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[ZOONAMI]

3 hours of gaming time isn't really that bad. Hopefully the battery is replaceable and we can buy a spare battery and charging dock for the batteries easily. Like LG does with their phones. A lot of phones only get about 4-6 hours of screen time and that's not even gaming.

Also this is probably dev kit battery time so hopefully it will be improved somewhat for the actual release.

 

[kevin1025]

As someone who would never take the tablet out of the Switch dock, I'm cool with that.

But for others, that is atrocious. That's no good at all.

 

[big_erk]

So I will need to charge 20 times to finish a 60 hour game...

If you only want to play that 60 hour game off-screen and away from any power source.

 

[Faiz]

I told someone yesterday that I thought 3 hours was the absolute minimum acceptable battery life.

If it's 3 hours MAX (meaning it will never actually reach that in real world use), that doesn't meet my criteria.

 

[Jonneh3003]

I trust Laura Dale but we can't take this as fact yet, either way I think a lot of us play our portables at home and having the dock set up in your media system makes charging it a breeze. Not a promising number but it doesn't break my confidence in the product.

 

[darkazcura]

Yeah I was scared of that. I was expecting 3 but hoping for 5-6. We will see. :/

 

[Alucrid]

looks like i was off base with my 48 hour estimate. disappointing!

 

[Smokey]

As a working adult, 3 hours sounds fine to me considering the specs. I wouldn't use it in that mode outside of a commute anyway. Maybe on a plane?

 

[AmFreak]

- 3 hrs. max. battery life
- dock provides extra power

These 2 points together don't make much sense.
If you are able to provide extra power through the dock, why aren't you designing the hand-held in a way that you can actually use it as a hand-held?

 

[Oddduck]

This is a very powerful portable device so I'm not surprised at the battery life.

 

[Paracelsus]

3 hours of a portable full blown 3D high quality high budget premium console-like experience sounds like a reasonable deal to me. When are you going to find 3 straight hours to play with this thing while you're on the go anyway?

 

[Boney]

Was anybody expecting more out of intensive gaming from a little thing? How long does a gaming laptop work, I doubt it's 2 digits. Things are what they are and I'm sure there'll be a bulkier 3rd party battery that will provide more time for those who need it. Sadly, same as my phone, there's a constant preoccupation to charge it whenever possible.

The only things I can imagine the dock providing with the info we have is either some form of ventilation or overclocking when plugged without the worry of wasting battery.

 

[Gator86]

What were people expecting? It's going to be running console-level demanding games and it's not like Nintendo became hardware wizards overnight. Why wouldn't the battery life be shit?

 

[metalslimer]

That sounds pretty damn awful for Japan. Maybe they will keep the 3ds around until they can release a more efficient model. It does seem about right though. 3 hours of intense anything on any portable nowadays will completely drain the battery.

 

[LordOcidax]

As expected.

 

[LAM09]

3hrs?! Wow

 

[FunkyDealer]

Hopefully this is just the case with devkits. What's even the point of just three hours?

 

[jelly]

Do Nintendo skimp on batteries or try their best?

I remember the WiiU controller had a smaller battery than what could fit in there.

 

[Father_Brain]

I sure hope Nintendo implements strict performance requirements for games when not docked.

Also, will "dock mode" literally require the dock, or will it work when playing the portable configuration on AC power?

 

[Solid SOAP]

3 hours is fine if I can plug a charger with me and play. Realistically where am I going to be bringing this thing where I'm not going to primarily be sitting?

 

[sajj316]

If this product can push 4 hours .. I'd say it's a win. Even if you take this thing on a long drive, you can easily connect this to a power source.

Would love to know if this has standby features .. keeping the game in a paused state .. conserve power, etc.

 

[Orbis]

I would rather wait to hear some actual numbers from final hardware. 3 hours would be a disappointing figure, not a deal breaker for me as I don't have 3hrs travel time per day and I also have a portable charger. But it would be a real pain in the ass and a definite no to others.

 

[Jonneh3003]

3 hours on a dev kit running at full blast with zero final unit optimization?

This is important. We don't have the final product guys.

 

[Oersted]

Bringing it around was the only point of the whole 3 minutes of video, no need to hide the head in the sand.

That said, maybe it got better battery life, and that info was based on old Dev Kits?

It can not be based on the commercially available product.

 

[OCD Guy]

Hasn't Nintendo come out and said that the dock has no addition processing power? Could have sworn there was a thread about it.

Yes the certainly did.

I don't care how reliable she's been in the past.

I'd bet anything on it that any difference in performance when portable and docked is the Nvidia SOC entering different power states and the frequencys "down clocking" to promote better battery life.

People will still claim that she's right as she says

what I’ve heard is additional processing (lacking specifics atm) for when docked.

So yes technically there is "additional processing" when docked, but it's down to the Nvidia SOC increasing the frequency of the clocks when docked over portable.

What are people expecting? A separate processor, gpu? lol. At best there will be additional active cooling like a fan on the dock so that the clocks can increase, but no separate Nvidia hardware on the dock.

 

[big_erk]

looks like i was off base with my 48 hour estimate. disappointing!

I was closer with my 47hr 59min estimate. I win.

 

[dracula_x]

They don't call it a portable. They call it a home console.

Pretty clear if the battery is that bad, this will be positioned more as a "take it with you" deal and not "play it on the go." There is some distinction there.

Yep.

 

[Machina]

What were people expecting? It's going to be running console-level demanding games and it's not like Nintendo became hardware wizards overnight. Why wouldn't the battery life be shit?

Batteries wear out. Where the fuck is this thing gonna be battery life wise 2 years post purchase?

 

[DonShula]

Which is pretty much what they have stated.

I have a Samsung Tab S2, and if I run a demanding game on it for 3 hours I'm running on empty. Unless you want the unit to weigh as much as a laptop this is the trade off. Third parties will come out with extended life battries that will probably add heft to the system as well as external Mophie type battery packs. I don't see why anyone is surprised.

This is a good point - console style gaming on a tablet, even an iPad, is going to drain battery like crazy. Sure, my iPad can go for days without a charge, but if I only use it for graphic-intensive gaming, it's not going to last more that a few hours anyway. People are comparing this to the 3DS that ran two screens at what resolution again? Getting the same battery life out of a 720p screen running much more intensive games doesn't sound all that unreasonable.

 

[Plinko]

People do need to remember that devkit battery life can increase with different internals/optimization.

Remember--verified reports were that the devkits were running with noisy and actively cooled Tegra X1s. Implementing the new custom chips could help to reduce the need for the cooling/internals and, as a result, increase battery life.

For the new page.

 

[Ricerocket]

3 hours MAX sounds like in the best condition. So 2 hours on gaming with higher brightness.

 

[Intel_89]

3 hours of a portable full blown 3D high quality high budget premium console-like experience sounds like a reasonable deal to me. When are you going to find 3 straight hours to play with this thing while you're on the go anyway?

I take a bus across the country every weekend, the trip takes about 4 hours with a 15min break in between, I know I'm part of the minority but I was hoping to 4-5 hours to get me through the whole trip.

 

[Kodaman]

too hard to put Rumour on the title?

Seriously.

 

[designgears]

You guys complain about battery life until someone like Samsung starts pushing the limits and exploding things...

 

[JCX]

I doubt the additional processing in in the dock, but rather just using either upclocking on the Tegra, or ARM's big.LITTLE architecture and switching to the faster processors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARM_big.LITTLE

That's what I'm thinking too. Makes sense for it to be upclocked while docked since battery life wouldn't be a concern.

I do wonder if Nintendo will give the option to uplock while in handheld mode (like a power saver vs full power mode). If you're somewhere with an outlet, you could get full power on the go.

 

[BRocknRolla]

Really want these leaks to keep coming.

If Nintendo isn't going to market their console for the next two months, leakers can do the job for them.

too hard to put Rumour on the title?

If you look at the source material linked in the OP (Which is just good form), the fact that these are rumors, and even the exact type of people the rumors are coming from, is made explicitly clear.

 

[aett]

3 hours max is honestly all I would need for my purposes. I play portable games (without a charger) during my lunch break and then for about 30-45 minutes after work when I wait for my wife to get off of work so we can carpool. The rest of the time, I'm plugged into the wall.

 

[Yautja_Warrior]

With the power of the console and screen size, the battery life seems about right but its not ideal. Hopefully for the final release they stick a bigger battery in it, to push around 5-6 hours out of it, similar to 3DS and Vita.

If not, I can see them selling battery pack chargers for it, so you can charge it up on the go, similar to what you can get for mobile phones and tablets.

 

[Jonneh3003]

- 3 hrs. max. battery life
- dock provides extra power

These 2 points together don't make much sense.
If you are able to provide extra power through the dock, why aren't you designing the hand-held in a way that you can actually use it as a hand-held?

I don't know what you mean?

 

[diablo900t]

Not surprised. Most cell phones get 4-5 hours of screen on time at most, and that isn't even running hardware intensive apps.

Pokemon Go probably would drain a high end cell phone battery in less than 3 hours.

 

[Morts]

I rarely play for three uninterrupted hours at home, 3 hours for on the go is fine.

 

[andrerobot]

Also, notice the size of device:

Yeah, people saying that this is a handheld, comparing it to a 3DS are delusional.
This is a home console that is portable, not a handheld with TV out.

Heck, it is so large, it probably eats VITAs for breakfast.

 

[Deadpool_X]

I'll say this again: Anyone expecting more than 3 hours is lying to themselves. This is not 3ds hardware we're talking about here. This is a high powered handheld running graphically intensive 3d titles and wifi...the battery was never going to last long.

The closest I've seen to this is the Sega Nomad, and that thing would devour 4 AA batteries in like an hour.

 

[Chezzymann]

They don't call it a portable. They call it a home console.

Pretty clear if the battery is that bad, this will be positioned more as a "take it with you" deal and not "play it on the go." There is some distinction there.

The problem is that it's a really underpowered home console. So I kind of wish they focused on one thing.

 

[ElectricBlanketFire]

As someone who rarely plays games for more than an hour, I'm fine with this, though I understand why people wouldn't be happy.

 

[lenovox1]

tablets have way better battery life than 3 hrs, so I have a hard time believing this

The Nvidia Shield gets around "3-4 hours of intensive gaming."

http://www.trustedreviews.com/nvidia-shield-tablet-k1-review-games-camera-battery-and-verdict-page-3

The iPad Mini 4 lasts about 5 hours under heavy load. (BaseMark OS II benchmark)

http://www.anandtech.com/show/9724/the-apple-ipad-mini-4-review/3

ETA:

You are using the wrong benchmark. When running GFXBench, the battery lasts less than 4 hours.

 

[SlipperyFishes]

RE: dock, what I’ve heard is additional processing (lacking specifics atm) for when docked. However, would expect a few secs to switch.

Haven't Nintendo/Famitsu already debunked this about the processing power?

 

[Quintin DM]

3 hours is bad but considering what it is, I don't think it's surprising nor should anyone really have expected much. Chances are ur gonna be carrying this thing around in a bag of some kind right? So is it really too hard to just carry around a portable charger of some kind along with it? I mean I know it's not ideal, but the point is there will probably be options that can help extend the battery life here, third party and maybe first party battery packs will probably exist too.

 

[The Main Event]

3 hours is bad, but as long as you can charge it via USB, I'm alright with it.

 

[ElFly]

Which is pretty much what they have stated.

I have a Samsung Tab S2, and if I run a demanding game on it for 3 hours I'm running on empty. Unless you want the unit to weigh as much as a laptop this is the trade off. Third parties will come out with extended life battries that will probably add heft to the system as well as external Mophie type battery packs. I don't see why anyone is surprised.

I think they will run into the problem that the switch won't fit into the dock if they add heft to the console

I guess third parties may sell a whole new dock for this too but we have yet to see if that's even possible