The Nintendo Switch 2 may be clocked higher than expected in docked mode but “crazy low” in handheld mode to achieve better battery life, according to rumors circulating online.
During the latest episode of the Broken Silicon podcast, Moore’s Law is Dead, and The Phawks commented on the power of the next Nintendo console. According to Moore’s Law is Dead, people at NVIDIA wanted the console to hit 4 teraflops in docked mode, and to achieve this, the console will supposedly be clocked much higher than expected.
In handheld mode, on the contrary, the YouTuber heard that the system will be clocked “crazy low,” possibly below 800 Mhz, for a few reasons. Besides achieving better battery life, The Phawks highlighted how low power consumption would result in a system producing low heat and fan noise, which are important factors to consider for a console that is targeted towards children. Nintendo designed the original Switch with children in mind as, for example, the console’s back stand is easy to put back if removed, and its cartridges were made to taste horrible to prevent children from biting them. A console with low power consumption would also not require a lot of cooling and would have no overheating issues in case it gets covered somewhat, which is something that children using the system carelessly could do.
During the podcast, it has also been discussed how much ray tracing will be prevalent in Nintendo Switch 2 games. Based on what the Japanese company has done on the current console with its first-party titles, Moore’s Law is Dead,and The Phawks speculate how ray tracing will be mostly present in first-party titles, considering how Nintendo does a lot of optimization work to achieve the best possible visuals with acceptable performance, while third-party developers will stick to rasterization and use NVIDIA DLSS to achieve better visual quality and performance.
The Nintendo Switch 2, which has been described as a “conservative hardware evolution” by Chinese manufacturer Mobapad, has yet to be officially revealed. Whether it launches later this year or in early 2025, the official reveal shouldn’t be too far off in the future.