What the Wii U has under the hood
Nintendo doesn't like to talk specs. Instead, they like to talk experiences and feelings. Those are all fine and good, but come on, we wanna see some numbers! Well, here they are:
The main guts are "powered by a custom 45nm multi-core processor with embedded DRAM. In addition to its IBM heart, the graphics are powered by a custom AMD Radeon HD GPU." OK, sounds good, although those are some mighty general descriptions of what's on board. No clock speeds or RAM amounts means we're still sort of in the dark, but we do know it'll be able to pump out 1080p HD video and should be on par with the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Which is fine for now, but it'll leave Nintendo a generation behind yet again when Sony and Microsoft decide to release new consoles.
But in any case, it's not clear what kind of disc drive is on board, but we do know that it'll be able to play all Wii games, which is nice. It'll presumably also be able to use that pile of Wiimotes and nunchucks you've accumulated, which will make the console a cheaper prospect as well.
