Nintendo DS Lite: LV 2

The Nintendo DS is the first portable game system with touch screen controls. But what makes the DS lite better than the original? Brightness and battery life. Now most people can not justify selling or trading their original DS for the new model. However here are my discoveries about the lite that might change your mind.

Brightness is key for all hand held game systems. The original DS is bright, until you see the DS lite. The brightness has 4 different settings. The lowest is about equal with the original DS. After that the brightness is off the chart. Level 2, 3 and 4 are incredible. I keep my brightness at level 3 because level 4 is very bright and sucks up more battery life. The increased brightness is a great feature, but it also enhances colors. Before I bought my lite I was playing Spectrobes. The game uses colors to identify fossils, minerals and cubes. well using the DS I had difficulty knowing which was which based on the colors. That week I purchased a lite from a good friend and was absolutely amazed. The colors were vivid and very clear. I know the lite claims 30% more brightness, but I think it also has much more color programed into the system. Basically that means for example the DS might read 136 different colors while the DS lite would read 215. I'm not stating thats what is going on, I'm just saying thats the difference in colors between the systems.

Battery life is a major component with hand held systems. The original Game Boy used 4 AA batteries and lasted a couple hours. The DS lite's second claim to being better is 19 hours of game play at full brightness. That also means lower brightness levels will increase battery life. Well I can safely say I have gone 3 days with good hours of game play and not needed to charge the lite. The battery life is really amazing. Be aware that using the Wi-Fi connection and LAN game play can suck up a little more batter than usual. However, this is usually not a problem, in fact you hardly notice this unless you are constantly online. I purchased Star Fox Command and played online constantly and noticed I did have to charge my DS lite a little more often than usual. Another neat thing about charging the battery is that it only needs 4 hours to obtain a full charge. And once the DS lite is fully charged it automatically stops charging, so the battery isn't being overcharged. I thought this was a very neat and wise feature since most gamers I know charge their DS while sleeping.

Overall I can say the DS lite is a very good purchase for the hand held gamer. The DS is selling 5 to 1 over the PSP the last time I looked at the stats. The new numbers suggest 3 to 1 in the future, but those are speculations. But aside from that the DS lite is well worth the purchase. Everything is brighter and clearer on the screen. I sold my DS to another friend last week. And after looking at him play, I couldn't help but notice how big and dark it was compared to the lite. I highly suggest purchasing a DS lite for any gamer of any age.