Just a few quick comments on the Switch after a day of use.<p>First, a quick digression, Nintendo seems to have gauged the launch demand pretty well. There are some other comments here regarding Target morning waits. I was 2nd on line at 6:40am in a northern NJ Target. The guy in front of me had slept in his car (!), but he seemed to be the only one that did. By 7:45 the line was 20ish people. Our Target had 25 consoles. So everyone that got there by 8 (opening time) got one. Nice.<p>The hardware seems really good. I was surprised at how nice it all fit together (nice, solid clicks) for a product that costs half as much as an iPad! It's obviously still a "toy," but I don't mean that in a bad way. The finish is below typical Apple HW standards for sure, but I think that's to be expected at $299. It feels rugged enough to take with you, although as some said, a screen protector might be nice for extended away play.<p>To me, the nicest, most thoughtful thing about the HW of this gen of tech products is (believe it or not) USB C! Can I please shout out my love for this freaking connector!! GO USBC! Seriously, I didn’t realize how much subliminal psychic damage non-symmetrical USB plugs have done to me. This connector is so great. You no longer feel that weird little moment of anxiety where you know it will take you an extra second to look inside the damn connector and re-orient the blasted plug 3 times. If you are an old man like me (58), you will probably need to go find a pair of reading glasses, adding insult to injury.<p>The new Zelda is breathtaking, but you can tell that it wasn't designed for the small screen. It looks really, really great on my OLED 1080p TV, where I think it is meant to be played. Little things like HUD element size are too small for my eyes on the little screen. The FOV is not quite right for the small screen either. Not deal killers, but also things that could be fixed in a patch.<p>The Pro controller is a very nice "on the couch" controller. Very solid. No lag time. The analog sticks are fine, although I much prefer a mouse for camera controls, but that is my age talking.<p>I am totally loving this little thing. It's well put together, the only game I care about is Zelda, so the software is great. I think Nintendo has a potential home run here.
The dock is pretty underwhelming from what I've seen. There is no protection for the screen, sliding in between two pieces of plastic. Pretty cheap, for a premium priced, and well engineered hybrid device, that will be taken in and out.<p>Semi-relevant. Breath of Wild looks like such a fantastic game, but it's completely ridiculous that the performance is often times WORSE in the docked mode. I'm hoping this is just crappy porting issues, and can be patched. But running only 900p, and getting 20fps shouldn't be tolerated.
Just got mine. Charged and used. This thing is such a joy to use. I'll probably play with it more in mobile mode. It feels good to hold it. And yes it's underpowered on the spec sheet but at the same time, it works really well. And I'm having a lot of fun with it so for me that's the main thing really :D.
It's inexcusable that the controllers get jammed to the wrist straps so easily. Google "stuck joy-con" and you'll find articles and videos about how to un-stuck them if you've accidentally put them on backward. Why is it even possible to put them on backward? Even when they're on forward it often's often extremely hard to separate them. We had a switch party and pretty much every single person put them on backward once and we get to get tiny screwdrivers out to un-stick them<p>Nintendo even has a page up already that just says "send them back"<p><a href="https://en-americas-support.nintendo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/22528/p/897/c/715" rel="nofollow">https://en-americas-support.nintendo.com/app/answers/detail/...</a><p>I suspect they'll end up releasing a new model of controller that doesn't have these issues but it's really hard to believe this wasn't found during development.
Ifixit just posted their teardown as well.
<a href="https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Nintendo+Switch+Teardown/78263" rel="nofollow">https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Nintendo+Switch+Teardown/782...</a>
Wow, the Nintendo Switch has a fan? It is amazing how thermals are such a limiting factor in today's devices. I remember that a browser dev increased the Nexus 5's benchmark score drastically by placing it on a bag of ice.
I showed up at Target at 4 am and was second in line. Some other poor soul had been there since 11 and out of the 50 units available there were probably 10 people at opening. Not sure if that suggests demand isn't that great or what.<p>It's hard to figure out. Check out the unit next to the Wii U tablet and the latter looks very much like a clunky cheap toy. Everything here seems well-designed (don't scratch your screen on the dock though), the joycons are very clever. I must admit tablet mode with them is just okay and they are undersized in every way compared to other controllers, but snapped onto the controller shell you forget it isn't just a regular controller. Very cool.<p>The hardware though? It makes me nervous. I get at $300 and what Nintendo was going for you don't have much of an alternative. Maybe I'm spoiled but 900p upscaled at 30 fps with drops when docked feels wrong in 2017. The game (BotW) is beautiful and controls wonderfully but the lag is noticeable at times for me and the lack of fluidity hurts the experience. Oddly enough playing at 720p undocked isn't slow at all and on the small screen looks great. I kind of drool at the thought of this upscaled to 4k at 60fps and that and it wouldn't be hard on modern hardware. Maybe a remaster or emulator?<p>It very much feels like a mobile device you can dock versus a home console you can take with you. Just not sure how much headroom is in the hardware to make this last for three or four years without major compromises.<p>Does anyone else have an impression?
I'm in love with the Switch! Form factor on point that feels like the culmination of experiments coming from 3DS, Wii U and Wii. My son has been playing the new Zelda non-stop, it's that fun and deep.<p>It's a much harder Zelda game, feels somewhat like Dark Souls in the combat department. I died at least 5 times an hour due to overwhelming enemies. It's a blast!<p>One thing I love about the Switch is that even if my controllers get busted I can just buy another pair of joycons. With the Wii U it was really stressful to remind the kids to be careful because you have to send in the gamepad for repairs.
Interesting note, apparently they materials and such used to create this device do not work well with adhesives used by a very popular skinning company, they posted their results on reddit <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/NintendoSwitch/comments/5xc5si/warning_do_not_skin_your_nintendo_switch/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/NintendoSwitch/comments/5xc5si/warn...</a>
It's a bit shame that there is no chip part information. I am particularly wondering which microcontroller they use for the remote controllers. I will wait for iFixit's teardown review.
Regarding the speaker grille "why:"<p>I'd assume the "speaker ports" are either for air flow, or the entire case works as a resonance chamber and wave guide.<p>Are there other reasonable options?
In terms of memory architecture, does anybody know if Nintendo went with cartridges in order to better address the limited RAM of the system (compared to other consoles)?<p>In the old days cartridge ROM was just mapped into the system RAM so you could address game assets without necessarily having to load them into system RAM, thus you could get by with far less RAM than you'd expect.
The Nintendo Switch seems like a nice tablet form factor game console.<p>I am a bit underwhelmed by their decision to compromise the usability of the right Joycon - moving the analog stick below the digital buttons is certainly bad for US/European bigger hands, bad for ergonomic reasons, an unreasonable trade off.<p>I am underwhelmed by their decision to add no additional fan to the Dock. It's just s piece of very cheap locking plastic that might scratches your screen. It could have cooled the Switch and get out more performance out of the GPU (now they have to underclock it).<p>I am a bit underwhelmed by the Joycon grip, that is not very ergonomic for larger hand, and is just a piece of cheap plastic. The Pro controller looks good, but it costs extra $ 70 ($ 20 mote than PS4/X1).<p>I am a bit underwhelmed that the Joycons have no analog trigger buttons. Already with Wii U the analog triggers were greatly missed in e.g. Lego City Undercover, the car acceleration was all or nothing which pales compared to GTA gameplay on PS4/X1/PC.<p>I am a bit underwhelmed about the tear down, while good executed it lacked the final tear down and analytics of the core components like the "haptics engine" and the SoC board incl ARM chips.<p>I am looking forward to a revised model at the end of 2017 that fixes things. Maybe even a XL or XS version would be great - like the New 3DS XL which was a greatly improved and better for larger hands. The ergonomics of the Wii U gamepad better than the Switch too, maybe they can adopt ideas in a revised version.
It's amazing how compact that joystick is.<p>I wonder if the Joy-Cons will be changed out on people's systems more than controllers usually are. They're almost a fashion accessory in the tablet/portable mode.
This might be slightly off-topic, but if you like this type of teardown content, I highly recommend checking out AVE's channel on Youtube [1]. He does plenty of tool teardown's, things like drills, all types of heavy industrial gear, and some electronics thrown in. I find is fascinating, because you start to learn about the manufacturing process, why mechanical engineers choose specific materials, how they cut corners, and generally how things are made at low cost and high volume.<p>Here's some highlights:<p>- Dyson Supersonic Hair Dryer: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-vJxez9UF8" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-vJxez9UF8</a><p>- Hammer Drill Mechanism: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joetVGrMfAY" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joetVGrMfAY</a><p>- Blendtec Blender: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lA0kiYqyBmo" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lA0kiYqyBmo</a><p>- KitchenAid Mixer: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qKp-0h9P18" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qKp-0h9P18</a><p>- $500 Mining Flashlight: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Te06Y26Hyiw" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Te06Y26Hyiw</a><p>[1] <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/arduinoversusevil/videos?view=0&sort=dd&live_view=500&flow=grid" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/user/arduinoversusevil/videos?view=0...</a>
It runs on FREEBSD
<a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13789444" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13789444</a>
the Switch booting into its FreeBSD kernel:<p><a href="https://twitter.com/Y_Mokko/status/837610472362786817" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/Y_Mokko/status/837610472362786817</a>