Hacking Question Will Switch Hacking will allow us to install Android ?

Risingdawn

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You mean you wouldn't call the Switch underpowered?

Unless you're running a £5k gaming p.c everything is underpowered, what's your point?

Did anyone compare the power of a gameboy advance to a PlayStation, or a PSP to an Xbox360? Nope. Why? Probably because you couldn't be that stupid and get away with it.

Now ofc gaming sites love to stoke some fanboy fire for hits; some people are just simply to DENSE to think about the logic of comparing a battery powered device with a screen to a huge black dedicated powered, helicopter fan cooled slab of electronics sitting heavily under their tv.

You'd have to be a bit of a moron not to be able to logic your way through why such a comparison is nonsensical at best, and simply trolling at worst.

Hierarchy of home consoles:
PS3<PS4<Xbox X. Xbox X is the most powerful home console.

Hierarchy of handhelds: PSP<3DS<Vita<Switch. Switch is the most powerful handheld console.

So to answer your question, no. I wouldn't call Switch underpowered. It's far better than my previous 3DS or Vita. And it will remain that way untill another 'more powerful' handheld comes out worth caring about. Playing a handful of shitty android games on a shield tablet doesn't for me, like pretty much any gamer out there, rival a true dedicated big name handheld, and Switch is the best one out there right now. Period.
 

the_randomizer

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Quoting you both, the switch wouldnt run shield tv games because it is indeed underpowered (compared to the shield tv) and that is a fact. Adding a dual boot to android wouldnt help at all considering you are running a quad core cpu at 1.0ghz, and most heavy games on android requieres higher cpu clockspeed to run at reasonable speed.

Now imagine trying to run the shield tv ports, eh... The underclocked tegra x1 wouldnt help at all too, at least speaking about handheld mode.

Yeah, it's almost as if the Switch was designed around portability and longer battery life compared to powerful tablets or something. WTF cares?
 
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DeslotlCL

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Yeah, it's almost as if the Switch was designed around portability and longer battery life compared to powerful tablets or something. WTF cares?
Yeah? I know what you said, but you also said that as a response to the guy who thinks shield tv games could run on switch. If you say people cry a river about switch low specs is because it is a fact, at least with the target device the guy used as and that both of us responded to.
 
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the_randomizer

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Yeah? I know what you said, but you also said that as a response to the guy who thinks shield tv games could run on switch. If you say people cry a river about switch low specs is because it is a fact, at least with the target device the guy used as and that both of us responded to.

And I'm saying that people should get over it already and move on and get a powerful tablet if they want to dive into powerful portable gaming.
 

DeslotlCL

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And I'm saying that people should get over it already and move on and get a powerful tablet if they want to dive into powerful portable gaming.
Well it may not be portable, but is kind of a fair comparision since both uses the same architecture, so the switch is like the shield tv little brother, just that in this case the successful and portable lil brother :P
 
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guily6669

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And I'm saying that people should get over it already and move on and get a powerful tablet if they want to dive into powerful portable gaming.
Tablets are beyond expensive... My friend paid 200eur for a crap Asus with 720p LCD, Chinese mediatek SOC quad Core 1.3 or 1.4ghz, 2GB ram, low performance GPU...

He broke the screen and bought a Lenovo with Snapdragon 401 for 130eur lol it gave like 50 points on 3d mark while my 2014 Sony Xperia Z2 gives a huge amount lot more...

And Nvidia is also not selling the tablet anymore and it won't get any more updates either...
 
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Several points that need to be addressed here:

Clockspeed: Yes the Switch running Horizon (the Switch FreeBSD based OS) is using a underclocked X1, that does however not mean it can't be clocked higher when running Android. This is a limit either set in the BIOS or by the OS, if we have Trustzone access that can be changed regardless, and if set in software, Android has that function nativily as long as we are running with elevated privileges (root). So regardless Shield games should be possible to run at full speed if the cooler can handle the increased clock speed (based on what we know of the thermals it definitely can be overclocked to Shield speeds without thermal throttling.)

Emulation: Dolphin should run relatively decently on the X1, even my older devices (LG 3, Galaxy S4 etc.) run it ok, and my newer devices (LG G6, Galaxy S8) run it great. The simple fact is that until we have Vulcan drivers for Switch, N64 and Gamecube/Wii emulation will not be possible, so I actually think we will be emulating those systems on Android before we get to natively in Horizon.

Besides emulation Android actually has a decent library of games that would be great on Switch, and since Android supports HDMI over USB C you could enjoy those games on the TV with the pro controller/joycon over bluetooth also obviously supported in Android.

In the end there is no real benefit over the phone you are using the read this, but it can be nice to have.

EDIT: With the exception of sound glitches Melee runs relatively good on the Shield TV (about half speed), so if overclocked we should expect similar results on Switch:
 
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Pleng

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What would someone do once they have Android running on a Switch anyway? Whatever those apps are, surely its easier to port those same apps to the Switch OS than hoping for the whole of Android to be ported over.

So please enlighten me as to how you'd port Sonic 4 ep 1&2, all the GTA games, Skype, MS Word, Excel, Netflix, OneDrive and Dropbox, for starters.

Buy $300 system to install OS that can be found on $25 stick/tablet ..... why?!

Come into page 3 of a thread and ask the same question that was already asked in the first page, and has been answered multiple times... why?

Why Android on Switch?

That goes for you, too.
 

nmkd

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I've said in in another thread a while ago...

It's funny how people get excited when they see a barely functional Retroarch on Switch, but when it comes to Android they're like "you have a phone for that".

Some reasons why it makes sense on Switch:

- Tons of emulators out of the box, more than anyone could ever port to Switch OS
- Tools like file servers and managers
- Media players
- Open source games (DOOM 1-3, Quake 1-3, Return To Castle Wolfenstein, ...)

Why a phone or tablet is not a valid reason against it:

- Some things like file servers need to be on Switch itself
- Switch has a bigger screen than most phones, and by far not everyone has a tablet
- Seamlessly working joy-cons (Using them on a phone is a bit of a hassle, and there's no rail)
- Docking - Android can adjust the resolution without rebooting, so it would work quite well
- Not everyone's phone is faster than the Switch (when it comes to emulators and open source games)
 
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guily6669

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And another good point is the fact that Nvidia Shield TV running android has the same SOC as the Switch... I wish they could use its rom with its drivers that already have vulkan and mod it to add compatibility drivers with the rest of the Switch's hardware.
 
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Timburpton

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Why the hate on bringing new features? Sure YOU might not have a use for this but others will.

To me it sounds perfectly logical. With a working android port, you will have access to all the android apps and games. For instance, you want a media player and instead of a native homebrew, with an android port you could simply download and install an android media player.

Side point, this is why I introduced the sd2vita concept as a possible benefit to the switch. Everyone crapped on it but with such functionality it will be immensely useful for multi-boot OSes.
 
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aos10

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i am a bit confused here, why someone wants to install android on the switch? there is already nvidia tablet
or other android with controller attached to it.
 
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Rune

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I think its clear that this discussion has basically divided people between those who need Android and those who don't. The actual question asked in the OP has gone out the window. :lol:
I personally don't care about it because I have about 4 or 5 perfectly capable Android devices in my house that I can game on if I want to, in multiple different ways whether that's on the TV or a portable device. I guess someone else who doesn't have this same luxury would like to see Android on the Switch though, so that's a fair opinion.
I suppose if someone out there wants to make this happen then I shouldn't really care. It's an option I don't have to use. I guess any potential issue for me would be if a dev was neglecting another project I was more interested in, in favour of this.
 
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