It was much debated on the Internet what SoC Nintendo's Switch is using. Some say it is powered by Nvidia's 2 years old Tegra X1, others say it is powered by a custom Tegra Pascal chip. It seems we finally have an answer as ARM claimed the Switch will be powered by 4x ARM Cortex-57 cores. For reference, the X1 also uses four ARM Cortex-57 cores. While Nvidia's Pascal based Tegra P1 chip utilises four Cortex-57 cores as well, it also has 2 additional Denver2 cores that are lacking in the X1 and ARM's announcement. That means it's very likely that Nintendo went with the X1, although with some sort of possible customization.

Source

Update

Someone asked ARM via email about the facebook post and ARM says it was 'not an official statement' and removed the post. Whether it was posted by mistake or if there is any other reason behind it is anyone's guess. ARM notably didn't deny the truthfullness of the post, but at present the Switch's SoC remains unconfirmed.

 

[kumikochan]

It's cute when console peasants worry or mock the power of a console.
Nintendo has never been hindered by their underpowered hardware, I doubt it'll be an issue this time around either.

If you want good specs, get a PC. It's really not all about the specs despite that being what most people jerk off to.

Sure they haven't been hindered at all. Hence why they lost all 3th party devs with the Wii U making it fail. You keep telling that yourself

 

[Hells Malice]

Sure they haven't been hindered at all. Hence why they lost all 3th party devs with the Wii U making it fail. You keep telling that yourself

They fucked the WiiU in many, many other ways. Hardware was barely an issue. The Wii was also absurdly successful despite being a potato, and really same with all their consoles. You must be too young to know Nintendo's history.

and to be honest if I wanted 3rd party titles i'd play them on the infinitely superior PC version. Even if Nintendo released some super console, no one would buy it for the third party titles. At this point most people already own an xbone or ps4. Especially console gamers. Nintendo is only going to do well if they make strong titles, which honestly so far they have a solid lineup coming out. They're also getting a bunch of big devs behind them like Atlus and other jRPG games which tend to be lower on the spec requirements without sparing quality.

Not to mention the whole gimmick of the console actually being a pretty healthy one. The idea of being able to take the console anywhere and play is pretty cool.

Suffice it to say, anyone thinking the Switch needed some beefcake specs to survive have absolutely no clue what they're talking about. Nintendo has NEVER survived on the power of their hardware, and honestly I doubt that will ever change. Nintendo is very stuck in its ways.

 

[AtlasFontaine]

They were using the Eurogamer article as a source lol, this was clearly a mistake.

People again freaking out over nothing.

 

[TR_mahmutpek]

This should be in the OP:
http://switchcore.net/2017/02/07/arm-cpu-not-confirmed-nintendo-switch/

 

[Patxinco]

I'm with @Hells Malice , nintendo doesn't fucking care about the graphics, and me neither.
If i want to play a full graphics game, i use my pc, and that's more than enough capable of running everything i need at full specs.

 

[grossaffe]

Sure they haven't been hindered at all. Hence why they lost all 3th party devs with the Wii U making it fail. You keep telling that yourself

What third party support did they lose? The Wii didn't get fantastic third party support, but even if it did, using that to prove the Wii U lost third parties because of power is a failed argument considering the Wii was FAR weaker compared to its competition than the Wii U. Okay, maybe you think the Wii doesn't count for some reason or another. So then the Gamecube must be the console that has all the third party support that the Wii U lost for Nintendo. Except that developers, for some reason, preferred to target their games to the weaker-yet-more-expensive PS2. Boy, this "more power = 3rd party support" argument is really not looking good at this point. Well maybe we'll find the fabled "lost" third party developers on the N64. But no, yet again the third parties preferred the weaker PS1 to the N64.

But sure, let's pretend that console power is an accurate way to predict which console will see the most third party support.

 

[migles]

So once again nintendo is using outdated and underpowered hardware compared to competing consoles. Is anyone really surprised at this point?

the fact they are using an ARM processor and Nvidea gpu, (instead just go with one) just confirms nintendo cheaped the fuck out and arranjed a nice deal...
cuz you know, more parties=more sponsors=more third "outside" investors

i mean, if i get the news right (of having both companies in it)

 

[tech3475]

They fucked the WiiU in many, many other ways. Hardware was barely an issue. The Wii was also absurdly successful despite being a potato, and really same with all their consoles. You must be too young to know Nintendo's history.

and to be honest if I wanted 3rd part titles i'd play them on the infinitely superior PC version. Even if Nintendo released some super console, no one would buy it for the third party titles. At this point most people already own an xbone or ps4. Especially console gamers. Nintendo is only going to do well if they make strong titles, which honestly so far they have a solid lineup coming out. They're also getting a bunch of big devs behind them like Atlus and other jRPG games which tend to be lower on the spec requirements without sparing quality.

Not to mention the whole gimmick of the console actually being a pretty healthy one. The idea of being able to take the console anywhere and play is pretty cool.

Suffice it to say, anyone thinking the Switch needed some beefcake specs to survive have absolutely no clue what they're talking about. Nintendo has NEVER survived on the power of their hardware, and honestly I doubt that will ever change. Nintendo is very stuck in its ways.

Correct if I'm wrong but Nintendo's home consoles didn't start getting really behind the competition power wise until the Wii which only truly succeeded because of Wii Sports (seriously, this would have likely been received like the Wii U otherwise).

Third party support will also be an issue with the Switch since it's USP is being a hybrid portable, but if devs struggle to get ports running then we may see another Wii U in terms of support in a couple of years (unless this thing really takes off so they have to support it, like with the PS2).

 

[StarTrekVoyager]

A Tegra X1 is more than enough. This means the Switch still trounces the Wii U even in portable mode, and that's still absolutely awesome.

 

[sarkwalvein]

As always, if Nintendo thinks this is bad PR and still doesn't reveal the CPU itself, it probably means it is either this or worse... Who knows, perhaps it is only 2xA57.

 

[WiiUBricker]

This should be in the OP:
http://switchcore.net/2017/02/07/arm-cpu-not-confirmed-nintendo-switch/

Important part from the article:

It's still odd that they made this facebook post. My guess is someone posted it by mistake and took it down. Now they claim this was not an official announcement to save themselves or something. Note that in the email they did not deny the truthfullness of the post.

It's cute when console peasants worry or mock the power of a console.

If you want good specs, get a PC. It's really not all about the specs despite that being what most people jerk off to.

Well I assume people who buy the Switch buy it for new Nintendo games. A PC won't help them with that.

 

[migles]

It's still odd that they made this facebook post. My guess is someone posted it by mistake and took it down. Now they claim this was not an official announcement to save themselves or something. Note that in the email they did not deny the truthfullness of the post.

what i read: "it's not an official statement, we don't know what we sold to nintendo, thats why we shared it on the first place lol"
Yeah... x)

he i bet more shoe that's more likely the employe in charge of that facebook account, did a mistake. the mistake of revealing stuff earlier..
i find it very hard, unless it's an indian employee who is in the other side of the planet with no "direct pipe" to ARM headquarters, to make a mess up like claming switch is powered by ARM...
it's more likely the employee post the news and later got a heads up "hey, you was not supposed to tell that yet"

 

[leonmagnus99]

i do not know too much about chips and stuff, is this one that was confirmed for the switch ps3/wiiu level ?
or just slightly better?

 

[mbcrazed]

Can people please stop bashing the Switch for being "underpowered"? When has Nintendo EVER cared about graphics! I mean, come on everyone. It's the content produced on the console. Let's all have a little faith!

 

[DarkIrata]

Can people please stop bashing the Switch for being "underpowered"? When has Nintendo EVER cared about graphics! I mean, come on everyone. It's the content produced on the console. Let's all have a little faith!

Super Nintendo? *cough* Sega vs Nintendo

 

[mbcrazed]

Super Nintendo? *cough* Sega vs Nintendo

Oh yeah! That's very true! For right now though, let's just all hope the Switch does well!

 

[Tigran]

If you look at the original facebook post.. it linked it's source to another site.. that linked it's source to an old Neogaf thread.

Until someone cracks the switch open, I'd take this worth a grain of salt.

i find it very hard, unless it's an indian employee who is in the other side of the planet with no "direct pipe" to ARM headquarters, to make a mess up like claming switch is powered by ARM...

Actually that is very likely. Most tech companies don't exactly have their Techs, accountants, or even sales department talking with community managers (Which I do think should get resolved).

 

[raystriker]

Looking forward to the class leading 900p performance

 

[Tigran]

You mean the same that the Xbone and PS4 tend to use?

 

[Zense]

If graphics didn't matter, we'd still be playing 8 bit. Both graphics and storytelling are important.

This is a very interesting statement. Personally, I've been thinking a lot about what the leaps in technology have given us in terms of new gameplay mechanics. Obviously going from 3rd gen (8-bit) to 4th gen (16-bit) did provide us something in terms of being able to distinguish objects and have more objects on screen, but the biggest leap was when we were able to have 3D graphics. Just think of all the different genres that have been created after (FPS, 3d platformers etc.).

To get to the point, since the 6th gen (PS2, GC, XBOX) I feel like we've only been trying to polish what's already been created, that is trying to see how much AA and pixels we can stick up our a$$ thanks to the new specs. As far as I can see, these last two generations the only things we've done are small progress in development of AI (The Last Guardian is a subtle exception), we've tried to create better physics by being able to destroy buildings and not only moving crates HL2-style, and now we're trying VR with the use of motion controllers. AI development probably stopped because of multiplayer taking over. Why care about computers trying to seem realistic when you can just have real humans.

I'm not impressed by how far we've come in terms of presentation in games. I stress the broader term presentation and not just graphics. As a matter of fact, I get really disappointed when I see that in 2017 when I hack or bash someone it feels as realistic as it did back in the 16 bit days where the same animation would play out no matter what enemy you were hitting. Just think of a JRPG where you have a ground enemy vs. air enemy. Same Goddamn animation, but no one expected any different. The next God of War is my best example of this. Just look at the E3 gameplay trailer and you'll see that when he's cutting with his axe at the hulky thing, there's no reaction as if he's just hitting the same way he would when cutting through air. This was excusable back in the 4th gen, but today I'd rather see that extra amount of animation than higher FPS, AA, denser pixels etc.. There's is no excuse for this. We have the storage capacity to allow for more animation.

What I like about Nintendo is that they try to provide innovation, but right now everyone in the gaming industry is confused about where to go for the next step, cuz the last 10-15 years we've only gotten better textures and more polygons.