Nintendo DSi Vs Original Nintendo DS

Here's my comparison photos that I took of the new Nintendo DSi and the Original Nintendo DS and my thoughts on the Nintendo's new portable. The DSi was released in November for sale Sale in Japan, but according to press announcements from Nintendo the DSi won't be available for sale to the US and European game markets until mid-2009 or possibly even later.

The original DS was a bit bulky, and the new DSi is much slimmer and slightly less wide and long, similar in size to the DS Lite. With the decrease in size it fits much nicer and easier in your pocket.

The new DSi does not have a port slot for Gameboy Advance games, this means that if you have some of the older Advance games you'll want to stick with the original DS or DS Lite that both have Advance slots.

But if you are new to the DS and don't own any Gameboy Advance games, there is no problem with getting the DSi since all of the new games are in DS cartridge form and the games are no longer made for the Gameboy Advance.

There is now an SD Card slot on the side of the DSi, this can be used to save photos taken with either of the 2 cameras on the DSi, play music saved on the SD card, or install games to the SD Card that can be downloaded from the new DS Store built into the DSi. About the Music Player in the DSi, it only supports AAC playback and without support for the MP3 codec this really limits it's usefulness since MP3 is the most commonly used audio format on the web for Music as well as Podcasts.

The UI layout of the menu interface has been totally redesigned with many open slots where shortcuts to installed games and downloaded applications from the DS game store can be placed. The DS Store is only available on the new DSi. The DS Store uses a DS points system for game purchases very similar to the Wii Online Store, but unfortunately you can not use your Wii Points from your Wii console to purchase games in the DS Store. This seems to have been an oversight by Nintendo, that hopefully will be corrected in the future. It would be easier if there was one set of Points that can be used in either the DS Store or the Wii Store to buy games online, it doesn't make much sense to have them separate.

The volume key has been moved to the Side on the DSi, from the DS and DS Lite. The Volume has also been changed from an analog slide volume control, to a digital Up/Down Volume rocker control.

There are 2 cameras built into the DSi, one on the inside in the center and one on the outside on the Top Right corner. When the DSi was first announced there was some confusion about the resolution of the cameras, both cameras take VGA (640x480) resolution images. The quality is so-so, but the fun comes in with the Photo editing application that comes built into the DSi. There are many easy to do and fun modifications you can do to the photos you take, similar to the Photo Booth program that comes standard on Mac OSX.

The Stylus that comes with the DSi is longer and slightly thicker than the stylus that came with the original DS. This makes holding the stylus much more comfortable and natural in my experience.

Here's a comparison of the UIs from the Original DS and the DSi.

Top screen on the Original DS

Bottom screen on the Original DS

Top screen on the DSi shows a random photo you've taken with the DSi camera. Each time a game is played, an application opened, or the Screen is Closed then Opened again the Background Image changes.

Bottom screen on the DSi shows the new application layout, with many positions where downloaded games/applications can be accessed.

One of my main interests in the DSi is to see how the Web Browser performs and handles compared to other Browsers on mobile devices. The Browser is actually a version of Opera for the DSi. The DS and DS Lite have previously had versions of Opera available for sale in cartridge form. While a Browser is a very important application, in reality nobody wants to pay about $20 for a Web Browser. The Browser and Camera are 2 of the key features demonstrated on the commercials for DSi in Japan. When I first powered on the DSi, after entering the Date/time/etc. I looked around for the Browser but could not find it, I thought this was strange for it not to be pre-installed considering it's advertised on the commercials. But then I opened the DS Store and one of the first messages that popped up was about the DS Browser available for download and installation for the cost of 0. Based on this, I think Nintendo is using the Browser installation process to educate their customers that the DSi can install applications, and that games can also be purchased and downloaded from the DS Store. Without this experience, the customers might not consider or know about the DS Store or how it works. The actual download and install process was pretty easy, espcially if you've already configured a WiFi network on the DSi.  I am really impressed with the Browser on DSi and I have a lot more to say about it, so I'll write a separate Blog post including Photos about the Browser on DSi.