AMD seems to be developing Nintendo NX APU

After Microsoft and Sony, AMD found a new client for custom APUs. AMD develops these custom APUs for Sony's PS4 en Microsoft's Xbox One already.

In this case it'll be a "semi-custom" chip for a game console, very likely this will be the NX from Nintendo. AMD started last quarter with the development of the semi-custom APU which is developed based on very specific wishes from the client. AMD CEO Lisa Su stated that she expects a solid year for the revenue created from game-console chips, which gives AMD an opportunity to grow in the 2nd half of the year. So, chances are high this all refers to the NX from Nintendo, a x86-apu based game console. The combination of a processor and GPU delivers much advantages for Nintendo.

AMD classifies the APU developed as “semi-custom.” Accelerated processing units (APU) chips combine a central processing unit (CPU) and graphics processing unit (GPU) on a single chip. Nintendo has already made the jump from IBM’s PowerPC to x86-based (AMD and Intel) architecture. That means that games written for Nintendo’s current Wii U console will be x86 compatible. It would make sense for Nintendo to continue its relationship with AMD and continue to use x86 architecture in its next-generation design, which Nintendo announced would be called the NX.

[Concertoine]

From what i've heard, the Wii U isn't x86 like the article says. Its actually PowerPC

[Lon3wolf]

Yeah that's how I understand it too.

[Ark_]

Indeed PowerPC.

My guess for NX is ARM chips ... AMD starts to support Android with these.
Considering the rumours about NX being Android based and the whole DeNa thingy ... just makes more sense to me.

[ABizzel1]

That's because it is a PowerPC CPU, and unless something's changed then this might be a blunder from guru3d which is rare for them. What I take from this is that Nintendo is more than likely making 2 versions of some games, Power PC / x86 that will be cross platform (Zelda rumors looking more and more true).

As far as the other information goes, it's a no brainer and like I said multiple times it's the obvious choice for them, the only real question was whether they keep PowerPC for easy backwards compatibility, and if this is true it's less likely.

There are plenty of APU's out there, and currently Kaveri is a solid option for them if they're not trying to go head to head with PS4 and XBO as rumored.

It's a $90 APU retail, which means Nintendo could get it at around $60 - $70 per chip, which is nearly half the price of the PS4 APU, and realistically could make the NX a $199 - $249 console. It's only a 800 GFLOPS APU (with graphics RAM), so it's around 2/3 the power of the XBO (or around 2.5x the Wii U). And honestly that's the route they need to go for the rest of this gen, until they can get a bit more oomph.

It's more than enough for their franchises, just enough to get some decent 3rd party support, and selling at a entry level price the majority of gaming can get behind with enough performance to not be flatout underpowered.

And hopefully if it sells well (my guess around 50m), they can focus on building up their software efforts like establishing a solid online network so we can have more online games like New Super Mario, Mario Party. And most importantly make games the fans want like Pokemon MMO, Pokemon Snap, Earthbound, New IP's etc...

I'm still not sold on it after 2 burns from Nintendo consoles, but I'm much more hopeful for NX than I am satisfied with my Wii U.

[1nsomniac]

If they release the NX with those specs they will get no 3rd party support again. They're getting no support because it's so underpowered by the competition. How do you expect that to change if it releases with a lower spec again & by that point acompute will be in play & will be making the gap even larger.

If the NX releases & cannot compete with 4+ year old consoles, already in homes, it will fail. That's just simple common sense.

It makes no logical sense at all. By the time it releases who is going to buy a 2nd/3rd console that cannot achieve what your current console can. Then why would a developer invest in a sub version of their game that no one would choose to buy over the better version of the consoles that are already in homes...

[N4g_null]

They should go high end. Hbm for system memory. 4gigs acts like 12. It also runs cooler and smaller form factor. It's anyone guess right now. I really hope they let us choose the power of our next console.

They could also make the wiiu chip a mcm also with the apu being another core. Pipe it all to hbm 1 and use different versions for different applications.

Game pad attachments for new 3ds functions. Local cloud tech and you got a versatile system.

I wonder if arm chips will be involved.

[ABizzel1]

@1nnsomniac

A perfect example of when people speak without any clue what they're talking about, so let's get to work.

"If they release the NX with those specs they will get no 3rd party support again."

I didn't list full specs, but if I did the specs. would be as follows:

A10 7700 APU (512 Core GPU)
4GB GDDR5

$199 - $249

Those specs are perfectly in line with the R7 250. For comparison sake, the XBO is based on the R7 260, and the PS4 based on the R9 270. So literally a step down for each console GPU wise.

Game wise here is a small list of games those specs can run.
http://www.notebookcheck.ne...

To keep things simple here are some standouts graphically.

Battlefield 4 / Hardline
720p @ 60fps medium settings (PS4 / XBO, 900p / 720p @ 60fps high)

Tomb Raider
720 @ 60fps high settings (PS4 1080p @ 60fps, Ultra+ / XBO 900p @ 30fps, Ultra+)

The list is short, but for a better comparison the R7 M370 lines up pretty well with the R7 250 (though slightly above), and has list of newer games.
http://www.notebookcheck.ne...

Here are some more standouts:

Witcher 3
720p @ 30fps low settings (PS4 / XBO, 1080p / 900p @ 30fps mid-high)

Call of Duty Advanced Warfare
720p @ 60fps low settings (PS4 1080p @ 60fps, high settings)

Alien Isolation
1080p @ 30fps high settings (PS4 1080p @ 30fps, Ultra settings)

Dragon Age Inquisition
720p @ 30fps medium settings (PS4 1080p @ 30fps, High settings)

Far Cry 4
720p @ 30fps medium settings (PS4 1080p @ 30fps, High settings)

Ryse: Son of Rome
720p @ 30fps low settings (XBO, 900p @ 30fps, mid-high settings)

Batman: Arkham Knight
720p @ 30fps low settings (PS4, 1080p @ 30fps, high settings)

Yeah they can't get any games from 3rd parties running on that hardware with those specs....... /s

These are the graphics kings for 3rd parties and all those games are playable on that hardware at 720p and low - mid settings. And unlike last-gen low settings is still a great looking game with a base that's acceptable even compared to high settings. The main differences are lighting, shadows, effect, texture quality, draw distance, and in the case of these specs. vs PS4 / XBO, Resolution. Seems like a big deal, but it's not as huge of a negative as most would immediately think.

https://www.youtube.com/wat...

Educate yourself.

[ABizzel1]

"If the NX releases & cannot compete with 4+ year old consoles, already in homes, it will fail. That's just simple common sense."

That's the problem with your thinking (and people who agreed with you and disagreed with me). Nintendo can't compete with Sony and MS in a head to head battle.

*They're heading into this with an install base of 0, whereas PS4 and XBO will have an install base of around 50m / 30m by the end of 2016.

*The majority of 3rd party games have already found homes on PS and XBO, and there’s nothing Nintendo can do to change that this gen.

*Both PS4 and XBO will be at a lower price by holiday 2016, easily $329 (PS4), and $299 (XBO).

That’s why they simply release another 5 year console, that has good enough performance, at a entry cost of $199 - $249 as a secondary / third console.

By comparison you think it’s common sense to release a $400 console, with slightly better specs than the PS4, with an install base of 0, an underwhelming online network, off the back of a failed console, and the 2nd console in a row that burned many former Nintendo fans who’ve moved on to PS or Xbox.

That’s the absolute opposite of common sense. That’s sending their console business to it’s death. GPUs from AMD are just now getting an upgrade with the R 300 series, and at best you can classify the increase within the “mid-range” as a small step forward, because performance is still very much on par with the R9 200 series which the PS4 and XBO are based off of. At best you’re looking at a R7 370, because the 280 / 380 have too much TDP and heat to be used in a console by 2016. So you’re looking at a slightly better PS4. Yah better ports, 3 - 4 years after the fact.

It’s a waste and a stupid investment, because they’d be stuck with that $400 console for an entire generation which would bleed into the PS5 and XB4 cycle and get crushed.

It makes NO logical business sense.

You’re putting too much emphasis on 3rd party helping Nintendo, which as I already said is pointless considering those games have homes and entire franchises on PS and Xbox that have skipped Nintendo now going on 2 generations.

A $400 console would be another flop, and alienate a huge market for Nintendo (the child & family gamers). A $200 console while not as powerful as XBO and PS4, is still a capable box, has a price point that the majority of gamers can buy, and gives Nintendo a chance to catch up in services which they’re 2 generations behind in.

*Nintendo’s online is at best on par with PS3’s launch online, and used about as much.
*They have no PS+ / G4G equivalent (120 free PS+ games over 5 years)
*They have no western 3rd party support
*They have the bare minimum of multimedia and apps
*Their exclusives don’t need the greatest tech, focus on artstyle, and sell regardless.

And you expect a $400 console to be the remedy to all this.... Nintendo needs and entry level console that can sell to a larger install base than 20m tops, and they need to focus on fixing all the issues they have outside of hardware. First party games sell a Nintendo console, not 3rd party. Having high end $400 hardware for the sake of hopeful 3rd party parity instead of fixing all their issues is a stupid choice. They can focus on better hardware the following gen once they fix all the things they’re generations behind in.

[ABizzel1]

@scissor_runner

HBM while much faster isn't really helping GPUs right now, and won't until version 2 drops. 4GB of HBM does not at like 12GB of GDDR5, and the R9 Fury is showing that now with games not getting the gains it needs to surpass the 980Ti (6GB GDDR5) or Titan X (12GB GDDR5), that could also be due to poor drivers / non-propritary use of HBM (since it's a brand new card), but until more GPUs have it, it won't be used to it's max, and only Nintendo exclusives would really benefit in a console, and that would instantly push them up into the $500 price range for a new console if they go with a better CPU / GPU / HBM and a PowerPC core for backwards compatibility (even without the PowerPC it's still $500).

Nintendo is not selling a $500 console if MS or Sony couldn't. Nintendo isn't even selling a $400 console, nor will they take away 3rd party share from Sony and MS, with them being in dead last 4 generations in a row now with western devs. (20 years in last by the time NX launches).

3rd party support is only there to supplement the release of Nintendo's exclusives and to provide a full and complete library of games that Nintendo hasn't had in over a decade.

The safer and smarter choice is to drop a $200 console, with good enough hardware, fix all the issues they're behind in, and have a capable console on the market for 5 years tops, then drop a real console that can compete with the PS5 / XB4, but no more than $299 price.

Their problems aren't going to be fixed in 1 generation, and a $400 console is only going to kill them off, when they're stuck with poor 3rd party sells again, and trying to sell a $400 console with exclusives alone.'

Would you rather have a first party only box that cost $400, or one that cost $200 and does the same thing with lower settings? The majority would choose the $200 console, and third party developer lose nothing in the transition since PS4 is going to be the primary console this entire gen, and games can simply be ported down to the Wii U with no real fear of losing millions since it'll have the same architecture as PS4 / XBO, and doesn't require extra coding.

It's not what fans want to hear, who are looking for a powerful console from Nintendo, but it's the smartest business move for them. Not sending a $00 console out to flop.

[JacketsNest101]

@1nsomniac

I would argue that the lack of third party support is due mainly to the differences in architecture and sales, not power. Early in the Wii U's life it missed games that 360/ps3 got. Then, when XboxOne/PS4 came out, it still didn't get a lot of the games that both the current and last gen systems got. This is due in large part to install base, but a good amount of that is the actual architecture of the console. Wii U is power PC based, which is why it is compatible with Wii discs. Devs showed that they were willing to develop versions of new x86 games for power pc consoles because they had the install base for it. They simply weren't willing to spend the extra money to make a Wii U port of a game that they had every reason to believe wouldn't sell.

Also, your idea makes no business sense, as has already been pointed out. Do you know why SEGA is not in the console market anymore? It's because they did exactly what you are saying Nintendo should do. And the day that Nintendo drops out of the console market is the day the console market dies.

[hduce]

Good catch Concertoine! The Wii U not being x86 based is part of the problem. Here's a bubble +.

[DevilOgreFish]

That is great news. i wonder if they'll consider an R9 series GPU, R9 290's a 5 Tflops GPU. they're getting cheaper now that the 390 is out.

[DevilOgreFish]

Well given the temperature and TDP of a 290 they may consider something much less. it's their hardware to judge what they put in.

[OverdosedWitDopeness]

If they can pull off putting a 280 or 280x it would be a big improvement over ps4 and xone as well as true CPU

[ABizzel1]

As the guy above you said the TDP and heat would be too much for a console. The R7 370 is the only happy medium based on AMD GPUs, and that's a slight boost over the PS4, similar to PS4 > XBO.

If they want tons of power they have to go with NVIDIA for TDP, but that also means the console is going to cost much more, because the 960 is the only happy medium above the 370 and cost about $40 - $70 more, depending on the GRAM in the 370 (2GB / 4GB).

[OverdosedWitDopeness]

@abizzel1

So true amd need to step there production up. Just got a 970 upgraded from a 7850 and its awesome. Definitely a good choice since I don't plan on going higher than 1080 with it.

[ABizzel1]

@Overdosed

AMD has value on their side which is why all 3 consoles went with them over NVIDIA. Their cards can't be beat at price to performance almost cleanly across the board, it's just that NVIDIA's cards require less power, draw less heat, and generally silent. AMD improved on this with the R 300 series, but it's still not enough to compete with the gains NVIDIA made with Maxwell.

If you're a gamer on a budget you can't best AMD when it comes to CPU + GPU combo, and even their motherboards are a bit cheaper. But if you want the best, or TDP is a real concern (micros) then Intel and NVIDIA are your go to.

Also the 970 is an amazing card for the money, and more than enough at 1080p. I'm still rocking my SLI 760's so I'm right there with you performance wise. Though about upgrading, but I'll wait for Volta or Pascal.

[jaycptza]

And cost wise push them way over the PS4/XBO then they would probably be dead on launch

[lemoncake]

Would have loved to see someone stick a decent chunk of cash into nvidias hand to see what they could come up with for a console.

[OverdosedWitDopeness]

Didn't Sony do that last gen? And wasn't the gpu weaker than the cell cpu inside?.

[lemoncake]

Original Xbox was nvidia, PS3 was nvidia. But no nvidia this gen. Dunno how you can compare a gpu to a cpu.

[Haru]

The cell CPU is very strong and it's even stronger than PS4's CPU but the GPU which was developed by nvidia was very weak

[DevilOgreFish]

Weren't the first devkits of XB1 and PS4 APU based? Some of them were X86 and others used AMD A10s.

[GamahFoLife]

Yep, Wii U is PPC. Article is wrong, but NX will be x86.

[Sy_Wolf]

nVidia worked pretty hard to completely alienate themselves from the console manufacturers and Nintendo have been sticking with AMD for a very long time. It would be news if they WEREN'T going with AMD.

[teo72]

Seems like Nintendo is copying the market leader Sony with the NX. Besides after Sony abandoned IBM Cell, IBM probably turned the price up higher than what was acceptable to Nintendo. Another reason could be get back the interest of the third party devs by having a machine which will be easy to make games for. Also I think that the NX will be either as powerful or a littlebit more powerful than the PS4; proberly the latter.

[Shinobi100]

NX is a handheld.

In 2014, Nintendo struck a deal for brand new "free-form LCD screen" technology. That means you could have a screen shaped like Mario's head as opposed to the now standard 4-corners display. Sharp, the company who made the 3DS screen, was contracted to begin production of these screens in early 2016. See how it all pieces together?

[SilentNegotiator]

Reggie already accidentally told us that it is a "home console". Some sort of hybrid home/handheld platform, maybe, but NX is not an exclusively handheld console.

[Shinobi100]

There is zero chance of it being a traditional console. In that same quote where Reggie IMPlED that, he also defended Wii U's sales saying that it's very early in this generation's lifecycle. That doesn't imply anything. It means the Wii U will be on shelves for years to come. Nintendo would not put two different big home consoles on store shelves at the same time.

[SilentNegotiator]

"saying that it's very early in this generation's lifecycle"

Don't fall for the PR BS; Wii U is selling worse than Gamecube and they're ready to dump it. An average of a little over 3 million a year is awful.

They had Wii on the shelves for a while after Wii U launched...Wii U will probably stick around for another year or two after NX releases (my bet is within next two years), and then it's been around for ~5 years.

I'm telling you, it's why their last E3 was weak and they didn't show the new Zelda (because it's going to get the Twilight Princess treatment).

[wonderfulmonkeyman]

No, NX is a home console.
Following release history, the soonest you'll see it is in late 2017, if not mid-2018, because that would mark the 5 year cycle's fifth year for the Wii U, which would herald the transitional period from one console to the next.

By the time the NX releases, the Wii U will have lived out its full life.

[Shinobi100]

Word on the street is that NX is releasing in 2016. Nintendo has repeatedly said they don't announce things years before they come out like other companies do.

[JacketsNest101]

@shinobi

I find that hard to believe. Nintendo has said nothing about NX other than wait til 2106. So either we are getting NX holiday 2016 or it's coming in 2017. Companies need time to market new products, and releasing a console 5 months after you first announce it is a bad idea. Devs haven't even reported anything about dev kits for NX. Now, if they do a big huge presser in January detailing the NX and then release it holiday 2016 that would seem reasonable because they will have had the time to market the console, but that still doesn't give devs the time they need to make games for the console. Nintendo has a history of announcing a console one year before releasing it,and I highly doubt that that isn't the case here. If they were releasing it next year, we would have heard from devs about dev kits, seen something about it at E3, and gotten bombarded with NX marketing and hype from E3 until now. It's coming, at the earliest, in 2017. Period.

[godmachine]

unless there going gamepad again which for wii u backwards compatibility makes sense i guess?? but sharp making screens amd using a new mobile chip , dena as the network and app oriented content provider seems inline plus 3ds is pretty old at this point idk i mean the wii u does make money for nintendo , it has a hell of an attach rate, if they price and bundle right who knows

[wonderfulmonkeyman]

Nintendo's words were "we don't announce games that are 5 or 6 years in the future".

Nintendo, for the most part, has ALWAYS conformed to releasing a console after their latest one has already been out for 5 years.

The NX was announced last year ahead of schedule in order to counter claims that they were ditching consoles for phones by working with DENA.

We won't be seeing the NX till 2017 unless Nintendo has some sort of new reason to go back on their word.

[SilentNegotiator]

Good. High end Intel stuff is nicer, but for lower-mid end stuff, AMD is a much better way to go, at least price wise.

[Qrphe]

This isn't a surprise at all, if they wanna keep backwards compatibility, better keep on going with AMD who produced their Wii U hardware.

[Shinobi100]

Read this quote by Miyamoto: "In this perspective, while we are only going to be able to start this with the next system, it will become important for us to accurately take advantage of what we have done with the Wii U architecture. It of course does not mean that we are going to use exactly the same architecture as Wii U, but we are going to create a system that can absorb the Wii U architecture adequately. When this happens, home consoles and handheld devices will no longer be completely different, and they will become like brothers in a family of systems."

He's talking about the Wii U for the entire paragraph. So why does he mention a handheld device at the end? NX is a handheld that can play Wii U games. It doesn't replace Wii U. They're "brothers". Do you kill off your brother?

[girevik]

I don't know, ask Cain... ;) I kid, I kid.

[CouldHaveYelledUiiW]

Why are you talking about wrestling, this is a gaming site?
I kid the kidder ;)

[stragomccloud]

Hopefully they include a power pc chip on board as well for backwards compatibility. I'll be very upset if I can't play my old Wii and Wii U games.

[JacketsNest101]

Nintendo relies on backwards compatibility to keep their gaming library during the inevitable droughts. I honestly feel that they will probably not have a ppc chip on board (since it might raise the price too much) but instead will use the DeNA internet thing they are creating to tie games to your account and then use that data to determine what games you own and give you those games free on virtual console. Maybe that's a pipe dream though, but I do feel that they will eventually use the VC as a way to get around the hardware restrictions that backwards compatibility imposes on their console architecture.

[kakashi81]

Should be able to handle 2.5 GFLOPS and a faster X86.

[jhoward585]

Intel. That cool. Sound like Nintendo are finally going for a much higher clock speed for the NX. No offense AMD has good cpu but Intel has better CPU than AMD. the faster the CPU the better.

Another things, I really hope Nintendo go with a NAND storage space for game storage which would give it better loading time. Get rid of the weak link and Squash having the same movable parts a HDD has.

[wonderfulmonkeyman]

Why are we talking about this as if it's fact?
The most we know is that it's a home console.
That's it.

[Ark_]

I am not even sure, if they stated it's a home console ... allways got that "dedicated gaming device" notion in my head. Could really be anything.

[Shinobi100]

Further proof NX is a handheld device: Zelda. A game mysteriously delayed until...? A game that happens to be the most anticipated game in Wii U history. Iwata has said that the next system will share Wii U's inner tech specs. This is bc the Wii U & 3DS both had software shortages at various points. Having multiple systems with the same tech allows you to release the same game on multiple systems. So no shortages. NX is a handheld and Zelda Wii U is one of its launch titles.

[jhoward585]

Key word. "Semi custom" The wii U hardware isn't using semi custom parts, the NX will.

That means Nintendo won't be going with existing components on the market which is a good start.

Well, One thing I'd to say here, Nintendo's will most likely go with a 1080p 60fps capable hardware because it was something that helped made their games shine on the Wii U. That said, I think Nintendo will follow the same path and assure that the NX can maintain 60fps for most of their game(if not all)

With this is mind, if Nintendo wants the NX to maintain 1080p 60fps and also pack a punch in the graphical department, and out performs the x1/ps4, they're going to have to invest in buying better parts for the NX hardware. Another thing, power wattage is another thing that needs to be considered if the NX is a handheld home console hybrid. If Nintendo go with any of today's existing parts on the market, it will be very difficult for them to accomplished their goal to make a system that is more powerful than the ps4 because again power wattage is something that is heavily needed to make an hardware runs faster or else they will get their tail whipped again. However, there is a solution to getting the necessarily power wattage, use a 14nm process for the NX. Going with a 14nm process will definitely give the NX near(or better) PS4 hardware power. plus, 14nm process will certainly give it long hours play time for a handheld. If they decide to use a 28nm process the nX will be too bulky for a handheld device or it will be a power hogger. Not to mention, the NX will cost too much to make in the end.

If Nintendo, however, decides to go with less powerful system they can still make the NX a good descent system by upping the clock speed, HBM memory, NAND storage, and a very fast MOBO.