The Nintendo Switch 2 is a question of when, not if. The current Switch launched way back in 2017 and a steady drip from the rumor mill suggests Nintendo is hard at work on the follow-up. And there are heaps of questions about the Big N’s next effort; how powerful will it be? Will it be backwards compatible? Will it even be called the Switch 2?
Now a little bit of light seems to have been thrown onto the first of those questions with an expansive report from Digital Foundry investigating what the internal hardware of the Switch 2 may look like working from this hypothesis.
Of course, there’s been no whiff of officialness whatsoever from Nintendo and even DF itself says it’s not 100% certain this is the Switch 2 chip. But a lot of common sense seems to suggest it could be the beating heart of Nintendo’s next hybrid console.
This is a preliminary picture of T234 in Wikipedia. Very clear. So why do we always guess? Nintendo will use a customized one, T239. pic.twitter.com/Qp5Im5udlQJune 11, 2021
This being the case, there’s a lot of reorganizing that needs to happen. The T234 is fabricated on the 8nm process with 12 ARM A78AE CPU cores — putting it behind the 7nm process used by the Xbox Series X. It’s also got a die size of 455mm2 compared to 360mm2 on Microsoft’s AMD chip.
One of the biggest clues Nvidia is refining this chip for the Switch 2 is leaked information suggesting the company is using the NVN2 API — a second version of the API used to test the original Switch — to emulate how the T329 will behave.
All of this adds up to sound reasoning about what’s going to be inside the Switch 2 on the technical front. But what does that mean for gameplay?
Because of the downgrades needed to get the T234 into some kind of a mobile-ready chip, it may not be feasible the Switch 2 could run 4K — certainly not in handheld mode and it’s unlikely to feature a panel capable of that resolution if Nintendo wants to keep costs down. It could, however, use DLSS-enabled 1440p to upscale to 4K when in docked mode. But would that come at a frame rate cost?
Ultimately, Nintendo tends to do its own thing and not be troubled by the graphical or processing grunt paraded by Sony and Microsoft. So, while there’s certainly a need for a hardware push on the Switch 2, the exclusive games Nintendo is able to trot out from its stable will go a long way toward securing sales. Especially if the company can keep the overall cost of the console down.
We’ll have a little while to wait before we find out for certain. According to best guesses, we’re unlikely to see the Switch 2 until at least the second quarter of 2024. For all the latest rumors and leaks on the console, check out our regularly updated Nintendo Switch 2 hub here.
More from Tom's Guide
