 → Nikkei: Nintendo plans on ramping up around 30 million Nintendo Switch units for this fiscal year, approaching multiple part suppliers about accelerating production. And Nintendo will release a follow up Nintendo Switch model capable of better graphics. (Everything, except for the better graphics part, is true.)
Potentially relevant rumour:
4 May 2021 → Economic Daily News: Foxconn and Macronix are assisting Nintendo in increasing the production of Nintendo Switch units this year whilst also maintaining a good relationship with Nintendo. One particular example is that Macronix's willing to proceed with the production of read-only (ROM) memory chips for Nintendo in advance, despite the risk of inventory shrinkage, especially during a global chip shortage, to support Nintendo. Such action is rare in the industry, which implies Macronix's confidence in Nintendo's market forecast, and Macronix's belief that losses from inventory shrinkage are only temporary and can easily be recouped. Foxconn's direct access to the source of the materials enables Nintendo to easily secure enough materials, allowing Nintendo to adjust production volume. And in spite of Nintendo being rumoured to be dealing with tight production capacity since the second half of last year, Foxconn's rumoured to rent Sharp's factory in Malaysia to increase production, which implies the importance of Nintendo as a consumer for Foxconn. (Unknown)
Potentially relevant news:
25 May 2021 → Arm via Anandtech: Arm officially announces the first consumer Armv9 CPUs, the Cortex-X2, the Cortex-A710, and the Cortex-A510.
Relevant news:
10 April 2021 → Nikkei via Nintendo Everything: Shuntaro Furukawa mentions that whilst Nintendo constantly thinks of ideas for new ideas, many of them aren't feasible due to cost and technology limitations. And if any of the ideas becomes feasible, Nintendo devotes resources into developing the technology.
Relevant rumours:
7 April 2021 → Twitter: Dataminers also noticed that audio support for the Bluetooth driver has been added in system update 12.0.0 for the Nintendo Switch, although it has not been officially enabled. (True)
6 April 2021 → Twitter: After Nintendo released the system update 12.0.0 for the Nintendo Switch, dataminers discovered that the system update 12.0.0 enabled the option to update the Nintendo Switch Dock's internal firmware. There's also a reference to "CrdA" in the option to update the Nintendo Switch Dock's internal firmware, which Mike Hensen says stands for "Cradle Aula", which is the new dock for the upcoming 4K model. (Mostly true, except the part about the 4K model.)
Potentially relevant news:
20 April 2021 → Nvidia via United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO): Nvidia filed a patent for a haptic control interface that induces haptic effects using machine learning on 24 September 2019, which was granted by the USPTO on 20 April 2021.
20 April 2021 → Nvidia via ResetEra:
Nvidia briefly went over the specs of Orin during the "DRIVE AGX Hardware Update with NVIDIA Orin" session at GTC 2021. The amount of transistors increased from 17 billion transistors to 21 billion transistors. The performance increased from 200 INT8 TOPS to 254 INT8 TOPS. And the memory bandwidth increased from 200 GB/s to 205 GB/s.
12 April 2021 → Nvidia: Nvidia formally announced the Atlan SoC during the GTC 2021 keynote, which runs at 1,000 TOPs, and features the Grace-Next CPU, the Ampere-Next CPU, etc. The Atlan SoC is planned to be in automakers' 2025 models.
7 April 2021 → Silicon Motion via Anandtech: Silicon Motion announces the SM2708, Silicon Motion's first controller to support the SD Express interface. The SM2708 is a two-lane controller running at PCIe 3.0 speeds and is capable of sequential transfer speeds of 1,700 MB/s.
6 April 2021 → PixArt via United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO):
PixArt filed a patent for a joystick with light emitters and optical sensors inside the internal chamber on 25 April 2019, which was granted by the USPTO on 6 April 2021.
Potentially relevant rumour:
28 April 2021 → kopite7kimi mentions that Orin and H100 are the only products from Nvidia so far that's based on the Lovelace architecture.
~March 2021~
Potentially relevant news:
30 March 2021 → Arm via Anandtech: Arm formally introduces the Armv9 architecture, with the main goals being security, AI, and improved vector & DSP capabilities. Arm mentions that Matterhorn and Makalu, the codenames for the next-generation Cortex-A CPUs, are expected to have a 30% IPC gain over a span of the next two generations. And Arm's working on variable rate shading (VRS), ray tracing, and advanced rendering technique for future Mali GPUs. Arm says to expect Armv9 CPU designs to be unveiled later in 2021.
Relevant rumours:
24 March 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi implies in a reply to VideoCardz's article of Bloomberg's article of the new Nintendo Switch model on 22 March 2021 that the new Nintendo Switch model's SoC features a GPU based on the Lovelace architecture. And kopite7kimi mentions that Orin might feature one Lovelace GPC (graphics processing cluster).
22 March 2021 → Bloomberg: The new Nintendo Switch model's going to use an upgraded chip from Nvidia that has a better CPU, increased memory, and supports DLSS, which allows game visuals to be reproduced at 4K when connected to the TV. Analysts expect the new Nintendo Switch model to be priced higher than the Nintendo Switch's price of $299.99. Analysts believe that $349.99 will increase the value proposition of the new Nintendo Switch model, although analysts also believe Nintendo can still drive strong demand for the new Nintendo Switch model at $399.99. (Mostly false, except for the price.)
14 March 2021 → Bloomberg: Nintendo plans on releasing a revised model of the Nintendo Switch that has a larger, improved display, as well as have upgraded graphics when connected to the TV, in the latter half of 2021. Executives at component suppliers, software publishers, and retailers believe Nintendo's planning on sales of the Nintendo Switch to be flat or slightly higher in the FY 2021, which is going to be boosted by the introduction of the model with an OLED display. (Mostly true, except for the upgraded graphics when connected to the TV.)
8 March 2021 → ResetEra: The DLSS model*'s SoC hasn't been taped out as of March 2021.
5 March 2021 → Gamereactor: Gamereactor has heard from someone with knowledge in the matter that Nvidia plans on stopping production of the Tegra X1+ in 2021. (Unknown)
3 March 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake mentions that Nintendo's planning on positioning the new model as a revision. (Unknown)
3 March 2021 → ResetEra: Imran Khan mentions that the new model should viewed more as a mid-gen refresh than successor since the new model primarily prioritises improving frame rates and resolution. (Unknown)
3 March 2021→ Twitter: Imran Khan mentions that there are enough people with development kits for the new model that leaks will inevitably happen. (Unknown)
3 March 2021→ Bloomberg: Nintendo plans on releasing a new Nintendo Switch model that features a 7 inch, 720p OLED display from Samsung Display Co., which starts mass production in June 2021 at the earliest, and are scheduled to be shipped to assemblers by July 2021. Nintendo opted to use rigid OLED displays rather than the flexible OLED displays used in high-end smartphones due to falling prices from excessive supply. The new Nintendo Switch model does 4K graphics when connected to the TV. (Mostly true, except for 4K graphics when connected to the TV.)
~February 2021~
Relevant news:
27 February 2021 → Nikkei via Nintendo Everything: When asked about former president and CEO of Nintendo Co. Ltd., Hiroshi Yamauchi saying that "there is no relation between how fun a game is and how good the hardware is", Shuntaro Furukawa, the current president and CEO of Nintendo Co. Ltd., mentions that whilst Hiroshi Yamauchi's words are always on his mind, some parts of Nintendo's philosophy must change as times change.
17 February 2021 → Nikkei via Video Games Chronicle: Shuntaro Furukawa, the president and CEO of Nintendo Co. Ltd., mentions that rather than having a specific time frame for hardware development, Nintendo's "constantly researching technology" in order to offer consumers new forms of entertainment. Nintendo hopes that the Nintendo Switch can stay in the market for another 4 years. Shuntaro Furukawa acknowledges that Nintendo's competing against not only video games, but also all forms of entertainment. And he emphasises that "If we [Nintendo] don't make fresh and surprising proposals to new customers, we will always be forgotten" since consumers will eventually become tired of a product.
Relevant rumours:
23 February 2021 → Sina Corporation: Genesys Logic, Inc. is said to be one of the suppliers for the new Nintendo Switch model. (Genesys Logic provided the GL3510, a USB 3.1 Gen 1 hub controller chip, for the Nintendo Switch Dock (HAC-CDH-MAIN-10).) (Unknown)
18 February 2021 → ResetEra: The Cortex-A55 cores might not be used in the Nintendo Switch revision. (Unknown)
18 February 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake from Nate the Hate reiterates that the Nintendo Switch revision has DLSS and 4K functionality. (Unknown)
16 February 2021 → ResetEra: The Nintendo Switch revision may be launched by March 2022 at the latest. (Unknown if referring to the OLED model or the DLSS model*. True if the OLED model and false if the DLSS model*.)
1 February 2021 → Twitter: Tom Phillips from Eurogamer says that the "Nintendo Switch Pro" is coming. (Unknown)
Potentially relevant news:
15 February 2021 → TechPowerUp: Transcend announces the launch of Transcend's CFexpress 820 Type B Memory Card, which supports the NVMe PCIe Gen 3x2 interface, and has sequential read and write speeds of up to 1,700 MB/s and 1,300 MB/s respectively.
~January 2021~
Relevant rumours:
20 January 2021 → Economic Daily News: Innolux will be the exclusive supplier for the Mini LED displays, with ELAN Microelectronics and Macroblock supplying timing controller chips and driver circuit chips. (False)
18 January 2021 → anue: ELAN Microelectronics and Macroblock won contracts to supply timing controller chips and driver circuit chips for the Mini LED displays supplied by Innolux to be used on the "Nintendo Switch Pro".
9 January 2021 → Twitter: Mike Hensen, one of the Atmosphere developers, mentions that Aula, the codename for the next model, will use a new DisplayPort to HDMI converter chip from Realtek (e.g. the RTD2173 or a similar chip) and will feature an improved display, which is supplied by a new manufacturer, and requires special handling in code, which suggests that OLED or Mini LED technology will be used. (True)
7 January 2021 → Economic Daily News: Macronix provides Nintendo samples of Macronix's 48-layer NAND flash.
Potentially relevant news:
19 January 2021 & 20 January 2021 → ELAN Microelectronics, Macroblock, and Innolux via Taiwan Stock Exchange: ELAN Microelectronics, Macroblock, and Innolux have simultaneously stated that the reports of supplying parts for the new Nintendo Switch model were based on press speculation rather than facts. (True)
9 January 2021 → NIO via VideoCardz: NIO announces the ET7 sedan, which will be powered by Adam, a supercomputer powered by 4 Orin SoCs, which features 48 Cortex-A78AE cores, 256 3rd Gen Tensor Cores, 8,096 CUDA cores, and 68 billion transistors.
7 January 2021 & 8 January 2021 → Mercedes-Benz via YouTube & Nvidia: During CES 2021, Mercedes-Benz announces that the Mercedes-Benz User Experience (MBUX) Hyperscreen is powered by a SoC that has 8 CPU cores and 24 GB of RAM with a max bandwidth of 46.6 GB/s. And Nvidia confirms that the Mercedes-Benz User Experience (MBUX) Hyperscreen is powered by Nvidia's GPUs.
Potentially relevant rumour:
14 January 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi suggests that the Orin SoC is fabricated using Samsung's 8N+ process node and features a GPU based on the Lovelace architecture.
~December 2020~
Relevant rumours:
19 December 2020 → ResetEra: The Nintendo Switch revision's SoC's going to feature Arm's Cortex-A78 CPU cores. (Unknown)
18 December 2020 → ResetEra: NateDrake from Nate the Hate has heard about the Cortex-A78 being used, although he couldn't verify the validity of what he's heard. The only thing he can verify is that there will be 4K functionality of some kind, although he doesn't know what type of 4K functionality. And NateDrake thinks DLSS is realistically possible. (Unknown)
14 December 2020 → ResetEra: Nvidia will stop the production line for the Tegra X1 starting from the beginning of January 2021. The Nintendo Switch revision (a mid-gen refresh or a successor) is planned for release at 2H 2021. The Nintendo Switch revision's SoC's going to be fabricated using Samsung's 8 nm process node and is capable of achieving Xbox One S performance in terms of raw performance (before DLSS). And DLSS is mandatory, allowing for the Nintendo Switch revision to supersample to 4K.
(Posts #544, #10,201, #10,206, #10,215, #10,290, and #10,298) (Unknown)
Potentially relevant news:
8 December 2020 → JEDEC: JEDEC announces the publication of the UFS Card 3.0 specifications, which offers a maximum interface performance of 1.2 GB/s, compared to a maximum interface performance of 600 MB/s for UFS Card 2.0.
~November 2020~
Potentially relevant news:
2 November 2020 → Arm: Arm formally announces the Cortex-A78C, with the option to choose between the hexa-core (6) 'big' system, or the octa-core (8) 'big' system.
~October 2020~
Relevant rumour:
26 October 2020 → Economic Daily News: Nintendo approached Innolux to supply Mini LED displays for the new Nintendo Switch model planned for release in 2021. (False)
*The article's deleted, but there's fortunately an archive of the article, which can be read here.*
Potentially relevant news:
7 October 2020 → Arm: Arm formally talks about the next two generations of Arm Cortex-A CPUs codenamed Matterhorn and Makalu, with Makalu having 30% more performance compared to the Cortex-A78. And future Arm Cortex-A CPU designs, starting from 2022, will only have 64-bit support.
~September 2020~
Relevant rumour:
9 September 2020 → Bloomberg: According to anonymous third party developers, Nintendo's asking them to make their games 4K-ready. (Unknown)
~August 2020~
Relevant rumours:
24 August 2020 → Bloomberg: Nintendo's looking into including increased performance and 4K graphics for the upgraded model of the Nintendo Switch, despite specs not being finalised. (Unknown)
24 August 2020 → Economic Daily News:
~July 2020~
Potentially relevant news:
31 July 2020 → LinkedIn: Nvidia mentions in a job posting on LinkedIn that Nvidia's looking for senior embedded graphics engineer for the Tegra solutions engineering team that's working on AI technology for game consoles, AI solutions for GPUs like DLSS 2.0, and optimising the performance of various software components of the Tegra graphics and system software stack.
~May 2020~
Potentially relevant news:
19 May 2020 → SD Association: The SD Association announces SD Express 8.0, which supports PCIe 4.0, and can support up to 3,938 MB/s in transfer speeds.
17 May 2020 → Nvidia via Anandtech: Nvidia gives more details about the Orin SoC, such as the Orin SoC features a GPU based on the Ampere architecture, and Nvidia has shown an updated stack of Orin SoC configurations.
~March 2020~
Potentially relevant news:
26 May 2020 → Arm via Anandtech: Arm formally announces the Cortex-A78 and the Cortex-X1.
3 March 2020 → Cypress Electronics announced CCG6DF and CCG6SF USB-C controllers for PCs and notebooks, which supports USB-PD and USB4, which is now sampling, and is planned for volume production at Q3 2020.
Potentially relevant rumour:
11 March 2020 → Twitter: kopite7kimi mentions that the new Tegra SoC is being fabricated using Samsung's 8 nm process node, which is based on Samsung's 10 nm process node.
~January 2020~
Relevant rumours:
11 January 2020 → Twitter: Dr Serkan Toto mentions that DigiTimes reports that the new Nintendo Switch model uses magnesium alloy instead of plastic for the housing. And the new Nintendo Switch model will come with a better CPU. (The magnesium alloy part seems somewhat true, specifically the front housing panel, specifically the small border around the screen, and the kickstand. Otherwise, false.)
6 January 2020 → DigiTimes: Nintendo plans on releasing a new Nintendo Switch model in mid-2020, with volume production beginning on Q1 2020. (False)
~December 2019~
Relevant news:
11 December 2019 → Macronix via Anandtech: Nintendo is Macronix's first customer for Macronix's 48-layer 3D NAND memory.
Potentially relevant news:
18 December 2019 → Twitter: Nicholas La Rocco from ComputerBase says that Nvidia's German enterprise PR confirms that the Orin SoC is being fabricated using Samsung's 8 nm process node.
17 December 2019 → Nvidia via YouTube: Nvidia formally announces the Orin SoC at GTC China 2019, mentioning that the Orin SoC features 12 of Arm's "Hercules" CPU cores and a GPU based of Nvidia's next-gen GPU architecture, and that the Orin SoC is 7x more powerful than the Xavier SoC, and Nvidia has shown the full stack of Orin SoC configurations.
~April 2019~
Relevant rumours:
17 April 2019 → Nikkei via Gematsu: The production of a next-gen model that's "...a full model change of the current hardware" will be released after the less expensive model is released. One developer mentions that development on the next-gen model is currently in a state where "it is not clear who will lead the creation of the concept" since Nintendo's said to be trying out various features, such as operability, video expression improvements, OS changes, etc.
~March 2019~
Relevant rumours:
25 March 2019 → Wall Street Journal: Nintendo plans on releasing a new model that's aimed at enthusiast gamers, although it won't be as powerful as the PlayStation 4 Pro or the Xbox One X. (Unknown)
~* → a tentative name that I use~
~**→ a marketing nomenclature used by all foundry companies~
Are you confused by how DLSS works? No worries, for ILikeFeet made an excellent post about how DLSS works on an engine level.
So without further ado, have fun, everyone!
The purpose of this thread is to be the one and only place on ResetEra to speculate and discuss news and/or rumours that may or may not pertain to future Nintendo hardware and technology.
Disagreeing with other members is a normal and inevitable part of speculation and discussion. But please don't dismiss the opinions of other members when speculating and discussing. And the site rules apply to this thread, such as:
- no trolling
- no sexual and/or objectifying posts
- no bigoted posts
- no platform wars
- no hostility towards other members
- no engaging in off-site drama
- no accusations of astroturfing
And there are a couple of rules exclusive to here that I hope the mods will strictly enforce, such as:
- no unwarranted negativity
- no off-topic, throwaway comments (e.g. "I'm posting, so I can get access to the hidden post.", "Nintendo's gonna Nintendo.", etc.)
- no incessant nagging towards potential insiders, reputable insiders, and/or reputable sources, for more information
Do you feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of speculation and discussion?
No worries! I'll be continuously updating this thread with any news and rumours coming from the speculation and discussion as quickly and as often as I possibly can.
It should be noted that any links to potentially relevant rumours from potential insiders will be hidden to people who at least do a couple of posts in order to protect potential insiders. But not all potentially relevant rumours involve potential insiders.
The newest news and rumours will be on the very top whilst the oldest will be on the very bottom.
Last updated: 3 May 2022 14:15 (UTC-07:00)
~May 2022~
Potentially relevant news:
3 May 2022 → Samsung via Twitter: Samsung announced the development of Samsung's UFS 4.0, which offers a speed of 23.2 Gbps per lane, which is 2x faster than Samsung's UFS 3.1, uses Samsung's 7th generation V-NAND technology and a proprietary controller, has a sequential read speed of up to 4.2 GB/s and a sequential write speed of up to 2.8 GB/s, is 46% more power efficient than Samsung's UFS 3.1 with a sequential read speed of 6 MB/s per mA, has a max dimension of 11 mm x 13 mm x 1 mm, and has capacities up to 1 TB. Samsung also announced mass production of Samsung's UFS 4.0 is planned to start at Q3 2022.
~March 2022~
Potentially relevant news:
21 March 2022 → Nvidia: Nvidia updated the Jetson AGX Orin technical briefing during GTC 2022 (Spring 2022), where the AI performance for the Jetson AGX Orin 32 GB module remains the same at 200 TOPS (INT8), but the AI performance for the Jetson AGX Orin 64 GB module has increased from 200 TOPS (INT8) to 275 TOPS (INT8). Nvidia has also increased the max CPU frequency for all Jetson AGX Orin modules from 2 GHz to 2.3 GHz. However, the Jetson AGX Orin 32 GB module only has 8 Cortex-A78AE cores instead of 12 Cortex-A78AE cores present in the Jetson AGX Orin 64 GB module. The max GPU frequency for the Jetson AGX Orin 32 GB module has decreased from 1 GHz to 939 MHz. But the max GPU frequency for the Jetson AGX Orin 64 GB module has increased from 1 GHz to 1.3 GHz. And the Nvidia Deep Learning Accelerators (NVDLA) present on the Jetson AGX Orin 32 GB module run at a max frequency of 1.4 GHz and at a max frequency of 1.6 GHz for the Jetson AGX Orin 64 GB module.
As for the Jetson Orin NX modules, the AI performance for the Jetson Orin NX 8 GB decreased from 100 TOPS (INT8) to 70 TOPS, and the AI performance for the Jetson Orin NX 16 GB module remains the same at 100 TOPS (INT8). The max CPU frequency for all Jetson Orin NX modules remains the same at 2 GHz. However, the Jetson Orin NX 8 GB module only has 6 Cortex-A78AE cores instead of 8 Cortex-A78AE cores present in the Jetson Orin NX 16 GB module. The max GPU frequency has decreased for all Jetson Orin NX modules, with the max GPU frequency of the Jetson Orin NX 8 GB module decreasing from 1 GHz to 765 MHz, and the max GPU frequency of the Jetson Orin NX 16 GB module decreasing from 1 GHz to 918 MHz. And the Nvidia Deep Learning Accelerators (NVDLA) present on all Jetson Orin NX modules run at a max frequency of 614 MHz.
The Orin Series SoC Data Sheet mentions that Orin's GPU has 4 Texture Processing Clusters (TPCs), with each TPC having 2 SMs, with each SM having a RT core, confirming that Orin has a RT core per SM. And the Orin Series SoC Data Sheet mentions that Orin's GPU features 2nd Generation RT cores.
Relevant news:
1 March 2022 → FamiBoards: The documentation present in "nvn2" mentions that GA10F, Drake's GPU, has 12 SMs in total, and 128 CUDA cores per SM, with GA10F having a total of 1536 CUDA cores.
1 March 2022 → Twitter: According to a picture provided by NWPlayer123, the codename for T239, which has been mentioned by kopite7kimi, is now called Drake, after Tim Drake, the real life alias of Robin, in the DC Comics universe. And the documentation in "nvn2" mentions that the T239's GPU's based on the Ampere architecture, supports DLSS 2.2, and supports RTX.
1 March 2022 → Twitter: The source code for DLSS has been illegally leaked. And based on a picture provided by TechPowerUp, there exists a folder named "nvn2"; and inside the folder, there are references to NVN, the Nintendo Switch's API, on the file names "nvn_dlss_backend.h", "nvndlss.cpp", and "nvn_dlss.cpp", very strongly implying that Nintendo and Nvidia are indeed working on a new SoC for new hardware.
~February 2022~
Potentially relevant news:
26 February 2022 → Phoronix: Nvidia introduced a new [Intel] High Definition Audio (HDA) driver set, which comes with a few patches that adds HDA driver support, and uses an Azalia controller, for Orin ("Tegra234") with Linux 5.18. Orin also supports DisplayPort Multi-Stream Transport (MST).
24 February 2022 → Kioxia: Kioxia announced the sampling of the next-generation UFS, which supports the MIPI M-PHY® v5.0 standard, utilise Kioxia's BiCS FLASH™ 3D flash memory technology, and is available in three capacities: 128 GB, 256 GB and 512 GB. Kioxia's next-generation UFS has a theoretical interface speed of 23.2 Gbps per lane (or 46.4 Gbps for two lanes) in HS-GEAR5 mode. And Kioxia's next-generation UFS with a 256 GB capacity has 90% and 70% improved sequential read and write speeds respectively, as well as 35% and 60% improved random read and write speeds respectively, in comparison to UFS 3.1 with a 256 GB capacity.
17 February 2022 → Creatures Inc: Creatures Inc mentioned in a job listing that technologies, such as ray tracing, and DLSS, could be indispensable. And Creatures Inc also mentioned paying attention to technologies introduced in game engines such as Unreal Engine 5.
13 February 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a senior embedded systems engineer who's responsible for developing new features that can be successfully deployed to massively used video game consoles, optimising solutions that are developed for performance and designed for scalability, and contributing to the architecture, design and maintenance of a Linux based system stack, and etc. A candidate for senior embedded systems engineer position is required to have 5+ years of software development experience, excellent C and C++ programming skills, solid understanding of multi-core SoC devices and low-level kernel software, good understanding of advanced game engine related subjects (e.g. 3D graphics, audio programming, etc.), experience with working with large open-source projects or maintaining large existing code bases, Windows and Linux for software development environments, & embedded systems for a multi-processor and/or multi-core system, and a BS degree in Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field, and a BS degree in Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field, with a MS degree preferred.
10 February 2022 → Nintendo: Shuntaro Furukawa talked about how maintaining and expanding the nearly 100 million annual playing users is important for Nintendo's next hardware platform when answering question #4 during the Q&A session for the financial results for the fiscal year ending on March 2022.
Potentially relevant rumour:
5 February 2022 → Twitter: Greymon55 mentioned that there's not much difference between the Lovelace architecture and the Ampere architecture.
~January 2022~
Potentially relevant news:
31 January 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a contract job listing for a wireless communications software engineer who's required to have 1-3 years of being a C/C++ software engineer, have experience with software development on Linux, and have knowledge on Wi-Fi and Bluetooth specifications, with knowledge of other wireless standards (e.g. LTE, 5G, Zigbee, SigFox, or LoRa), networking and WLAN protocols (e.g. TCP, UDP, IP, etc.), and Bash, Python and Git, being highly desirable.
24 January 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a senior shader compiler engineer who's required to have expertise in LSL and/or HLSL programming, knowledge of GPU hardware and software architecture, C/C++ programming skills in C/C++, excellent software design, problem solving, and debugging skills, and parallel and asynchronous processing experience, with open-source shader compiler solutions (e.g. glslang, DXC, etc.) and LLVM experience highly desired.
9 January 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a leader device driver software engineer who's responsible for designing and developing device drivers for current and future video game consoles, as well as implementing embedded software using C++ constructs, driving architecture definition and creating associated documentation, and leading development on major software subsystems.
8 January 2022 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a senior multimedia engineer who's responsible for architecting, designing, and developing software to support multimedia use cases, developing new features capable of being successfully deployed in massively used gaming console, researching technical issues and providing expert guidance, communicating and collaborating effectively with other engineers, and driving software development activities in small team settings.
~December 2021~
Potentially relevant news:
11 December 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a CPU debugger software engineer intern who's available during summer 2022.
11 December 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a 3D graphics API software engineer intern who's available during summer 2022.
11 December 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, VA) posted a job listing for a Wi-Fi/Bluetooth software engineer intern who's available during summer 2022.
10 December 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) posted a job listing for a senior shader compiler software engineer who's responsible for working on Nintendo's shader tools, as well as critical features, performance tuning, and troubleshooting with internal teams and vendors.
~November 2021~
Relevant rumours:
9 November 2021 → FamiBoards: NateDrake mentioned that late 2020 devkits have limited RTX support, with RTX support being adjusted due to the power consumption. RTX support has been tested for handheld mode, but battery life has been impacted more negatively than anticipated.
Potentially relevant news:
9 November 2021 → Nvidia: Nvidia announced the Jetson AGX Orin, which is capable of 200 TOPS (INT8). The Jetson AGX Orin features 12 Cortex-A78AE cores running at a max frequency of 2 GHz and a GPU based on the Ampere architecture with 2 GPCs, 16 SMs, 2048 CUDA cores, 64 Tensor cores, and 8 RT cores, running at a max frequency of 1 GHz, which is capable of up to 131 Sparse TOPs of INT8 Tensor compute, and up to 4.096 FP32 TFLOPs of CUDA compute. Nvidia also announced that AGX Orin dev kits will be available on Q1 2022. Nvidia also announced the Jetson Orin NX, which is capable of 100 TOPS (INT8). The Jetson Orin NX features 8 Cortex-A78AE cores running at a max frequency of 2 GHz and a GPU based on the Ampere architecture with 1024 CUDA cores, 32 Tensor cores, and 4 RT cores, running at a max frequency of 1 GHz. Nvidia mentioned that Jetson Orin NX will be available on Q4 2022.
9 November 2021 → Samsung: Samsung announced the development of the industry's first 14 nm** based 16 Gb (2 GB) LPDDR5X DRAM, which has data processing speeds of up to 8.5 Gbps, which is 1.3x faster than LPDDR5's data processing speeds of 6.4 Gbps, whilst also using 20% less power compared to LPDDR5.
2 November 2021 (?) → LinkedIn: Nvidia posted a job posting for a senior game console developer tools engineer, where some of the duties mentioned being creating graphics profiler features for NVIDIA GPUs, enabling game developers to achieve higher and more consistent frame rates, implementing graphics debugging features by reading/writing GPU registers and memory, and by processing and manipulating GPU commands at the driver level, and working closely with internal and external partners, including other peer organizations within Nvidia.
~October 2021~
Relevant rumours:
13 October 2021 → Nate the Hate: NateDrake has heard from developer sources that large third party developers received devkits for the DLSS model* on late 2020, with smaller third party developers receiving dev kits for the DLSS model* on June 2021. The DLSS model*'s currently positioned to third party developers as a revision, similar to the Game Boy Color and the New Nintendo 3DS. Third party developers are developing games exclusive to the DLSS model*. And third party developers are targeting completing the development of games for the DLSS model* by late 2022. Nintendo has informed third party developers that Nintendo plans the release window for the DLSS model* to be around late 2022 to early 2023. The DLSS model* can output games in 4K using DLSS. And third party developers are excited about DLSS model*.
4 October 2021 → Digital Foundry: Digital Foundry believes a next-gen console exists and 4K dev kits are out there. Digital Foundry also believes a 2022 launch date for a next-gen Nintendo Switch is unlikely, but not necessarily due to the global chip shortage, since Nintendo probably has booked orders years in advance. And Digital Foundry believes it's unlikely the OLED model was originally planned to have 4K capability, but was ultimately canned, due to the sheer costs of creating in-development consoles, although there may be an outside chance, citing the Tegra variant of the Nintendo 3DS dev kits as an example.
Potentially relevant news:
25 October 2021 (?) → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Developer Inc. (Redmond, WA) has posted an intern job listing for a GPU profiler/debugger software engineer.
19 October 2021 → Parade Technologies: Parade Technologies formally introduced the PS8830, a USB4, DisplayPort 2.0, and Thunderbolt 3.0 retimer chip that supports USB 3.2 tunnelling and DisplayPort 1.4a tunnelling, as well as support DisplayPort Alt Mode 2.0, which Parade Technologies said is sampling now.
6 October 2021 → ADATA: ADATA announced the ADATA Premier Extreme SDXC SD Express Card, a SD Express 7.0 card that's capable of sequential read and write speeds of 800 MB/s and 700 MB/s respectively.
~September 2021~
Relevant news:
30 September 2021 → Nintendo European Research & Development (NERD) via FreePatentsOnline.com: Nintendo European Research & Development (NERD) filed two patents (here and here) titled "Systems and Methods for Machine Learned Image Conversion" on 25 March 2020, which was published by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) on 30 September 2021.
30 September 2021 → Zynga via Kotaku: Zynga denies the Bloomberg report, mentioning that as the developer for Star War: Hunters on the Nintendo Switch, Zynga confirms that none of the devkits in possession or are in receipt are the 4K devkits.
29 September 2021 → Nintendo: Nintendo mentioned to investors that Bloomberg falsely claimed that Nintendo's supplying tools for developing games for a Nintendo Switch model with 4K support. And that Nintendo has no plans to release any other Nintendo Switch model other than the OLED model.
Relevant rumours:
30 September 2021 → Gamereactor Spain: Gamereactor Spain has learned that at least one third party developer company is working on a 4K game for a Nintendo console.
29 September 2021 → Twitter: Dave Gibson mentioned that Nintendo isn't lying to investors about:
- Nintendo not supplying tools for developing games for a Nintendo Switch model with 4K support since the tools are supplied by Silicon Studio
- Nintendo not having any plans for releasing any other Nintendo Switch model other than the OLED model since Nintendo hasn't officially announced any other Nintendo Switch model
Potentially relevant news:
27 September 2021 → IM Motors: IM Motors unveiled pictures of the Orin X prototype, which will be integrated into the electronic control unit (ECU) of the IM AD intelligent driving system. Orin X, which is fabricated using a 7 nm** process node, features a brand new Nvidia GPU and a 12 core Arm CPU, which is capable of delivering 254 TOPS, making Orin X 10x more performant than Mobileye's EyeQ5, and 3.5x more performant than Tesla's HW3.
21 September 2021 → LinkedIn: Nintendo Technology Development, Inc. (Redmond, WA) has posted a contract job listing for a software engineer for display technology and development, with mention of one of the duties being researching technologies and algorithms that's going to be used for post-processing images.
~August 2021~
Relevant rumours:
15 August 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake mentioned no third party developers have heard about the DLSS model* until late 2020.
Potentially relevant news:
25 August 2021 → JEDEC: JEDEC announces the publication of the standard for the XFM Embedded and Removable Memory Device (XFMD), a new universal data storage media that provides a NVMe to PCIe Express interface in a small, thin form factor.
10 August 2021 → Kioxia: Kioxia announced that Kioxia's 256 GB and 512 GB UFS 3.1 chips, which has 30% improved random read and 40% improved random write compared to the predecessors, are being sampled.
3 August 2021 → Parade Technologies: Parade Technologies announces that the PS195 and the PS196 DisplayPort 2.0 to HDMI 2.1 converters are sampling now.
~July 2021~
Relevant news:
19 July 2021 → Nvidia: Nvidia publicly released the Nvidia DLSS SDK 2.2.1, which adds a sharpening slider, support for Linux, and an auto-exposure option, as well as brings bug fixes & stability Improvements. Nvidia DLSS SDK 2.2.1 is meant to be directly integrated into custom/proprietary engines.
6 July 2021 → Nintendo & The Verge: Nintendo officially announces the Nintendo Switch (OLED model), which has 7-inch OLED display, 64 GB of internal flash storage, and a kickstand similar to the one on the Microsoft Surface products. And the Dock that comes included also features a built-in LAN port. Nintendo also confirmed in a statement to the Verge that the OLED model doesn't have a different CPU or more RAM compared to other previous models.
5 July 2021 → Nintendo via Nintendo Everything: Shuntaro Furukawa mentioned that Nintendo is continuously working on development of hardware, software, and accessories, but he cannot comment on any specific products currently under development, referring to the shareholder's question about reports on the new Nintendo Switch model.
Relevant rumours:
24 July 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi mentions that Orin and Dane are using Samsung's 8N process node and the GPU on Orin and Dane is based on the Lovelace architecture.
10 July 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake has heard from certain third party developers with access to the devkits with DLSS, which aren't the ADEV devkits, that Nintendo has touted the DLSS model* as a revision rather than next-gen hardware.
8 July 2021 → ResetEra: The reason why the DLSS model*'s SoC hasn't been taped out yet is because Nintendo's goals haven't been achieved in some way. (Multiple posts below post #15,590 have quoted the original post before it was redacted.)
Potentially relevant news:
28 July 2021 → JEDEC: JEDEC officially announces LPDDR5X, which has a speed extension of 8,533 MT/s, in comparison to 6,400 MT/s for LPDDR5.
~June 2021~
Relevant news:
29 June 2021 → 3DJuegos: Larian Studios Barcelona mentioned that Nintendo asked third party developers for feedback regarding potential future hardware upgrades. And Larian Studios Barcelona told Nintendo to bring out new hardware with more power and more memory, or risk having the new hardware become like the New Nintendo 3DS, being totally removed from the real world.
Potentially relevant news:
23 June 2021 → Lexar: Lexar announces the development of SD Express 7.0 and microSD 7.0 Express cards. Lexar's SD Express 7.0 and microSD 7.0 Express cards uses Silicon Motion's SM2708 controller chip, runs on the PCIe 3.0 interface, and can achieve up to 824 MB/s in sequential read speeds and 410 MB/s in sequential write speeds. The maximum capacity for Lexar's SD Express 7.0 and microSD 7.0 Express cards are 512 MB and 256 MB respectively. Lexar plans to launch the SD Express 7.0 and microSD 7.0 Express cards in 2022.
1 June 2021 → Micron: Micron announces that the company will be shipping the world's first 1α-node based LPDDR4X DRAM in volume on June 2021. Micron also announces the company is sampling 128 GB and 256 GB densities of Micron's 96-layer NAND for Micron UFS 3.1 for automotive applications. Micron UFS 3.1 offers 2x sequential read performance and 50% faster sequential write performance compared to Micron UFS 2.1.
Relevant rumours:
28 June 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi mentions that Dane, the codename for the DLSS model*'s SoC, is based on Samsung's 8 nm process node. And kopite7kimi mentions that Lovelace is roughly similar to Ampere, architecturally speaking.
11 June 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi reiterates that the GPU on the DLSS model*'s SoC is based on the Lovelace architecture.
10 June 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi claims that the DLSS model*'s SoC is a customised version of Orin, with the model number T239.
8 June 2021 → ResetEra: More developers are going to have access to the DLSS model*'s dev kits during the week of E3 2021.
~May 2021~
Relevant news:
6 May 2021 → Universal Display Corporation via Seeking Alpha: Universal Display Corporation mentions that there's a report about Nintendo using an OLED display for the "Nintendo Switch Pro". (Everything, except the "Nintendo Switch Pro" is true)
Relevant rumours:
28 May 2021 → Vandal: According to a manufacturer in Asia with access to the new Nintendo Switch model, the new Nintendo Switch model can output up to 4K when connected to the dock for TV mode. The size of the new Nintendo Switch model is also very similar to the Nintendo Switch, suggesting that the current Joy-Cons are compatible with the new Nintendo Switch model. The up to 7" touchscreen has no bezels, which is how the new Nintendo Switch model can be very similar in size with the Nintendo Switch. The touchscreen features an OLED display as rumoured by Bloomberg, which has a better image quality than the LCD display on the Nintendo Switch. The new Nintendo Switch model features a kickstand similar to the kickstand found in the Microsoft Surface Pro. The microSD slot is accessible on the side in the back on the new Nintendo Switch model as opposed to behind the kickstand on the Nintendo Switch. The dock for the new Nintendo Switch model is wider, has two USB 3.0 ports, and has a built-in Ethernet port. Whilst the new Nintendo Switch model is in final production process, the new Nintendo Switch model might not arrive in Europe until the end of November 2021, with a limited number of units compared to previous consoles. (Everything, except the 4K output, is true.)
27 May 2021 → Eurogamer: Eurogamer corroborates Bloomberg's report that Nintendo plans to reveal the "Nintendo Switch Pro" before E3 2021, so that third party publishers can announce games that support the "Nintendo Switch Pro" during E3 2021. (False)
27 May 2021→ ResetEra: NateDrake heard that Super Nintendo Switch was the name he has heard a couple of months ago. He doesn't know if Super Nintendo Switch will be the final name. (Unknown)
26 May 2021 → Bloomberg: Nintendo plans to begin assembly for the new Nintendo Switch model in July 2021 and release the new Nintendo Switch model on September or October 2021. The new Nintendo Switch model is likely to cost more than $299.99 and might be announced before E3 2021 to allow third party publishers to announce the full lineup of Nintendo Switch games at E3 2021. The new Nintendo Switch model will be sold alongside the Nintendo Switch Lite, with the Nintendo Switch being phased out over time. Assemblers will begin to ship the new Nintendo Switch model as early as July 2021, with production planned to ramp up to a peak at around October - December 2021. Suppliers are confident in fulfilling Nintendo's orders in spite of the global chip shortage due to the production lines being better prepared for a potential component shake-up, and the parts being used by Nintendo are subject to less competition than the parts used on Microsoft's and Sony's home consoles. Of course there's no guarantee Nintendo can meet consumer demand for the new Nintendo Switch model since shortages of display driver ICs and Bluetooth chips have caused Nintendo Switch production to halt, and then resume, several times. (Everything, except for the 4K output and faster Nvidia SoC, is true.)
26 May 2021 → Twitter: Emily Rogers reiterates that the Bloomberg article is accurate in saying that new Nintendo Switch model will have upgraded chips and a new screen; and Nintendo's aiming to release the new Nintendo Switch model at around September - October 2021. (The part about upgraded chips is false whilst everything else is true.)
26 May 2021 → ResetEra: Emily Rogers via NateDrake mentioned that a new hardware announcement might happen a couple weeks before E3 2021 or a couple of weeks after E3 2021. (True)
2 May 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake mentions that as recently as a month ago that the SoC wasn't finalised as aspects of the SoC still being tweaked and altered to achieve certain performance goals.
2 May 2021 → Nikkei: Nintendo plans on ramping up around 30 million Nintendo Switch units for this fiscal year, approaching multiple part suppliers about accelerating production. And Nintendo will release a follow up Nintendo Switch model capable of better graphics. (Everything, except for the better graphics part, is true.)
Potentially relevant rumour:
4 May 2021 → Economic Daily News: Foxconn and Macronix are assisting Nintendo in increasing the production of Nintendo Switch units this year whilst also maintaining a good relationship with Nintendo. One particular example is that Macronix's willing to proceed with the production of read-only (ROM) memory chips for Nintendo in advance, despite the risk of inventory shrinkage, especially during a global chip shortage, to support Nintendo. Such action is rare in the industry, which implies Macronix's confidence in Nintendo's market forecast, and Macronix's belief that losses from inventory shrinkage are only temporary and can easily be recouped. Foxconn's direct access to the source of the materials enables Nintendo to easily secure enough materials, allowing Nintendo to adjust production volume. And in spite of Nintendo being rumoured to be dealing with tight production capacity since the second half of last year, Foxconn's rumoured to rent Sharp's factory in Malaysia to increase production, which implies the importance of Nintendo as a consumer for Foxconn. (Unknown)
Potentially relevant news:
25 May 2021 → Arm via Anandtech: Arm officially announces the first consumer Armv9 CPUs, the Cortex-X2, the Cortex-A710, and the Cortex-A510.
- The Cortex-X2 is a 64-bit only Armv9 CPU that has 16% higher integer performance and 2x higher machine learning performance compared to the Cortex-X1.
- The Cortex-A710 is the only Armv9 CPU that has both 32-bit and 64-bit support. The Cortex-A710 has 10% higher IPC than the Cortex-A78, and at the same peak performance as the Cortex-A78, the Cortex-A710 consumes 30% less power than the Cortex-A78.
- The Cortex-A510 is a 64-bit only Armv9 CPU that has up to 35% higher performance in SPECint2006, up to 50% higher performance in SPECfp2006, and up to 62% higher performance in LMbench. The Cortex-A510 also has 10% higher performance whilst consuming 20% less power than the Cortex-A55.
- a CPU cluster configuration of 4 Cortex-X2 cores and 4 Cortex-A710 cores for laptops
- a CPU cluster configuration of 1 Cortex-X2 core, 3 Cortex-A710 cores, and 4 Cortex-A510 cores for mobile
- a CPU cluster configuration of 4 Cortex-A710 cores and 4 Cortex-A510 cores for mobile
Relevant news:
10 April 2021 → Nikkei via Nintendo Everything: Shuntaro Furukawa mentions that whilst Nintendo constantly thinks of ideas for new ideas, many of them aren't feasible due to cost and technology limitations. And if any of the ideas becomes feasible, Nintendo devotes resources into developing the technology.
Relevant rumours:
7 April 2021 → Twitter: Dataminers also noticed that audio support for the Bluetooth driver has been added in system update 12.0.0 for the Nintendo Switch, although it has not been officially enabled. (True)
6 April 2021 → Twitter: After Nintendo released the system update 12.0.0 for the Nintendo Switch, dataminers discovered that the system update 12.0.0 enabled the option to update the Nintendo Switch Dock's internal firmware. There's also a reference to "CrdA" in the option to update the Nintendo Switch Dock's internal firmware, which Mike Hensen says stands for "Cradle Aula", which is the new dock for the upcoming 4K model. (Mostly true, except the part about the 4K model.)
Potentially relevant news:
20 April 2021 → Nvidia via United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO): Nvidia filed a patent for a haptic control interface that induces haptic effects using machine learning on 24 September 2019, which was granted by the USPTO on 20 April 2021.
20 April 2021 → Nvidia via ResetEra:
Nvidia briefly went over the specs of Orin during the "DRIVE AGX Hardware Update with NVIDIA Orin" session at GTC 2021. The amount of transistors increased from 17 billion transistors to 21 billion transistors. The performance increased from 200 INT8 TOPS to 254 INT8 TOPS. And the memory bandwidth increased from 200 GB/s to 205 GB/s.
12 April 2021 → Nvidia: Nvidia formally announced the Atlan SoC during the GTC 2021 keynote, which runs at 1,000 TOPs, and features the Grace-Next CPU, the Ampere-Next CPU, etc. The Atlan SoC is planned to be in automakers' 2025 models.
7 April 2021 → Silicon Motion via Anandtech: Silicon Motion announces the SM2708, Silicon Motion's first controller to support the SD Express interface. The SM2708 is a two-lane controller running at PCIe 3.0 speeds and is capable of sequential transfer speeds of 1,700 MB/s.
6 April 2021 → PixArt via United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO):
PixArt filed a patent for a joystick with light emitters and optical sensors inside the internal chamber on 25 April 2019, which was granted by the USPTO on 6 April 2021.
Potentially relevant rumour:
28 April 2021 → kopite7kimi mentions that Orin and H100 are the only products from Nvidia so far that's based on the Lovelace architecture.
~March 2021~
Potentially relevant news:
30 March 2021 → Arm via Anandtech: Arm formally introduces the Armv9 architecture, with the main goals being security, AI, and improved vector & DSP capabilities. Arm mentions that Matterhorn and Makalu, the codenames for the next-generation Cortex-A CPUs, are expected to have a 30% IPC gain over a span of the next two generations. And Arm's working on variable rate shading (VRS), ray tracing, and advanced rendering technique for future Mali GPUs. Arm says to expect Armv9 CPU designs to be unveiled later in 2021.
Relevant rumours:
24 March 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi implies in a reply to VideoCardz's article of Bloomberg's article of the new Nintendo Switch model on 22 March 2021 that the new Nintendo Switch model's SoC features a GPU based on the Lovelace architecture. And kopite7kimi mentions that Orin might feature one Lovelace GPC (graphics processing cluster).
22 March 2021 → Bloomberg: The new Nintendo Switch model's going to use an upgraded chip from Nvidia that has a better CPU, increased memory, and supports DLSS, which allows game visuals to be reproduced at 4K when connected to the TV. Analysts expect the new Nintendo Switch model to be priced higher than the Nintendo Switch's price of $299.99. Analysts believe that $349.99 will increase the value proposition of the new Nintendo Switch model, although analysts also believe Nintendo can still drive strong demand for the new Nintendo Switch model at $399.99. (Mostly false, except for the price.)
14 March 2021 → Bloomberg: Nintendo plans on releasing a revised model of the Nintendo Switch that has a larger, improved display, as well as have upgraded graphics when connected to the TV, in the latter half of 2021. Executives at component suppliers, software publishers, and retailers believe Nintendo's planning on sales of the Nintendo Switch to be flat or slightly higher in the FY 2021, which is going to be boosted by the introduction of the model with an OLED display. (Mostly true, except for the upgraded graphics when connected to the TV.)
8 March 2021 → ResetEra: The DLSS model*'s SoC hasn't been taped out as of March 2021.
5 March 2021 → Gamereactor: Gamereactor has heard from someone with knowledge in the matter that Nvidia plans on stopping production of the Tegra X1+ in 2021. (Unknown)
3 March 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake mentions that Nintendo's planning on positioning the new model as a revision. (Unknown)
3 March 2021 → ResetEra: Imran Khan mentions that the new model should viewed more as a mid-gen refresh than successor since the new model primarily prioritises improving frame rates and resolution. (Unknown)
3 March 2021→ Twitter: Imran Khan mentions that there are enough people with development kits for the new model that leaks will inevitably happen. (Unknown)
3 March 2021→ Bloomberg: Nintendo plans on releasing a new Nintendo Switch model that features a 7 inch, 720p OLED display from Samsung Display Co., which starts mass production in June 2021 at the earliest, and are scheduled to be shipped to assemblers by July 2021. Nintendo opted to use rigid OLED displays rather than the flexible OLED displays used in high-end smartphones due to falling prices from excessive supply. The new Nintendo Switch model does 4K graphics when connected to the TV. (Mostly true, except for 4K graphics when connected to the TV.)
~February 2021~
Relevant news:
27 February 2021 → Nikkei via Nintendo Everything: When asked about former president and CEO of Nintendo Co. Ltd., Hiroshi Yamauchi saying that "there is no relation between how fun a game is and how good the hardware is", Shuntaro Furukawa, the current president and CEO of Nintendo Co. Ltd., mentions that whilst Hiroshi Yamauchi's words are always on his mind, some parts of Nintendo's philosophy must change as times change.
17 February 2021 → Nikkei via Video Games Chronicle: Shuntaro Furukawa, the president and CEO of Nintendo Co. Ltd., mentions that rather than having a specific time frame for hardware development, Nintendo's "constantly researching technology" in order to offer consumers new forms of entertainment. Nintendo hopes that the Nintendo Switch can stay in the market for another 4 years. Shuntaro Furukawa acknowledges that Nintendo's competing against not only video games, but also all forms of entertainment. And he emphasises that "If we [Nintendo] don't make fresh and surprising proposals to new customers, we will always be forgotten" since consumers will eventually become tired of a product.
Relevant rumours:
23 February 2021 → Sina Corporation: Genesys Logic, Inc. is said to be one of the suppliers for the new Nintendo Switch model. (Genesys Logic provided the GL3510, a USB 3.1 Gen 1 hub controller chip, for the Nintendo Switch Dock (HAC-CDH-MAIN-10).) (Unknown)
18 February 2021 → ResetEra: The Cortex-A55 cores might not be used in the Nintendo Switch revision. (Unknown)
18 February 2021 → ResetEra: NateDrake from Nate the Hate reiterates that the Nintendo Switch revision has DLSS and 4K functionality. (Unknown)
16 February 2021 → ResetEra: The Nintendo Switch revision may be launched by March 2022 at the latest. (Unknown if referring to the OLED model or the DLSS model*. True if the OLED model and false if the DLSS model*.)
1 February 2021 → Twitter: Tom Phillips from Eurogamer says that the "Nintendo Switch Pro" is coming. (Unknown)
Potentially relevant news:
15 February 2021 → TechPowerUp: Transcend announces the launch of Transcend's CFexpress 820 Type B Memory Card, which supports the NVMe PCIe Gen 3x2 interface, and has sequential read and write speeds of up to 1,700 MB/s and 1,300 MB/s respectively.
~January 2021~
Relevant rumours:
20 January 2021 → Economic Daily News: Innolux will be the exclusive supplier for the Mini LED displays, with ELAN Microelectronics and Macroblock supplying timing controller chips and driver circuit chips. (False)
18 January 2021 → anue: ELAN Microelectronics and Macroblock won contracts to supply timing controller chips and driver circuit chips for the Mini LED displays supplied by Innolux to be used on the "Nintendo Switch Pro".
9 January 2021 → Twitter: Mike Hensen, one of the Atmosphere developers, mentions that Aula, the codename for the next model, will use a new DisplayPort to HDMI converter chip from Realtek (e.g. the RTD2173 or a similar chip) and will feature an improved display, which is supplied by a new manufacturer, and requires special handling in code, which suggests that OLED or Mini LED technology will be used. (True)
7 January 2021 → Economic Daily News: Macronix provides Nintendo samples of Macronix's 48-layer NAND flash.
Potentially relevant news:
19 January 2021 & 20 January 2021 → ELAN Microelectronics, Macroblock, and Innolux via Taiwan Stock Exchange: ELAN Microelectronics, Macroblock, and Innolux have simultaneously stated that the reports of supplying parts for the new Nintendo Switch model were based on press speculation rather than facts. (True)
9 January 2021 → NIO via VideoCardz: NIO announces the ET7 sedan, which will be powered by Adam, a supercomputer powered by 4 Orin SoCs, which features 48 Cortex-A78AE cores, 256 3rd Gen Tensor Cores, 8,096 CUDA cores, and 68 billion transistors.
7 January 2021 & 8 January 2021 → Mercedes-Benz via YouTube & Nvidia: During CES 2021, Mercedes-Benz announces that the Mercedes-Benz User Experience (MBUX) Hyperscreen is powered by a SoC that has 8 CPU cores and 24 GB of RAM with a max bandwidth of 46.6 GB/s. And Nvidia confirms that the Mercedes-Benz User Experience (MBUX) Hyperscreen is powered by Nvidia's GPUs.
Potentially relevant rumour:
14 January 2021 → Twitter: kopite7kimi suggests that the Orin SoC is fabricated using Samsung's 8N+ process node and features a GPU based on the Lovelace architecture.
~December 2020~
Relevant rumours:
19 December 2020 → ResetEra: The Nintendo Switch revision's SoC's going to feature Arm's Cortex-A78 CPU cores. (Unknown)
18 December 2020 → ResetEra: NateDrake from Nate the Hate has heard about the Cortex-A78 being used, although he couldn't verify the validity of what he's heard. The only thing he can verify is that there will be 4K functionality of some kind, although he doesn't know what type of 4K functionality. And NateDrake thinks DLSS is realistically possible. (Unknown)
14 December 2020 → ResetEra: Nvidia will stop the production line for the Tegra X1 starting from the beginning of January 2021. The Nintendo Switch revision (a mid-gen refresh or a successor) is planned for release at 2H 2021. The Nintendo Switch revision's SoC's going to be fabricated using Samsung's 8 nm process node and is capable of achieving Xbox One S performance in terms of raw performance (before DLSS). And DLSS is mandatory, allowing for the Nintendo Switch revision to supersample to 4K.
(Posts #544, #10,201, #10,206, #10,215, #10,290, and #10,298) (Unknown)
Potentially relevant news:
8 December 2020 → JEDEC: JEDEC announces the publication of the UFS Card 3.0 specifications, which offers a maximum interface performance of 1.2 GB/s, compared to a maximum interface performance of 600 MB/s for UFS Card 2.0.
~November 2020~
Potentially relevant news:
2 November 2020 → Arm: Arm formally announces the Cortex-A78C, with the option to choose between the hexa-core (6) 'big' system, or the octa-core (8) 'big' system.
~October 2020~
Relevant rumour:
26 October 2020 → Economic Daily News: Nintendo approached Innolux to supply Mini LED displays for the new Nintendo Switch model planned for release in 2021. (False)
*The article's deleted, but there's fortunately an archive of the article, which can be read here.*
Potentially relevant news:
7 October 2020 → Arm: Arm formally talks about the next two generations of Arm Cortex-A CPUs codenamed Matterhorn and Makalu, with Makalu having 30% more performance compared to the Cortex-A78. And future Arm Cortex-A CPU designs, starting from 2022, will only have 64-bit support.
~September 2020~
Relevant rumour:
9 September 2020 → Bloomberg: According to anonymous third party developers, Nintendo's asking them to make their games 4K-ready. (Unknown)
~August 2020~
Relevant rumours:
24 August 2020 → Bloomberg: Nintendo's looking into including increased performance and 4K graphics for the upgraded model of the Nintendo Switch, despite specs not being finalised. (Unknown)
24 August 2020 → Economic Daily News:
- The next-gen Nintendo Switch's planned to start manufacturing in Q4 2020 and launch in Q1 2021
- Macronix, Pixart, and Weltrend are listed as the new manufacturers for the next-gen Nintendo Switch
- Macronix will provide NOR flash memory for the console and ROMs for the Game Cards
- Pixart will provide image sensors for the next-gen Joy-Cons
- Weltrend will provide power management ICs and USB-PD controllers
- The next-gen Nintendo Switch will have better interactivity and better image quality for the display
~July 2020~
Potentially relevant news:
31 July 2020 → LinkedIn: Nvidia mentions in a job posting on LinkedIn that Nvidia's looking for senior embedded graphics engineer for the Tegra solutions engineering team that's working on AI technology for game consoles, AI solutions for GPUs like DLSS 2.0, and optimising the performance of various software components of the Tegra graphics and system software stack.
~May 2020~
Potentially relevant news:
19 May 2020 → SD Association: The SD Association announces SD Express 8.0, which supports PCIe 4.0, and can support up to 3,938 MB/s in transfer speeds.
17 May 2020 → Nvidia via Anandtech: Nvidia gives more details about the Orin SoC, such as the Orin SoC features a GPU based on the Ampere architecture, and Nvidia has shown an updated stack of Orin SoC configurations.
~March 2020~
Potentially relevant news:
26 May 2020 → Arm via Anandtech: Arm formally announces the Cortex-A78 and the Cortex-X1.
3 March 2020 → Cypress Electronics announced CCG6DF and CCG6SF USB-C controllers for PCs and notebooks, which supports USB-PD and USB4, which is now sampling, and is planned for volume production at Q3 2020.
Potentially relevant rumour:
11 March 2020 → Twitter: kopite7kimi mentions that the new Tegra SoC is being fabricated using Samsung's 8 nm process node, which is based on Samsung's 10 nm process node.
~January 2020~
Relevant rumours:
11 January 2020 → Twitter: Dr Serkan Toto mentions that DigiTimes reports that the new Nintendo Switch model uses magnesium alloy instead of plastic for the housing. And the new Nintendo Switch model will come with a better CPU. (The magnesium alloy part seems somewhat true, specifically the front housing panel, specifically the small border around the screen, and the kickstand. Otherwise, false.)
6 January 2020 → DigiTimes: Nintendo plans on releasing a new Nintendo Switch model in mid-2020, with volume production beginning on Q1 2020. (False)
~December 2019~
Relevant news:
11 December 2019 → Macronix via Anandtech: Nintendo is Macronix's first customer for Macronix's 48-layer 3D NAND memory.
Potentially relevant news:
18 December 2019 → Twitter: Nicholas La Rocco from ComputerBase says that Nvidia's German enterprise PR confirms that the Orin SoC is being fabricated using Samsung's 8 nm process node.
17 December 2019 → Nvidia via YouTube: Nvidia formally announces the Orin SoC at GTC China 2019, mentioning that the Orin SoC features 12 of Arm's "Hercules" CPU cores and a GPU based of Nvidia's next-gen GPU architecture, and that the Orin SoC is 7x more powerful than the Xavier SoC, and Nvidia has shown the full stack of Orin SoC configurations.
~April 2019~
Relevant rumours:
17 April 2019 → Nikkei via Gematsu: The production of a next-gen model that's "...a full model change of the current hardware" will be released after the less expensive model is released. One developer mentions that development on the next-gen model is currently in a state where "it is not clear who will lead the creation of the concept" since Nintendo's said to be trying out various features, such as operability, video expression improvements, OS changes, etc.
~March 2019~
Relevant rumours:
25 March 2019 → Wall Street Journal: Nintendo plans on releasing a new model that's aimed at enthusiast gamers, although it won't be as powerful as the PlayStation 4 Pro or the Xbox One X. (Unknown)
~* → a tentative name that I use~
~**→ a marketing nomenclature used by all foundry companies~
Are you confused by how DLSS works? No worries, for ILikeFeet made an excellent post about how DLSS works on an engine level.
I'm gonna head off a lot of the comments that crop up about DLSS.
all this comes from this presentation Nvidia did on DLSS 2.0. it answers pretty much every question people has about DLSS, but I'm gonna post a couple of screens from it
"wouldn't tensor cores use more power than a gpu without tensor cores?"
when you diminish the gpu usage overall, you reduce power consumption
"why not DLSS in the dock?" and "DLSS for every game as on OS function?"
DLSS is integrated deeply into the game engine
here, DLSS happens before post processing. the dock just scales and outputs an image to the tv. stuff like MCable does addition processing to the final frame, but that's pretty much a fancy sharpening function
the reason you can't use DLSS as an OS function is because the DLSS SDK needs these inputs. not every game makes these inputs, like pixel art games. trying to force will probably just get you an ugly-ass image
"is integration a lot of work"
not if you already support TAA, which most major engines do
So without further ado, have fun, everyone!
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