BinaryDemon’s back, ya’ll miss me? My niece and nephew are still rolling with Nintendo GBA SP’s and I was considering upgrading them to the latest Nintendo portable this summer. So I picked up a DSi to see if it lives up to all the hype.

Whats new since DS Lite:

-2 0.3M Camera’s with image manipulation software.
-Faster CPU/more ram.
-Improved speakers.
-Matte Finish, relocated power button.
-Slightly larger and brighter screens.
-SD card slot for storing recordings/music/pictures/games.
-Opera Web browser no longer requires special hardware.
-Access to DSi Store through WiFi, you wont have to visit download stations to try game demos.
-Improved Interface with Parental Controls.
-No GBA cart slot, so GBA games or hardware that requires it no longer works.

That is an impressive feature list. Sadly after trying many of the features, I cant help feel a little disappointed. The image manipulation software is easy and fun, but it would have been nice if the external facing camera was higher resolution so it could double as a camera in a pinch. The 0.3M Camera’s basically require you to be about a foot away from your photograph subject, which is perfect for the one aimed at your face but silly for the external facing one. The speakers, screens, and layout design are all improvements. The music playback is disappointing because the only format the DSi supports is AAC. Nintendo’s official reason for this is:

“As for music, if we allowed MP3 playback, a lot of those files may be pirated. We support AAC, which is the format used by Apple and iTunes. ” – David Yarnton. Nintendo General Manager UK

MP3 was also the standard for many years for legal music. It’s not like it’s difficult to convert MP3->AAC regardless of source, it’s just an annoying additional step. It seems to me that maybe Nintendo wants to run their own music store through DSi shop in the future and wanted a format that can utilize DRM. You have to use the DSi store to download the opera web browser, fortunately its free. I assume they make you do this initial step to satisfy parents who don’t want their children to have access to the browser. You are also given 1000 free DSi points. I didn’t use mine yet, I am not impressed by any of the current games. Browsing the web using the DSi Opera browser is slow and tedious. I highly recommend you quickly locate mobile versions of your favorite sites and bookmark them. For instance, trying to read my email from http://www.hotmail.com was slow and painful, but using the mobile version – http://mobile.live.com/hm/ was manageable. I am not sure what version of flash the Opera browser uses (if any) but I got a lot of missing plugin / upgrade flash player text. So don’t expect youtube.com or any other video site to work. It’s basically the same experience you get trying to surf the web off a standard mobile phone, a little less enjoyable than using an iPhone. I like using Column-View which uses both screens to display as much as possible, although it’s annoying to remember that only the bottom screen is a touchscreen. But I doubt many people will be spending a lot of time surfing the web on the DSi. I do like the option for using Parental Controls, although I didn’t test them. The absence of a GBA slot is particularly disappointing, since I am looking to upgrade my niece/nephew and they have a large collection of GBA games. It also means that Guitar Hero DS wont work either.

The DSi is a cool little device, but ultimately I feel that a lot of the new features are gimmicky and unlikely to be anything more than a distraction for a few minutes. I will hold off on the DSi vs DS Lite decision until this summer and watch what Nintendo does with the DSi Store and the firmware until then.

Right now, I would say if you already own a DS Lite or have a large collection of GBA games then don’t bother upgrading. If you don’t own a DS Lite/GBA games then you should consider getting the DSi.

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