Tested: Nintendo Switch and Apple USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adaptor

After my post discussing the hardware inside the Switch Dock, I thought I’d follow it up with a little experiment I tried last night. Testing the Apple USB-C AV Adaptor connected directly to the Switch via its USB-C port, I plugged in the included HDMI lead, and Nintendo AC adaptor.

It didn’t work

I wasn’t hopeful it’d work, but was surprised to see my amplifier detected a shift in audio signal, but didn’t actually output any sound. And as you can tell from the above picture, there was no video. Also of note was the adaptor (with power throughput) failed to even charge the Switch.

Apple are renowned for adding encryption to their adaptors (and even chargers), which make them only usable with Apple products – even though by design they use industry standard connectors, the custom firmware inside actually creates a proprietary solution.

It’ll be interesting to see how long it’ll take before the Switch Dock is reverse engineered and a cable solution is brought forward.

2 thoughts on “Tested: Nintendo Switch and Apple USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adaptor”

    1. Hi Dave! I was looking into other adaptors actually, but don’t fancy spending £50 on an experiment. I was thinking of getting a cheap one on eBay, but I’m betting Nintendo have unique encryption in Switch to only recognise the Nintendo Dock.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *