NINTENDO DS LITE FIRST IMPRESSIONS

I have finally gotten my hands on a Nintedo DS Lite and boy am I happy that I got it.

Nintendo released the Nintendo DS in late 2004 to beat out the upcoming release of the Sony PSP.

Immediately the mobile console was a hit and sold out in Japan and sold many units in North America as well.

Nintendo has continued the tradition of updating their products and in May released an update the the Nintendo DS call the DS Lite.

The DS Lite decreases in size physically but still keeps all the power of the original DS. The Lite sports brighter back-lit displays, better buttons and shorter, thicker stylus as well as integrated wi-fi (that only works up to 20 metres)

The DS Lite also still supports the GameBoy Advance cartriges but I was sad to see there was no legacy support for the old GameBoy Colour and GameBoy games (so I still have to hang on to my GameBoy Advance SP).

The DS Lite is only available in a polished white colour here in North America. This colour may in fact remind you of a little company in California that has a fruit for its name.

The cartriges for the DS system are so small. They are just a little bigger than an Canadian "loonie" in size and only a fraction of the size of a GameBoy cartridge.

The DS Lite is a great system and is highly interactive.

I also purchased the New Super Mario Bros game and Konami's Lost in Blue. Both these games use all of the DS's features, even the mic.

The DS is a big seller in stores and has put Sony's PSP on the backburner.

The DS Lite will most likely sell out the PSP and will win the portable battle. The sheer simplicity of the DS just makes it a more fun handheld. To be fair though the PSP is not just a gaminig machine and also contains a processor capable of over 300MHz making it very capable.

It's up to you. If all you want to do is play games then there is no reasong to pay $70 (CAN) more for a Sony PSP but if you want to watch movies, listen to music and browse the web then the PSP is the best way to go.