- Hey guys! This is Austin,
and this is the brand new Nintendo Switch.
Yeah, seriously it's actually new.
So alongside the Switch Lite,
Nintendo has also refreshed the standard Switch,
and really the only way short of looking
at something like a model number to tell the difference,
is by looking at the box.
As you can see this is an all red box
compared to the red and white one of the past.
TLDR; if you're buying a Nintendo Switch,
get the red box because this promises
significantly better battery life.
Now the good thing about the Switch
is that it actually doesn't cost anything extra,
and in fact, once we actually crack it open,
it should be kind of interesting to see the differences.
But on the outside this is essentially a Switch
exactly like every other model.
It takes a very keen eye to spot the
difference between the old and the new Switch,
but the main way to tell is by
looking at the model number.
So the original Switch is HAC-001,
whereas the new Switch is HAC-001-01.
Now it sounds like a very subtle difference
and especially when you look at the hardware it is,
however the brand new Switch,
promises up to two hours more battery life,
thanks to an all new Tegra processor,
which in theory, should deliver much,
much cooler performance as well as that better battery life.
Of course that's the question,
how much better is this new Switch?
So as far as I know there's actually no other
differences with the Switch on the actual unboxing side.
So some people have speculated that the plastic
on the Joy-Con's is a little bit different.
I'm not really sure, I mean I guess it- (sighs)
It feels...
No I think that's the same. (laughs)
Yeah no, these are the same. I don't think
they've really changed anything.
I know that there've been, some rumors
that there's like dust getting inside
the sticks and stuff but, as far as I can tell here
this looks exactly like the standard Switch,
and that being said, it is very easy
to accidentally get wrong version right?
- [Ken] Now, is this Switch,
going to be better, than this Switch?
- Are you literally just trying to
promote a video right now? All right well,
if you wanna see what this monstrosity is about,
you can check out this video right here,
where we built the Ultimate Switch.
Spoiler alert,
this is one of the Ultimate Switches we built.
Can't believe you're, promoting a video!
We just started this video and
now you're trying to get people to leave?!
You should watch this after you finish this video.
So with this brand new Switch,
the question really is not only how much battery
is the battery life, but how much better is this really?
Obviously it seems like a no brainer, right?
Same price, same everything, as long as you get
a red box Switch you're going to
get that better battery life.
But I'm really curious to see exactly
what is different with this,
and whether or not this gives us any
indicators of not only what the Switch Lite
will be like but almost not only importantly,
what the Switch Pro will look like.
So what exactly is inside this new Switch?
Well I have taken the liberty of taking apart
the old Switch as well as the new one,
and let's see what's actually different.
Ahem! That looks very similar! Um okay, so!
Batteries are both sixteen watt hours, so,
all the battery gains here really
do come down to the processor.
Um, I can notice some very minor differences,
uh, so this has different EMC flash.
Ummmm, ha-ha, that's uh,
that's about it.
So what's interesting about this
is that because it does have that upgraded
Tegra X1 processor, it means that in theory
this should be a cooler console,
and it certainly has better battery life.
However they have done absolutely no changes
to the cooling system that I can see.
Which means that you should still get that
same level of performance so even when it's dock mode,
if you were even remotely close to overheating before
this should be significantly better.
Which is interesting, because Nintendo probably
could have saved a few dollars,
by making this cooling system just a
little bit weaker, a little bit less robust,
because it's definitely overbuilt
for what this is doing right now.
However, at the end of the day it was
probably cheaper for them to just
swap out the SOC and call it a day.
The actual chip underneath is probably
smaller than it is here, so even though
from this vantage point I can't see,
lose almost certainly a sixteen nanometer
shrink of the twenty nanometer version of the X1.
So one of the cool things about the actual Switch itself,
is that it's a fairly powerful console,
but it's fairly powerful in sort of
the grand scheme of things,
because if you actually look at
the Tegra X1 which powers it,
it originally came out all the way back
in 2015 with the NVIDIA SHIELD TV.
Now at the time it was incredibly powerful,
but nowadays, it's good, but it's not exactly amazing.
And one of the main issues with this chip back in the day,
was that it was based on the twenty nanometer process,
which, long story short just was not very power efficient.
So the idea that they've shrunk it down to sixteen
on the brand new Switch, or I'm assuming sixteen,
but regardless they've shrunk it down on the new Switch,
it's pretty much entirely where these
battery life gains are coming from.
You can very much think of this as
the difference between the original PS4 and the PS4 Slim,
or, the Xbox One and the Xbox One S.
It's the same performance, same everything,
but because they've shrunk the processor,
it's gonna take up less power,
which means it's cheaper to produce,
and importantly for the Switch,
means that you've got better battery life.
Now Nintendo claims that this new Switch
can deliver almost double the battery life.
So specifically with Breath of the Wild as an example,
the Nintendo site claims that the old model
would get about three hours of battery life,
whereas the new model will get five point five hours.
That is, huge, especially given that we
now know that the battery is not any bigger
it's purely just an SOC change.
But of course we can't exactly take
Nintendo at their word, can we?
Yeah actually we kinda can.
We put both of the Switches head to head,
and essentially found that the results were pretty accurate.
So with the standard Switch we were
able to get two hours and forty one minutes of use,
compared to four hours and thirty four minutes
with the brand new Switch.
Now I will say there is a big sort of asterisk here,
in that the Switch automatically dims the screen regularly,
and we were using Super Mario Odyssey,
so it wasn't a hundred percent fair
as far as their comparison goes.
However both Switches were running at
the exact same time, they were both brand new,
a hundred percent battery, which I think
should be a huge indicator of just
how much better the battery life
on this new Switch is.
It's like, I mean it's the difference between uh,
two hour car ride and a four hour car ride.
I- If coulda come up with a better, example than that.
Almost immediately after the Switch was announced,
however, there were rumors about a Switch Pro,
but in this case, I think there's a lot to believe here.
It would make a ton of sense for Nintendo.
However if there will be a new Switch Pro,
it is certainly not coming out this year.
Nintendo of America's new president Doug Bowser,
just a great name, has gone on record with Scene At
as saying that the Switch Lite as well as obviously
this new Switch, will be the only new hardware this year.
There will not be any kind of Pro launching in 2019.
New and potential hint about the Switch Pro
comes from the FCC's website,
so in it, they posted a tear down of the Switch Lite,
which shows that the circuit board has the name
Valley on it as the code name.
Sounds not exciting right? Well it is!
On the original Switch there was the code name of Odin,
and as Valley was one of the son's,
perhaps maybe there would be a,
Thor? As the Switch Pro?
This is really into Nerd Town I will admit.
However there is actually better evidence than that.
A new one interesting tid bit from the FCC's tear down
of the Switch Lite, is the battery size.
So whereas the red box Switch as well
as the standard have a sixteen wide hour battery
the Switch Lite has a smaller thirteen wide hour cell,
but even with that, because it has that
more efficient processor, it still means that
you're getting that better battery life
than the original model.
However as of right now and at least
for the foreseeable future, the red box Switch
will definitely be the battery endurance champ.
Even though Nintendo is still silent
on whether or not we are going to get a Switch Pro,
the Japanese game site, Gamepedia, has got a ton
of rumors on some of the specs that we could expect.
According to them, the Switch Pro will ramp up
from four gigs on the current model up to eight,
as well as four times the internal storage.
Thirty two on the current Switch and Switch Lite,
and one hundred and twenty eight gigs on the Switch Pro.
All of which makes perfect sense for a pro console.
What will truly push the Switch Pro, however,
is going to be the actual spec inside.
So because the NVIDA Tegra X1 is fairly
old in the Switch right now, there is certainly
a lot of room for upgrades.
So not only does NVIDIA have other models
of the Tegra chip, but you can also imagine
a potential custom version which is specifically
meant for the Switch. Now, supposedly Nintendo
says that this is a custom chip,
but, by literally all accounts this is
a standard, off the shelf X1, so if they were
willing to do a little bit of customization,
perhaps adding some, retracing,
or some other cool features that NVIDIA has available,
they could really push the performance of this guy.
I do believe this will be based on the same architecture,
just because you want to keep that backwards compatibility,
right? I mean the Switch Pro needs to run standard
Switch games, and developers don't need to
necessarily develop a different version for each-
I mean, a game that works on the Switch Lite
should work on the Switch,
which will work on the Switch Pro.
However, with that extra power available,
it should mean that just like we see
on these standard consoles with the
Xbox and the Play Station Four,
you will have a game which will have an
upgraded mode for the pro version.
It will run at higher spec's, higher frame rates,
and in fact, that's the next major part
of the supposed Switch Pro, the screen.
Right now the Switch uses a 720p display,
and it does look okay when you put it in the dock,
however it is very to imagine, say,
a 1080p option on the Switch Pro,
as well as a 4K output on a TV.
Now I know this certain would not be
as powerful as something like a PS4 Pro or Xbox One X,
however, the closer that it can get,
and the more power you can pack in a portable console,
will absolutely help the Switch keep up,
as the next generation of consoles
are right around the corner.
Now of course, all of these rumors
have to be taken with a huge grain of salt,
but just taking a little bit of a step back
and looking big picture, I think Nintendo
would be crazy not to be considering
doing a Switch Pro right now.
I mean on one hand you're looking at the Switch
which has kinda become a little bit of a miracle machine.
I mean this is a mobile based processor
that is several years old,
and yet we are regularly seeing ports
of proper full PC and console games.
Think about DOOM, think about Wolfenstein,
the fact that these titles can
run on the Switch is incredible.
But those days are certainly going to be numbered,
considering that there is a brand new generation coming up.
With games such as the Witcher 3 sure to
absolutely push the Switch to it's limits,
it makes sense that we do need a next generation.
I mean sure these games are very impressive
considering what they're running on,
but if you look at the version of DOOM
on the Switch versus the DOOM on, PS4, PS4 Pro,
I mean it is really not in the same league.
It's the only difference between
maxed out settings on PC versus low.
It's such a huge cut, and with this
next generation of consoles coming out,
there are a lot of games which I don't think
will work at all on the Switch,
and that's something that Nintendo
should be really paying attention to,
because they have gotten a lot of up lift this generation,
by having some properly good cross platform ports.
Sure, lots of people buy Mario, and Zelda, and...
Splatoon- and I dunno whatever else they make,
but at of the day, the Switch is absolutely
being helped by the fact there is getting
so much third party support versus the Wii U,
and it has to have the power to keep up.
This can all be boiled down, actually surprisingly simply.
If you are buying a Switch this second,
the red box model is an absolute no brainer.
Same features, same price, except it's just got
much better battery life.
Now if you wanna wait a little bit
for the Switch Lite, it's a decent choice.
It is cheaper, but you do definitely have to ready
to use a portable only console.
Which I think a lot of people will be fine with,
but there is a little bit of a limitation there.
However, if you already own a Switch,
or you aren't in a huge rush, the Switch Pro
might be worth waiting for.
Now mind you, it's still all in rumor territory,
so we might be a year or more away
from a Switch Pro actually hitting stores,
but, I think there is a lot of potential,
and to me, if Nintendo does not really seriously
consider doing a Switch Pro soon,
I think they are completely crazy.
It just makes way too much sense.