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There is a lot of speculation in the community that when docked, additional video processing will be available in the hardware within the dock. When undocked,
by ben174 10y ago
There is a lot of speculation in the community that when docked, additional video processing will be available in the hardware within the dock.
When undocked, they can scale down resolution and frame rate for the smaller screen.
- macspoofing 10y ago>There is a lot of speculation in the community that when docked, additional video processing will be available in the hardware within the dock. Doubt it. Not a trivial problem to solve technically and console pricing is inflexible - they need to sell this thing for under $400, and Nintendo hates subsidizing hardware.
- chx 10y agoUSB C connector Alternate Mode can be used to carry PCIe signals (without Thunderbolt). Switching GPUs is a well solved problem for nVidia, they call it Optimus. By now this is a technically solved problem, no problems.
- rtkwe 10y agoI don't think with the nVidia blog posts and the pictures of the dock that they're hiding a more powerful GPU in the dock. If it were I'd expect a larger dock to provide more cooling to the docked GPU and some mention of 2 GPUs or GPU switching in the nVidia blog post about the Switch.
- chx 10y agoThis I do not know; I was just commenting on "Not a trivial problem to solve technically".
- macspoofing 10y ago>By now this is a technically solved problem, no problems. Is it? We're not talking about load balancing GPUs - we're talking about a GPU just disappearing underneath you (like when the user picks up the Switch), while maintaining context and dynamically lowering quality - I can't imagine that being a trivial problem. But that's not the major issue here. Nintendo is going to have to sell this thing for under $400. A mid-market smart-phone costs that much. Shipping a dock with a high performance GPU along with the actual portable isn't going to happen.
- jocro 10y agoOne concept that seems feasible - if the portable device is vented but lacking airflow for cooling, power that airflow with fans in the dock. Then, when docked, overclock the chip (or underclock when undocked). This all presupposes, though, that the hardware they're packing in the portable unit is comparable to what's in the PS4/XBO or their newer equivalents.
- white-flame 10y agoIt could be that the chip itself is throttled when in handheld mode, and the dock provides additional power and cooling, as an alternative take on that option.
- jmkni 10y agoThe higher end Intel NUC's work this way, would be cool if this was true