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The DS Lite is "smaller than a brick"
Arstechnica has posted a comprehensive five page review of the DS Lite, with a large portion dedicated to comparisons with the DS Phat. This isn't the first review of the DS Lite, but it could possibly be the most well thought out. Here are the key points of the review:The screens Greater viewing angle - "it's now possible to watch someone else playing the system and actually see the screen" Brighter - "the upgraded screen may be worth the price of an upgrade alone" Dead pixels - "my unit has a stuck pixel on the top screen" Flimsy? - "the bottom screen seems to be floating in the system case, not held down tight like the DS [Phat]" The feel Lighter - "the system is lighter, making it easier for me to cradle it using the tips of my fingers" Buttons - "The D-pad is a touch smaller... and a bit less satisfying in the click department" although "the buttons on both DS products are a little bit on the small side" Central microphone "makes games that use voice recognition easier to play." The battery Six hours usually, although "it's not hard to get eight hours of battery life as long as you don't continually keep the system on its brightest setting." The overall feeling from the review is that if you're a DS virgin and have been mulling a purchase, now is the time to jump in. If, however, you're a DS Phat owner and haven't decided whether it's worth trading in for the updated hardware, the suggestion from this review is go for it. "If you're a casual gamer or a hardcore fan who takes your portable everywhere, you'll like the way your games play and look on the DS Lite".
Japanese hardware sales, 29 May - 4 June: How bizarre [Update 1]
Oh, look. It's the weekly Japanese hardware sales chart. Every time I look around, it's in my face. The ranking, according to number of units sold:- DS Lite: 135,614 149,411 (52.42%)- PSP: 24,595 2,632 (9.67%)- PS2: 18,513 1,285 (6.49%)- GBA SP: 4,364 2288 (34.40%)- Game Boy Micro: 1,270 743 (36.91%)- Xbox 360: 1,245 3 (0.24%)- Phat DS: 1,159 2,967 (71.91%)- Gamecube: 798 318 (28.49%)- Xbox: 43 35 (43.75%)- GBA: 30 14 (31.81%) Whether it's a rare planetary alignment or mass hypnosis, something irregular is surely to blame for this weird state of events. Microsoft's consoles are the only ones not to take a sales plunge this week -- even the DS Phat's fall from grace sends it hurtling past the Xbox 360. How bizarre.[Update: Quite bizarrely, some of the numbers were from last week. Corrected.][Source: Media Create]
