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Report: New nintendo switch revision coming mid 2020
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For internal storage there have been BGA NVMe SSDs for quite a while now, which could hit over 1GB/s R/W, although both cost and power consumption would likely rule them out for Nintendo. Much more likely would be UFS, which could hit a few hundred MB/s at a lower cost and more reasonable power draw.
The bigger issue is external storage. If you're still using SD or microSD cards and allowing games to be installed on them, then that sets the baseline performance a lot lower, as games would still have to assume a minimum performance threshold at whatever the cheapest SD card on Amazon can provide, which is pretty low. There are UHS-II cards which can do 250MB/s to 300MB/s, but they cost a lot more than standard SD cards, and it's very difficult to enforce performance standards with them; once you've got an SD card slot on the system, people aren't going to be very happy if they buy a card, plug it in and are then told it isn't compatible.
Another option is the UFS cards mentioned above. I remember speculating about them just after the Switch was announced, as Samsung had just announced them. They would offer the benefit of a guaranteed minimum performance baseline, as you can't buy UFS cards that offer less than a few hundred MB/s of bandwidth. Unfortunately, they've never really taken off, and with even Samsung not actually supporting them in their phones, it looks extremely likely that they never will, which means they'll permanently be more expensive than comparable SD cards due to lack of competition.
If they want to guarantee certain flash speeds then there are two other options. One would be to drop expandable storage altogether, which would annoy a lot of customers, and force them to include much more internal storage, pushing up the price of the console itself. The other is to just go back to a proprietary memory format, which as a PS Vita owner scares the shit out of me.
Realistically I think SD cards are here to stay. However, if they genuinely did want to set some minimum bandwidth threshold for their flash memory, then I honestly think UFS cards would actually be the best of the available bad choices. The new Switch model would be pretty much the only major device using them, but I think it would actually be big enough to keep the format alive for its lifetime, and might be enough to push prices down a bit, even though they'd continue to be more expensive than SD cards.
But that's what I'm getting at. If there was a genuine market for Windows laptops for Nvidia, then that would warrant them pushing in more R&D dollars and pushing the design of the chip towards one designed for a Windows laptop, which would give us some context on the design. If there isn't a genuine market for ARM Windows laptops there, then we'd be looking at a chip designed almost entirely for Nintendo, with Nvidia's requirements an afterthought if anything. As it is, I don't think there's a big market for Nvidia outside of Nintendo for the chip, so I'd see something that's 90% or more Nintendo's requirements, with very little of Nvidia's other requirements in there. For a laptop Nvidia may want A77 CPU cores, but for Nintendo A75s may make more sense. Ditto for GPU, where I'd see a 384-core GPU hitting Nintendo's needs, even if Nvidia may not be able to sell it as well in other markets. The only places I'd see Nvidia pushing in hardware would be on the audio/video codec side, where they would want a next-gen Shield TV which can do AV1/8K/etc., which Nintendo wouldn't use, and perhaps Tensor cores, as Nvidia is already selling the TX1 as an "AI" processor with zero neural-net specific hardware, so I assume they see a market there.
If Nvidia could get a big ARM Windows customer during the design phase (ie Microsoft, literally the only option), then I could see a design that's much more on the Nvidia end of the spectrum than the Nintendo end, but I don't think there's a huge chance of it.
Similar die size doesn't mean similar cost. Wafer costs for 7nm are a lot higher than 16nm/14nm, and will almost certainly increase by a lot again for 5nm. I also don't think there's much point considering chips like Xavier or Orin as the "base" of anything used for Nintendo, as they're so heavily focussed on the automotive space. The actual name of the chip is DRIVE AGX Orin (Nvidia have never referred to Xavier or Orin as Tegra chips, as they're a completely separate line from their consumer-focused SoCs), and aside from all the automotive-specific hardware on it, it has a TDP in the range of 65-70W, which is well beyond anything that would be intended for a Switch–like device.
Besides, Nintendo is by far the biggest customer Nvidia has ever had, and probably will ever have in the SoC space. Any tiny bit of reduced R&D costs from adapting an existing chip (which would be pretty minimal, given they'd have to take a hacksaw to something like Xavier or Orin) would be negated by the long-term costs of a less well-designed chip for Nintendo's purposes. The next Nintendo device that needs a new SoC, whether that's this year, next year, or not until 2023, will get a new design from Nvidia with whatever CPU cores, GPU architecture and other bits and pieces are available from Nvidia and Nintendo considers good value for money.
No burrito no buy!
Most likely they are using the a55s for standby mode (kind of hard to confirm) and this likely increases standby battery life quite a bit.
Battery life is something Nintendo really cares about. Enough to pay for more expensive x memory for the lite. If only for this reason they are likely to keep the little cores imo.
It is certainly possible, but they didn't do it with the current switch, and it may be easier if they use 3 A76 cores instead of all 4, so they may just offset OS tasks to the 4th core.
It just seems a Nintendo sort of thing to do
I don't think it is, they've routinely put out worse and worse battery life and I think the Mariko versions with better battery life are directly related to bad press on OG Switch battery life.
only because that was all they had. if they could offload the OS to the A53s, they would have. since they can with newer ARM designs, that's definitely something they'll look into as long as there's no compatibility issue
Where is the source for this info that Nintendo could not get X1's with there a53's enabled?
What's the point of having a53's in there? Were the a53's in the tegra x1 TV box non functioning too?
Would it be possible or even feasable to use UFS as some kind of optane chip for the sd card or something like that? Say a 16GB UFS inside the system to cache files for the game. That would eliminate the problem with super slow SD Cards to some degree I guess.
Anyways, interesting stuff in here, thanks for the indepth views you all.
SD cards should theoretically be getting a speed boost pretty soon via SD Express, which should allow for speeds plenty fast enough for whatever Nintendo would need. The only question is how adoption is going to go, because UHS II adoption hasn't exactly gone too great, especially at the mircoSD form factor.
So far so good. Thraktor mentioned the worst case sd card one can buy and yeah, this will happen, so sd express is out as well I guess. But a boost via internal UFS II sounds possible to me (don't know anything in this regard) - like optane is boosting hdd in pc and like the sshdd drives like momentus xt or apple fusion drive. The internal UFS is caching up to 16 or 32 GB of recent used SD data to get 300-500mb/s read speed.
Even the current Switch isn't really built around the worst case scenario SD card. The whole system is built around having UHS I tier performance (which is marginally faster than how Switch carts tend to perform) and even their official SD card FAQ warns against using cards with lower performance (while not outright banning them). So long as SD Express manages to get sufficient market penetration (which is admittedly a pretty big unknown, but current speeds are going to become untenable as capacities start reaching multiple Terabytes), it would not be unreasonable for Nintendo to raise their recommended minimum SD card specs.
at the time, ARM only supported context switching. you could use either the big cores or teh little cores, but not at the same time. Nvidia had the A53s for low-powered stuff like web browsing and navigating the OS. Nintendo had no use for them since games will always need the big cores.
now if they have a completely new SoC for the Switch Pro, they could possibly use little cores for OS functions (or just have all big cores with no little cores)
Hmm I'm looking at a simple solution here, the NVME 2242 devices should be good enough, even back in 2014 this one only uses a little over a watt when reading, Samsung also has some pretty big advancements thanks to 3D NAND with these m.2 devices. (pdf)
What Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony have to do is only support fast reading from the internal hard drives for games, or at least only allow certain games to be installed on fast enough media. Microsoft has always supported external drives in their modern consoles, Sony does as well after an initial phase and Nintendo did with Wii U, so they all have to deal with users plugging in a USB drive and various speeds.
Nintendo using a 256GB ~$30 retail nvme m.2 2242 SSD with 1GB/s read speeds or better shouldn't be an issue, as they can be found today, but in 2023 it should be even wider supported.
I don't see the benefit of designing 2 separate architectures for Orin and Nintendo in a 2023 part. They have Hercules ARM cores, so why wouldn't they want to use them? It just streamlines their development and offers a more efficient and effective design. Using a GPU already designed for 7nm/5nm is also a pretty realistic approach, since it could serve Orin and Nintendo's needs.
Nintendo does try to meet requirements of next gen, the Switch's 4GB RAM and using the X1 over the K1 is also a pretty good indication of this. Nintendo is also under younger management that sees the value in technology, and coming into next generation a few years after Sony and Microsoft is also their MO here.
Nintendo isn't selling a portable that connects to the TV (they are, but that isn't how it is marketed). They are selling a console that can be taken with you like a portable. That requires a certain performance expectation, not matching their contemporaries, but being relatively close is important to the entire value of the Switch formfactor.
While 5nm 100mm^2 is going to cost more than 7nm in 2023, it will be after 3nm adoption and Nintendo spends plenty on SoCs in the past to cover the cost here, as I've mentioned the MCM in the Wii U was estimated around $110, considering the XSX has a 400mm^2 part in 2020, the cost should be between that $110 and the Tegra X1's $55 dollar cost.
The Orin power consumption is a 3rd party estimation, but is also irrelevant as Nintendo isn't going to use Nvidia's deep learning engines, cut out a lot of driving centric hardware, have a smaller GPU and not push nearly as high of clocks. That giant Orin chip is looking like something around the same size as Tegra X1, with 17 Billion transistors. This is also something I don't think Nintendo will push for, their power consumption, cost and needs likely means something no more than 2/3rd the size, or 10 Billion transistors, which should fit in something like 70mm^2.
2023 should be very interesting, just that amount of logic being used in a Nintendo product should be very easy for Nintendo to hit their price point, it should be a really compelling follow up to the Switch.
I'm not super tech inclined when it comes to numbers and die sizes and GPUs, etc. so basically if this is true, are we talking like XB1 and PS4 level performance? A little better? A little worse?
Thanks for the simple breakdown lol...I need it.
I'm all for a "Switch Pro" and would buy it almost assuredly, just curious how much power and difference could be packed into it considering form factor and size.
Thanks for the simple breakdown lol...I need it.
I'm all for a "Switch Pro" and would buy it almost assuredly, just curious how much power and difference could be packed into it considering form factor and size.
fun fact, Orin will be made on Samsung's 8nm process and will come as low as 15W flavors
I wonder if the switch Pro will get games that the standard switch won't get, like the new 3ds did.
I think it's certainly possible, since there are games that third party developers wanted to bring to the Nintendo Switch, but couldn't due to the Nintendo Switch not being powerful enough (like Kingdom Hearts III (according to rumours) for example).
If next gen is going to be cross gen for a while the switch Pro should be able to get all cross gen games, the OG switch will probably hold it back unless they have switch Pro exclusives.
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fun fact, Orin will be made on Samsung's 8nm process and will come as low as 15W flavors
This is big news, if true. Is that from a reputable souce though? I had my suspicions that it could use Volta, based on a chip coming out in 2 months from now. Somewhat dissapointing because if its the chip i think they will use, then its surely going to be 12nm, but not too surprised, cause its nintendo. I don't think anyone was expecting native 4k, so that's nothing to worry about.
ILikeFeet It's really funny that picture doesn't even mention the Xavier NX. The Xavier NX chip coming out in March 2020 (two months from now), and that's basically a shrunken down version of the original Xavier. This Xavier NX has two power modes, one at 10 watts, and the other at 15 watts. The 15 watt mode has 384 cuda cores with the thee GPU clocked up to 845 GFLOPs, and its using LPDDR4x RAM on a 128 bit bus at 51.2GB/s. Theoretically we should get up to 68 GB/s if Nintendo decides to increase the clockspeeds of the LPDDR4x RAM, though that would bring up the voltage a tiny bit. As for the CPU, that's the only issue, because it uses carmel cores, which while is backwards compatible to a degree to a57s, not going to be a cake walk. The CPU for the Xaxier NX in 15 watt mode can also clock up to 1.4Ghz for 6 cores. Could they possibly use them, or what they swap them out for something like A75 or A76s w/ A55s? Who knows.
I don't see the point of Nintendo sticking to 10 watt mode. I think they will go to 15 watt mode, and the aluminium build sort of explains the better heat dissipation that is going to be needed for that higher power daw.
Tegra - Wikipedia
And a 15W orion could definitely come to the Switch 2. I could see Nintendo's intentional logic in this. There would be a solid performance gap between Nvidia NX and Orion NX. Orion NX would already be mature by 2023 and inexpensive to Nintendo. Possibly on a 5nm chip, if not 7nm.
If the rumor about a volta chip ends up being true, the Xavier NX chip is the best lead we have IMO, because its already being mass produced and its coming out in March 2020, however that contradicts that source saying that they haven't mass produced Nintendo's chip and that it might get pushed out past Q4 2020 if it doesn't get released then. They did say it was going to be a custom chip, so I'm curious to what extent. Perhaps different CPU? I hope so.
Xavier NX chip is 845 GFLOPs for GPU. If we count architectual impovements over TX1 and early 2010 AMD architecture, It's going to be around Xbone base level in power in docked mode in the best case scenario I think. I'm not expecting Nintendo to increase clockspeeds for the GPU at all.. But I could maybe see Nintendo lower clockspeeds for the CPU to keep the power draw down.
I wonder how many CPU cores (assuming carmel is equivalent to A75) and at what speeds would be equivalent to 2.5-3x the power of the A57s... basically the same power as xbone/ps4 CPU.
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I still have the feeling we will end up with the Xavier NX (with disabled/missing tensor cores) in the 15W TDP config. That would make perfect sense for Nvidia/Nintendo to go with a slightly modified existing Soc as a midgen refresh to lower development costs and put all efforts on Switch 2 instead.
Six Carmel cores clocked at 1.4 ghz, 384 cores Ampere GPU clocked at around 1200mhz, 8GB lpddr4x with a 128-bit bus rated at 51.2GB/s. That would put Switch Pro comfortably in the same ballpark as Xbox One S.
EDIT: ShadowFox08 Exactly.
How did you come up with 1200Mhz? Also curious when was the first time you suspected the Xavier NX.
that's not a modified chip, that's a completely new one since the config you list doesn't exist.
Wait what? Tegra Xavier NX does exist and its scheduled for March 2020. Only thing I don't see match up is the 1200MHz frequency of the GPU, which is listed to go to 1100Mhz.
Tegra - Wikipedia
NVIDIA Jetson Xavier Series
It’s the next evolution in next-generation intelligent machines.
www.nvidia.com
Tegra NX has components that Nintendo would have to strip out like the 2 deep learning engines, also not sure if they will keep Tensor cores as such a small amount might not be useful for up scaling.
Either way, I expect GPU clock to be between 1.228GHz and 1.536GHz, or 945GFLOPs to 1.179TFLOPs
Should put it right between the Xb1 and PS4 without the fancy new features or mixed precision or any DLSS upscaling.
Either way, I expect GPU clock to be between 1.228GHz and 1.536GHz, or 945GFLOPs to 1.179TFLOPs
Should put it right between the Xb1 and PS4 without the fancy new features or mixed precision or any DLSS upscaling.
Xavier is Volta, not Ampere like he mentioned. That's not a slight change as that would mean making a whole new SoC. And since Caramel is dead, there's no point in bringing it backWait what? Tegra Xavier NX does exist and its scheduled for March 2020. Only thing I don't see match up is the 1200MHz frequency of the GPU, which is listed to go to 1100Mhz.
Tegra - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
NVIDIA Jetson Xavier Series
It’s the next evolution in next-generation intelligent machines.www.nvidia.com
My bad, that was a typo. Volta would also match with that rumor mentioned above.
The GPU frequency is limited by the transistor count and CPU architecture, both of which will be changed for a Switch revision.Wait what? Tegra Xavier NX does exist and its scheduled for March 2020. Only thing I don't see match up is the 1200MHz frequency of the GPU, which is listed to go to 1100Mhz.
Tegra - Wikipedia
NVIDIA Jetson Xavier Series
It’s the next evolution in next-generation intelligent machines.www.nvidia.com
I think he meant to say the Volta, considering everything else matched up, including the carmel cores.
It is part of the Tegra line, but he is referring to the Xavier NX.
Wouldn't it be cheaper to just disable them instead of physically removing them like the A53s? I guess we really have no idea what Nintendo will do. I don't bet Nintendo will increase GPU speeds though. But hey, removing or even disablling should bring down the watt usage.
But I'm getting bad flashbacks of *Nvidia heavily advertising TX1 as a 1 TFLOP machine (lol fp16), and then bottle necking GPU speeds from 500 to 393 because of heat. Perhaps the same could happen to this chip and we get some bull shit number like 614 GFLOPs from 10 watt mode.
Honestly, Nintendo has let me down so much, that I don't expect them to surpass the advertised 845 GFLOPs in 15 watts mode, let alone reach it. I'd be pleasantly surprised..
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It not being time for Mass Production does not rule out a 2020 release or even require it to be an end of 2020 release. Historically Consoles have gotten final internals as close as 2 months before release. Even if the earliest it was coming was say September. Production could start as late as like July.
Assuming this leak is true and it ends up being Xavie NX... Is true that we have no idea what the CPU will be. It could be carmel, A75/A76 with A55 or even 4-6 A57 cores at an increased clockspeed. GPU will likely stay at 384 Cuda cores.
Nintendo did overclock GPU for the Wii U though, right?
No, never. Typo on my end. I meant Nvidia. Nvidia advertised TX1 for it GFLOPs. 1 TFLOP mainly, even though that was in fp16 and not possible to use fp16 100% of the time. 500 GFLOPs in FP32, which is what we all go by.
The rumor says it isn't Xaiver NX, it's a custom SoC made between Nintendo and Nvidia, a non off the shelf part, which makes sense, as the big problem with using off the shelf hardware is that the design is public and you can get tons of information for emulating it or beating the security behind it.
As for the cpu, until we hear it is 7nm, Volta is a 12nm part, so the CPU would likely be A75 cores which are already designed and produced on that process node.
As for the clocks, I'd assume higher than Xaiver NX because of all the changes, it likely will use 4 A75 and 4 A55 cores, though if we find out the Volta information is wrong and they are going with Ampere, then we can assume a higher clock, newer cpu and 7nm again.
I still think my ~1tflop to 1.2tflops is a good estimation of performance here, it simply doesn't make sense to move on from Mariko if it gets much closer to the Mariko's limit of 648GFLOPs, as a simple die shrink to even 10nm should allow 800GFLOPs or better, not to mention switching out the CPU can offer more power consumption to the GPU as well.
One questionable thing about them using Volta... I can see prototypes using Tegra Xavier, I've heard that Nintendo was testing on Xavier hardware last year, but they are testing tons of stuff always. The question is that Xavier was never used in a customer graphics card, it was used in professional grade Titan V ($3000) and AI/automotive parts, it would make a lot more sense for them to use a small GPU based on Turing, without RT cores for instance.
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It doesn't state the chip exactly. So it could be a custom version of the upcoming Xavier NX, who knows. That's assuming the source is actually legit. I don't know if its possible to reach 1.2 TFLOPs on 12nm. At least I'm not expecting it. If it miraciosly ends up being 7nm and ampere, I could certainly see it happening.
Mariko would almost never likely be unlocked to use its full potential at around 600 gflops, so it wouldn't matter anyway. But yeah, who knows.
Does anybody know how legit the source is? Until we hear from a credible source (perhaps digitimes knows or might release something soon), maybe we should it all with the grain of salt. Hmm
Mario's full potential is beyond Tegra X2's 750GFLOPs, Nintendo's 1.267GHz profile for Mariko is no where near its full potential, it's just the highest clock Nintendo tested on the GPU in Spring 2018.
As I've probably said here a few times before, an off the shelf Xavier NX has an approximately 0% chance of showing up in a Switch regardless of any rumors. Carmel is not a particularly good CPU core for gaming (or most things, really).
What makes you say that? The Mariko basically is a TX2 without denver cores, 8GB Ram and 128 bit bandwidth.
Doesn't matter either way, because Nintendo is not going to go above 10 watts power draw on mariko, and would rather prioritize on efficiency and battery preservation. The chances of mariko getting unlocked speeds is very unlikely.
Yes, none of us here have agreed it would be using a carmel on this page. Until we have a reputable source that doubles down on this source anyway, we should take it with a grain of salt.
DukeBlueBall where/who told you of this source? Looks like it was posted one week ago exactly.
I follow this leaker because he has hard sources from fabs in Taiwan and China.
Unfortunately there is not a way to get his post history beyond recent posts. He posts details about upcoming mobile products all the time. I don't recall him being wrong about any of it but I didn't look hard for past mistakes.
Pretty simple, TX2 is produced on 16FFC and TX1+ is produced on 12FFC, both via TSMC. TSMC moved production of all 16nm chips to 12nm for free last year, so Mariko is on a newer, lower power node than Parker, so yeah Mariko can hit 800GFLOPs+, this is why a new SoC means that the bump is likely greater than 800GFLOPs docked, when I say ~1tflops, I'm really saying somewhere between 940GFLOPs and 1075GFLOPs on the low end depending on clocks, there isn't much of a difference here, even 900GFLOPs on Volta should offer XB1 like performance, and I still kind of expect Turing if it's 12nm, simply because Volta didn't see a gaming GPU.
Like I said they are probably using it in standby mode.
Do you have proof that Mariko is using 12nm finfet vs 16? I have yet to see any proof from any teardowns that confirming this. And the gains to 12nm from 16nm finfet is minimal at best. Far less than 20 to 16.
12 nm is a free update for 16nm on the same node as I understand it. Wouldn't be visible in a tear down as they are very similar.
I like this idea. It would be trivial to make a home use ultra compact console that played Switch games at 1080p with consistent framerates, or even 4k upscaling with the right GPU, but 1080p is more realistic I suppose considering the focus on margins and affordability. It wouldn't take much to do, even something like the 1650 would be fairly overpowered for the task lol. Not that Nintendo world bring such a device to market, despite my interest and a few other 'there are dozens of us!'
Revising the handheld Switch models in any meaningful way seems unbelievably unlikely considering the clear lack of interest by Nintendo in performance, and the huge install base with weak hardware to focus on for development. Tiny QOL improvements and lower costs are about as much as can reasonably be expected. If anything, this is probably a cheaper to produce, more modern revision of the SoC, storage, and battery, to replace the OG Switch in preparation for making the Switch Lite $149, while bringing full Switch to $199 by holidays 2020.
Switch 'Pro' will end up being PC Emulation at the rate it's improving. And I have zero compuction in ripping my purchased titles to play there vs the Switch itself, unless I'm on a long vacation or something.
Something like an x-ray would help. My point still stands. I have yet to see solid proof that Mariko is using a 12nm.
Very unlikely that we'll be getting a $100 price drop on OG Switch this holiday. The Switch is still selling, and unlike Sony and MS, Nintendo is going to milk the hell out of it. President of Nintendo said it himself:
'In a recent investor call, Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa addressed a range of issues, including the idea that we shouldn't expect to see the price of the Switch to drop past the initial $299 any time soon, or the price of the Switch Lite to drop past $199.99:
"We want to maintain the value of our products and sell them at the current price points for as long as possible, so we have no plans to reduce prices at this time," he said, adding that the company would aim to increase profitability through amount sold rather than reduction in cost.'
$50 is reasonable though, notably against next gen. A pro console can further solidify a price cut.
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