Technical specs for any games console are always one of the first things hardcore players look to when thinking about whether or not to throw down that all-important pre-order. No-one really knew what to expect from the Nintendo Switch in terms of power or useability. The good news is that Nintendo have finally released the system’s final specs so we can hazard a pretty solid guess.
- 6.2″ 720p multitouch touch screen
- 1280×720 resolution (handheld mode)
- 1920×1080 resolution (TV mode)
- Custom Nvidia Tegra processor (Nintendo has not yet gotten more specific than that about its CPU)
- 32GB onboard memory
- microSD card slot
- 2.5-6.5 hours of battery life (depending on game)
- 802.11ac Wifi
- USB Lan adapter sold seperately
So there you have it. Not a massively long list by any stretch, and a bit short on the sorts of details and numbers that hardcore enthusiasts crave.
There are a few points to pull apart here though. The first and most eye-brow raising for many will be Nintendo’s assertion that the device can pull up to 6.5 hours of battery life in handheld or tabletop mode, depending on each game’s particular graphical demands. Nintendo’s own estimate is that players of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild will be able to get about three hours out of the device in handheld mode. Whether that pans out remains to be seen. If you ask us, given the size and brightness of that handheld screen, we’d say getting three hours of battery while running Zelda is wildly optimistic, however we’d be thrilled if proven wrong.
The addition of expandable storage pulled a huge sigh of relief from us, especially after hearing about the system’s aenemic 32GB of onboard storage. Compare that to the 1TB of storage offered by the PlayStation 4 and Nintendo’s offering seems rather paltry. Being able to add extra space with a microSD card, especially in a world increasingly fond of game downloads and online stores, is a godsend.
The final curiosity is that, as of press time, Nintendo are playing coy regarding the numbers on their custom-build Nvidia Tegra processsor. Why they are doing this is anyone’s guess, but we know that it’s a dual-core processor so it likely isn’t running more than 1.7-2.0GHz at most. This is more than adequate for the system in question, but Nintendo are staying mum nevertheless.
The Nintendo Switch releases worldwide on March 3. It will retail for AU$469.99.
———-
