Alleged Nintendo Switch 2 Motherboard and SoC Surface in New Video
A brand-new video has popped up online, and it’s not just speculation. This time, we’re apparently getting a real, up-close look at the console's motherboard and the all-important System-on-Chip (SoC) that will power our future gaming adventures.
According to Geekerwan's video, these are not prototypes. The components were supposedly extracted from a real Nintendo Switch 2 console that made its way onto the black market prior to launch. That would seem to lend credence to those crazy rumors from before that suggested affluent purchasers could obtain an early unit for a premium price. Obtaining one of those.
What's Under the Hood. A Closer Look at the Switch 2's Brain
Beyond just showing off the circuit board, the video dives into some fascinating analysis of the SoC. Thanks to a summary by R3ndezvous on the ResetERA forums, we’re getting some juicy details:
Size Matters: This new chip is allegedly a beast. It's meant to be double the size of the original Tegra X1 (20nm) in the original Switch – we're talking 207mm² vs 118mm². To put that in perspective, it's even bigger than some mobile GPUs such as the RTX 3050 Ti. That's some serious silicon real estate bump.
A Peek at the Past: An annotation on the chip itself allegedly shows a 2021 tapeout year. This is an interesting one, as it lends validity to the rumor that Nintendo has had this system prepared, or at least in a very advanced state, for a while now.
The Process Node Mystery: The manufacturing process of the chip isn't as straightforward as an 8nm. The teardown shows that it has specifications more akin to Samsung's 10nm process. What the exact implications of that are is still somewhat uncertain, but it's a curious fact.
Demystifying the Graphics Capability
What about the graphics. That's what everybody is eager to find out. Geekerwan's video sheds light on this front as well:
Ampere, or Something Else. The GPU architecture is clearly marked as an Ampere architecture, which forms the foundation of Nvidia's RTX 30-series. However, the YouTuber notices a strange layout that seems to bear some similarity to the more modern Ada Lovelace architecture (implemented in RTX 40-series cards). Is it a bespoke hybrid.
Core Counts Revealed: The benchmark confirms 6 TPCs (Texture Processing Clusters), 2 SMs (Streaming Multiprocessors) per TPC, and a total of 1536 CUDA Cores. This is a fairly standard configuration for mid-range and mobile Nvidia chips of the Turing and Ampere generations.
Of course, raw specs don't tell the whole story, especially with Nintendo's expertise in optimization. What it all translates to in the way of real-world gaming performance is still the million-dollar question. It's hard to say exactly what the Switch 2 will deliver based on PC hardware of similar numbers, but these specs certainly give a lot to think about.
It’s an exciting time to be a Nintendo fan, and leaks like this only fuel the anticipation. We’ll have to wait for official word from Nintendo, but the picture of the Switch 2 is slowly but surely coming into focus.
