Switch Discussion Thread

[samsonlonghair]

Eh, or they have the means to do so and choose to. Objectively speaking, if nobody bought them new, then nobody would be scoring a sweet TV from the curb years later.
...
(also, 'member when Nintendo built an entire system around stereoscopic 3D? )

Stop making so much damn sense! You're making it difficult for me to be an opinionated belligerent asshole to all the people who make more money than I do!

[ElkinFencer10]

Stop making so much damn sense! You're making it difficult for me to be an opinionated belligerent asshole to all the people who make more money than I do!

Hey man, I'm with you on that one!

[ElkinFencer10]

So it's now being reported (although unconfirmed by Nintendo, obviously) that the Switch will have 4 GB of RAM. Obviously there are more variables to RAM than just the amount, but what do yall think about that? On the one hand, while that's twice what the Wii U had - going strictly by amount - it's half what the Xbox One and PS4 boast. On the other hand, the Switch is, at its core, a handheld, and that 4 GB amount would be eight times what Vita had. Not only that, but the Wii U had DDR3, so if the Switch has 4 GB of DDR5 vs the Wii U's 2 GB of DDR 3, that would be a significant jump in power from their last console, at least as far as memory is concerned.

Should we look at this is a positive leak or a cause for concern?

[noiseredux]

the Shield tablet had 2GB, and is nearly two years old now. So I don't think that 4GB would be all that surprising in a "successor" that is that may not even be out for another year.

[darsparx]

I'm a little concerned if only because most computers I'd buy come with a standard 8gb at least. I'd really hope that isn't true and they somehow go for 12-16 instead. That would be ideal at this point. Of course I have no reason to even be thinking about it until I'm healed up and earning more. I know at that point people would be suggesting to get a pc(and i'm really starting to eye that surface book more fondly at this point....). I'd love to see nintendo really give it some power, especially given that slogan from the 90's and early 00's. Would be a great point to bring it back seeing as this should be a big anniversary since we've just passed the NES's. I really wish beyond the mini console that they would've pulled out all the stops to make this system compare a little better.

[ElkinFencer10]

Well, PCs also do a lot more than consoles. In addition to running games, they're running the operating system (which is a lot more complex than a console OS), and they're often running game clients (Steam, Galaxy, etc), passive virus scans, various cloud services, etc.

I would shy away from comparing console specs and PC specs too much for that reason. The comparison with the Xbox One, however, is a bit closer a fit IMO.

[noiseredux]

I'm a little concerned if only because most computers I'd buy come with a standard 8gb at least. I'd really hope that isn't true and they somehow go for 12-16 instead.

I really REALLY don't see that happening. Look at every Nintendo piece of hardware ever. It is always lower/older specs than whatever consoles are its competition. So thinking they'd jump it up to gaming PC specs is really wishful thinking.

[isiolia]

So it's now being reported (although unconfirmed by Nintendo, obviously) that the Switch will have 4 GB of RAM. Obviously there are more variables to RAM than just the amount, but what do yall think about that?

Should we look at this is a positive leak or a cause for concern?

Far as I recall this is what the dev kit specs said, so it's pretty much as expected.

Offhand, probably not that big of a deal. If it's a dev kit spec, there's a remote chance that it's talking about available memory, and there might be some reserved for the OS already (unlikely, but possible). More likely is that whatever OS Nintendo has on there will be leaner than what the PS4 or Xbox One have. Those may have 8GB of memory, but only about 5GB of that is available to games. Then it's split for VRAM...which comes back around to what the Switch is trying to do natively. If it's doing 720p native, then it needs a lot less for textures.

Generally, sure, if compared to home consoles, it's...not great. Half the memory, with significantly less bandwidth.
Compared to more similar devices though, it's solid. You know what else has 4GB of memory? An iPad Pro. The big one. The smaller one only has 2GB, like Air 2/etc. So for the class of device, it's pretty good, and will probably be more than sufficient for what the rest of the hardware can push.

[Sarge]

Also, I wonder if loading from cart will help with that, since the access should be quite fast. Well, that and SD. Either way, they may not need to worry as much about having a huge amount of RAM.

[ElkinFencer10]

I really REALLY don't see that happening. Look at every Nintendo piece of hardware ever. It is always lower/older specs than whatever consoles are its competition.

I'm not entirely sure about that. Correct me if I'm mistaken, but from what I remember, while the Master System outclassed it a year later, the NES was the strongest console (not PC) on the market in 1984 IIRC. The Super Nintendo, Nintendo 64, and Gamecube were also the strongest consoles on the market when they were released (though the Gamecube only held that title for a few days, as I recall). It really wasn't until the Wii and Wii U that Nintendo went for weak hardware.