Nintendo’s presentation of the Switch a few hours ago was impressive especially with the games coming out for the new console. Bethesda confirmed that Skyrim will be on the Switch, we also get to see more worlds featured in Super Mario Odyssey, and another trailer revealed for Breath of the Wild.
It’s interesting to see the Switch to run Skyrim. But the question rises, what’s in the Switch’s hardware? Where are the hardware specifications? We all know that not everyone has in-depth knowledge of “hardware” when it comes to performance, so I’m sharing my thoughts in this matter.
I’ve watched Nintendo’s presentation until the part where the hardware details will be shown but it seems that they didn’t, and they referred us to their website for more details after the show. Surprisingly, the only system configuration shown on their website are the battery life, screen resolution, and the internal memory size of the Switch.
Now, where are the Processor, GPU, and RAM (Memory) details? Unfortunately, there are no details yet. As what was revealed last year in October, the Switch is going to be powered by a custom Nvidia Tegra chip. Rumors from other websites stated that it’s an older Tegra architecture (Maxwell, an older architecture from Nvidia) – Tegra X1 SoC – which powered the Nvidia Shield Android TV, not the Tegra X2 “Parker”.
Knowing that Bethesda confirmed Skyrim will be on the Switch, we can’t deny the fact that the game’s original system requirements are:
CPU: Core 2 Quad Q9400
GPU: Nvidia GTX 260
RAM: 4GB
The details above are the recommended hardware needed for Skyrim to run on High or Ultra. Don’t expect Bethesda’s Skyrim Special Edition to run on the Switch similarly with the PS4/Xbox One version that offered more visual upgrade.
Skyrim Special Edition requires a minimum Intel i5-750, 8GB RAM, and a GTX470 GPU. There’s a possibility that Skyrim might be heavily customized to run smoothly on the Switch, but we can’t crush out the possibility that Bethesda might release the original version of Skyrim running on High or Ultra configurations on the Switch. But these are still speculations, and I might be wrong… or correct.
There were also rumors about the Switch getting extra power when it’s running in its dock, but in the presentation this wasn’t confirmed at all. So we might be expecting the same performance of Switch while on TV Mode and handheld mode.
We’re still in the dark in terms of the Switch’s hardware specifications. When the PS4 and Xbox One were announced, Sony and Microsoft also presented details of what’s inside their console. Knowing that the Switch will be powered by a custom-Tegra Nvidia chip, its overall performance will be slower than the original Xbox One itself.
Nintendo Switch will launch on March 3, 2017 worldwide with a retail price of $299.99.
