Nintendo Switch 2 PCB Leak Reveals an NVIDIA Tegra T239 Chip Optically Shrunk to 5nm

[btarunr]

Nintendo Switch 2 promises to be this year's big (well small) gaming platform launch. It goes up against a growing ecosystem of handhelds based on x86-64 mobile processors running Windows, its main play would have to be offering a similar or better gameplay experience, but with better battery life, given that all of its hardware is purpose-built for a handheld console, and runs a highly optimized software stack; and the SoC forms a big part of this. Nintendo turned to NVIDIA for the job, given its graphics IP leadership, and its ability to integrate it with Arm CPU IP in a semi-custom chip. Someone with access to a Switch 2 prototype, likely an ISV, took the device apart, revealing the chip, a die-shrunk version of the Tegra T239 from 2023.

It's important to note that prototype consoles physically appear nothing like the final product, they're just designed so ISVs and game developers can validate them, and together with PC-based "official" emulation, set up the ability to develop or port games to the new platform. The Switch 2 looks very similar to the original Switch, it is a large tablet-like device, with detachable controllers. The largest chip on the mainboard is the NVIDIA Tegra T239. Nintendo Prime shared more details about the chip.



NVIDIA originally built the T239 on Samsung 8 nm DUV foundry node, but the semi-custom chip powering the Switch 2 is very likely built on the Samsung 5 nm EUV node. This node offers a 70% transistor density increase over 8 nm, and Nintendo Prime calculates that the chip in the picture is roughly that much smaller than the 341 mm² die area of what the NVIDIA Orin would be with 2/3rd its CPU core and iGPU SM count. The chip in the pictures is estimated to has a die size of roughly 200 mm².

The T239 features a 3-tiered hybrid CPU consisting of one Arm Cortex X1 HP-core, three Cortex A78 P-cores, and four Cortex A55 E-cores, with Arm DynamIQ, a hardware-based scheduler. The iGPU of the T239 is based on the "Ampere" graphics architecture, with 12 streaming multiprocessors worth 1,536 CUDA cores. On the Switch 2, this chip drives 12 GB of LPDDR5X-7500 memory. The console uses a UFS 3.1 based 256 GB flash storage solution.

As for the device itself, the Switch 2 prototype measures 270 mm x 116 mm x 14 mm (WxDxH), which is noticeably larger than the 242 mm x 102 mm x 13.9 mm of the Switch OLED. Its display is larger, too, measuring 8-inch, compared to 7-inch of its predecessor. Nintendo likely took the opportunity to update the communications feature-set of the Switch 2.

View at TechPowerUp Main Site | Source

 

[john_]

The first Switch proved (again) that even with potato hardware Nintendo will sell. While we have a number of handhelds this time with AMD and (soon more) Intel hardware, I guess Nintendo will keep selling anyway.

 

[Zunexxx]

The first Switch proved (again) that even with potato hardware Nintendo will sell. While we have a number of handhelds this time with AMD and (soon more) Intel hardware, I guess Nintendo will keep selling anyway.

That’s not exactly correct, what they have proven with good optimization and good portfolio of games, u can sell shit hardware. They have really good first party titles and that’s the only reason they can sell their hardware.

 

[napata]

1,536 CUDA cores...

The mobile RTX 3050 GPU had 2048 CUDA cores, while the mobile RTX 4050 GPU has 2560.
What's the point of releasing a new Switch, when the performance will be almost identical to the old one??

Identical to the old one? What are talking about? The Switch has 2 SMs with 128 CUDA cores each & 4GB of RAM at 25GB/s bandwidth. This is a massive upgrade to that.

 

[TumbleGeorge]

1,536 CUDA cores...

The mobile RTX 3050 GPU had 2048 CUDA cores, while the mobile RTX 4050 GPU has 2560.
What's the point of releasing a new Switch, when the performance will be almost identical to the old one??

How does the mention of mobile dGPUs matter in this comment? I don't understand, this mention cannot be a justification for the statement at the end of the comment.

 

[Zunexxx]

I’m lost on what that dude is talking about. The first switch was literally a gimped 830m, underclocked. How does a 1536 cuda core ampere die not beat the shit out of it lol….

 

[dj-electric]

1,536 CUDA cores...

The mobile RTX 3050 GPU had 2048 CUDA cores, while the mobile RTX 4050 GPU has 2560.
What's the point of releasing a new Switch, when the performance will be almost identical to the old one??

This is like claiming the RTX 4070 has almost identical performance to a GTX 970. Were talking about a performance difference that deep.

 

[kondamin]

That’s not exactly correct, what they have proven with good optimization and good portfolio of games, u can sell shit hardware. They have really good first party titles and that’s the only reason they can sell their hardware.

And an awesome marketing team that knows their target market.

its a miracle that company isn't hated more considering their behaviour towards fans of the ip.

 

[Onasi]

That’s not exactly correct, what they have proven with good optimization and good portfolio of games, u can sell shit hardware.

Switch is also an example that platform optimization can really only take you so far - Tears of the Kingdom runs… barely. If you mess around with its physics and build mechanics enough (which is sort of the point of the game) the console just starts begging for death. They really do need some form of an upgrade quite desperately at this point. People joke about this new Tegra being fairly underpowered, and by the PC enthusiast standards I suppose it is, but it will be miles better (judging by specs) than what they have now.

 

[AusWolf]

That’s not exactly correct, what they have proven with good optimization and good portfolio of games, u can sell shit hardware. They have really good first party titles and that’s the only reason they can sell their hardware.

Exactly. Nintendo sells because of its games, not because of its hardware specs.

 

[_roman_]

I just looked it up:
When someone is interested on the switch grapic card: https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/switch-gpu-20nm.c3104

If the specification for the switch 2 are correct this is definitely not potatoe hardware.

Can anyone please translate this to a nvidia gpu please? What does this compare to?

The iGPU of the T239 is based on the "Ampere" graphics architecture, with 12 streaming multiprocessors worth 1,536 CUDA cores

Can someone compare this to a current snapdragon smartphone processor please?

Arm Cortex X1 HP-core, three Cortex A78 P-cores, and four Cortex A55 E-core

 

[JustBenching]

Switch is also an example that platform optimization can really only take you so far - Tears of the Kingdom runs… barely. If you mess around with its physics and build mechanics enough (which is sort of the point of the game) the console just starts begging for death. They really do need some form of an upgrade quite desperately at this point. People joke about this new Tegra being fairly underpowered, and by the PC enthusiast standards I suppose it is, but it will be miles better (judging by specs) than what they have now.

Yeap, it's not just Tears of the Kingdom, lot's of great games are kinda begging for better hardware. Nier automata and astral chains - in hectic fight scenes, oh boy do I get single digit framerate. Literally single digits

 

[john_]

That’s not exactly correct, what they have proven with good optimization and good portfolio of games, u can sell shit hardware. They have really good first party titles and that’s the only reason they can sell their hardware.

I think I said the same, but anyway.

 

[THANATOS]

1,536 CUDA cores...

The mobile RTX 3050 GPU had 2048 CUDA cores, while the mobile RTX 4050 GPU has 2560.
What's the point of releasing a new Switch, when the performance will be almost identical to the old one??

Actually your comment is what doesn't make sense.

Switch 1: 2SMM Maxwell 307-768MHz -> 157-393 GFLOPs
Switch 2: 12SM Ampere 307-768MHz -> 943-2359 GFLOPs
That's 6x more GFLOPs and that's with the same clocks, which likely will be higher.

The rest actually received much smaller increase.
The CPU part has the same number of cores, they are only more performant and possibly clocked higher.
RAM saw only 3x increase in size, Storage only 4x increase.
So why are you laughing at the GPU? Doesn't make any sense.

If I have to criticize anything about the GPU is that It's Ampere and not Ada, which is a more efficient architecture.

 

[Random_User]

This is just my own opinion. But making an new console, that is already inferior to every single handleld on the market, while not even being out yet. This is just the unreasonable waste of time and resourses. Nintendo wans to people play their games, locked within their outdated HW.
What would be more reasonable, is to easen the deady morgul grasp, and sell their games, though other stores, like Steam/EGS, or handheld makers. One-time purchase, or as a renting service. Even if it will be hardware locked to the particular console, like OEM licence, or by a special chip. They would still sell millions more copies, even considering the handheld console market alone. That's excluding the massive increase of Nintendo public image. A lot more would buy.

 

[Daven]

If I have to criticize anything about the GPU is that It's Ampere and not Ada, which is a more efficient architecture.

Nvidia stopped updating Tegra presumably due to lack of interest and/or fierce competition. Huang doesn’t like low margin parts. Nintendo just picked the last Tegra released and front-ported it to the latest compatible fab node.

 

[JustBenching]

This is just my own opinion. But makeing an new console, that is already inferior to every single handleld on the market, while not even being out yet. This is just the unreasonable waste of time and resourses. Nintendo wans to people play their games, locked within their outdated HW.
What would be more reasonable, is to easen the deady morgul grasp, and sell their games, though other stores, like Steam/EGS, or handheld makers. One-time purchase, or as a renting service. Even if it will be hardware locked to the particular console, like OEM licence, or by a special chip. They would still sell millions more copies, even considering the handheld console market alone. That's excluding the massive increase of Nintendo public image. A lot more would buy.

Then you are missing the point. Completely disregarding the switches game library - is there any other handheld on the market that achieves similar battery life to the switch oled while not weighting more than twice and being twice as big? Cause from what I've gathered, only the Ally X competes in battery life but it literally weight over twice as much, lol.

 

[clopezi]

This is just my own opinion. But makeing an new console, that is already inferior to every single handleld on the market, while not even being out yet. This is just the unreasonable waste of time and resourses. Nintendo wans to people play their games, locked within their outdated HW.
What would be more reasonable, is to easen the deady morgul grasp, and sell their games, though other stores, like Steam/EGS, or handheld makers. One-time purchase, or as a renting service. Even if it will be hardware locked to the particular console, like OEM licence, or by a special chip. They would still sell millions more copies, even considering the handheld console market alone. That's excluding the massive increase of Nintendo public image. A lot more would buy.

Switch has sold 150 million units, and millions of games. It's on his way to be the most selled console ever.

I hardly doubt that all portable pc-consoles from PC makers like Asus, Valve, etc, together, has sold more than 5 million units. There are no public data, because would be shame data. I own a Steam Deck and I'm happy with it, but please, get out of the pc-bubble. Switch it's a very big success and Nintendo it's not a fool, it's going to repeat the same formula. Good handheld console, good TV console, good games available with stable frame rates. Turn on, play and get fun. That's Nintendo.

 

[ratirt]

This is just my own opinion. But making an new console, that is already inferior to every single handleld on the market, while not even being out yet. This is just the unreasonable waste of time and resourses. Nintendo wans to people play their games, locked within their outdated HW.
What would be more reasonable, is to easen the deady morgul grasp, and sell their games, though other stores, like Steam/EGS, or handheld makers. One-time purchase, or as a renting service. Even if it will be hardware locked to the particular console, like OEM licence, or by a special chip. They would still sell millions more copies, even considering the handheld console market alone. That's excluding the massive increase of Nintendo public image. A lot more would buy.

All the handhelds are mimicking PC gaming. All of them except switch from Nintendo. All the handhelds are trying to surpass each other on the performance front just like PC graphics does. Nintendo is a totally different story. They don't want to compete with PC handhelds which one runs Cyberpunk faster, or any other PC game for that matter. The portfolio for Nintendo is so exquisite, and you cant find these games on a PC. And, good that you don't.

 

[Darc Requiem]

Actually your comment is what doesn't make sense.

Switch 1: 2SMM Maxwell 307-768MHz -> 157-393 GFLOPs
Switch 2: 12SM Ampere 307-768MHz -> 943-2359 GFLOPs
That's 6x more GFLOPs and that's with the same clocks, which likely will be higher.

The rest actually received much smaller increase.
The CPU part has the same number of cores, they are only more performant and possibly clocked higher.
RAM saw only 3x increase in size, Storage only 4x increase.
So why are you laughing at the GPU? Doesn't make any sense.

If I have to criticize anything about the GPU is that It's Ampere and not Ada, which is a more efficient architecture.

The Switch 1 CPU only used 4 Cores. The Switch 2 CPU has 8 cores.

This is just my own opinion. But making an new console, that is already inferior to every single handleld on the market, while not even being out yet. This is just the unreasonable waste of time and resourses. Nintendo wans to people play their games, locked within their outdated HW.
What would be more reasonable, is to easen the deady morgul grasp, and sell their games, though other stores, like Steam/EGS, or handheld makers. One-time purchase, or as a renting service. Even if it will be hardware locked to the particular console, like OEM licence, or by a special chip. They would still sell millions more copies, even considering the handheld console market alone. That's excluding the massive increase of Nintendo public image. A lot more would buy.

I really understand this logic. It misses one key point. Games for the Switch 2 will be built for the Switch 2. CPU Gaming handhelds just run existing PC games at very low settings. That's why consoles, especially older generations, were able to pull of ports of games that had no business running.

 

[THANATOS]

Switch has sold 150 million units, and millions of games. It's on his way to be the most selled console ever.

I hardly doubt that all portable pc-consoles from PC makers like Asus, Valve, etc, together, has sold more than 5 million units. There are no public data, because would be shame data.

Switch games are only playable on Switch and are made for portable gaming.
PC games are not built for that and you can play the same games on PC, laptop or PC-consoles.
I as a laptop owner have no need to buy a PC-console when It will provide me a worse gaming experience than my laptop.
PC-consoles are a niche market, It's stupid to compare It to Switch in my opinion.

Then you are missing the point. Completely disregarding the switches game library - is there any other handheld on the market that achieves similar battery life to the switch oled while not weighting more than twice and being twice as big? Cause from what I've gathered, only the Ally X competes in battery life but it literally weight over twice as much, lol.

Nintendo Switch OLED with Joy-con: 420g
102mm x 242mm x 13.9mm (with Joy-Con controllers attached)
Please note: 28.4mm at the thickest, from the tips of the analogue sticks to the ZL/ZR Button protrusions.

Asus ROG Ally X: 678 g
280x111x247~369 mm

It doesn't weight twice as much, but yeah, It's almost 2x thicker.
BTW, did you even consider why the other consoles are thicker or weight more? Because they have much faster SoC, which is more power hungry.

The Switch 1 CPU only used 4 Cores. The Switch 2 CPU has 8 cores.

Switch 1 has 8 cores and from that 4x A-53 are disabled.
Switch 2 has 8 cores.
We don't know If the 4x A-55 will be disabled or not.

All the handhelds are mimicking PC gaming. All of them except switch from Nintendo. All the handhelds are trying to surpass each other on the performance front just like PC graphics does. Nintendo is a totally different story. They don't want to compete with PC handhelds which one runs Cyberpunk faster, or any other PC game for that matter. The portfolio for Nintendo is so exquisite, and you cant find these games on a PC. And, good that you don't.

1. Nintendo is also significantly increasing performance with Switch 2, It's basically on the level of PC-handhelds with reduced TDP.
2. The rest of the handhelds are basically PC-handhelds, you have to increase performance there, because PC games are not done primarily for them but standard PC or are a console port. Nintendo games are done(optimized) for Switch's weak hardware.
3. The only reason we can't find those games on PC is because Nintendo doesn't want to port It, so their Switch console keeps selling.
Your comment how It's good we don't have those games on PC is pretty ridiculous because It means Nintendo "forced" you to buy their console so you can play those exquisite games.

 

[jabbadap]

Nvidia stopped updating Tegra presumably due to lack of interest and/or fierce competition. Huang doesn’t like low margin parts. Nintendo just picked the last Tegra released and front-ported it to the latest compatible fab node.

While true they lost interest in low margin consumer mobile space and thus Tegra moved on to automotive/robotics(Atlan(grace+ada) was to be successor of Orin but were cancelled and the next one will be Thor(Blackwell+poseidon)). Thus we get to the point of what is this small looking nvidia chip for nintendo, Orin has a lot of automotive stuff on die, so all of them has-to-go and is 12 core automotive arm cpu really needed(I doubt it). So I'm betting this is not a die shrink(die shape is wrong anyhow), but a custom "tegra" chip on 8nm Samsung node, which has been valitaded and tested based on Orin. But has it any parts of canned Atlan SoC, is to be seen(ADA gpu would be nice)...

And last but not least will this chip find its way to nvidia shield.

 

[silentbogo]

This is just my own opinion. But making an new console, that is already inferior to every single handleld on the market, while not even being out yet. This is just the unreasonable waste of time and resourses.

That's the way Nintendo has always done, and so far it worked out for them quite well. Nearly all of their consoles were several gens behind, but sold more units than current-gen competition.
Switch sold more than all whatever generations and revisions of PSP combined including Vita, beat PS4 and XBOne. Wii definitely had garbage hardware(essentially an updated gamecube), but thanks to immense game library and new motion-based stuf it outsold PS3 and XB360.
The only reason why Switch 2 may fail is by becoming a victim of its success. Before switch the market for portable consoles was pretty much dead (I'm not even gonna mention Smach Z fiasco) and smartphone gaming looked more and more grimm and unattractive as years went by. And after Switch we got a ton of new portable devices that can run existing Steam libraries and much more, so Nintendo now actually has to compete against the competition they themselves helped to create.

 

[agatong55]

Why dont we wait for the official specs and not some "leak" I think people are going crazy over nothing lets wait for the official specs before going off.

 

[JWNoctis]

Switch games are only playable on Switch and are made for portable gaming.
PC games are not built for that and you can play the same games on PC, laptop or PC-consoles.
I as a laptop owner have no need to buy a PC-console when It will provide me a worse gaming experience than my laptop.
PC-consoles are a niche market, It's stupid to compare It to Switch in my opinion.

To be fair, even the original Switch had plenty of ports from PC, before PC handhelds really took off, lately and most remarkably things like Hogwarts Legacy - And RDR2 too, I think? - to an at least playable performance and quality.

Still have the cart for Skyrim; It actually ran fine. Lack of modding support - including the unofficial patches - is a pity.

New hardware is interesting. More interesting is probably whether this new hardware would do anything helpful with existing games (They do still support Switch 1 carts and games, right? Haven't been following the news lately.)