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Soundwave on 10 September 2023
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sc94597 said:

There is an idea that seems common on this forum that older => cheaper.

It is important to remember that when companies like Nvidia and Nintendo plan hardware, they are considering how much something will cost 5-10 years now as much as it costs today.

Having older technology that is more expensive because you're the only buyer of it isn't ideal in those circumstances.

It's best to optimize for cheap but relatively new hardware (that is at the bottom of a binning process, see:https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/glossary-binning-definition,5892.html ) than it is to buy cheap hardware that is cheap because it is old.

We have no idea how new Nintendo president Furukawa thinks either, the last hardware made under Yamauchi (the GameCube) was very powerful, under Iwata they went a different direction because the PS2 just ate their lunch and were forced to pivot. But Furukawa is younger and also in a very different situation. He was a child with the Famicom (NES) and then in his college years was probably into the Playstation. The Switch is Nintendo's most successful hardware platform ever (yes, even if it doesn't outsell the DS it will sell far more hardware + software combined and make Nintendo more money). 

He's a young president coming and inheriting the huge success of the Switch. The situation Iwata entered into was totally different, the GameCube was floundering in his first few years and then panic button was hit when PSP was announced in 2003 (a year into Iwata's tenure) and Sony already having eaten Nintendo's home console marketshare looked poised to disrupt the portable market also. So he got thrown into the lion's den straight away. 

Who knows how different the Iwata era would be if for example he was coming into his presidency and the GameCube was a large success. 

The other thing is the hardware designer for most of Nintendo's past hardware -- Genyo Takeda retired in 2017 so this new hardware is basically the start of a new era one way or another. 

Last edited by Soundwave - on 10 September 2023