Hasta La Gadget!

Now this is a pleasant surprise. We expected to get our hands on a DSi, just not today. Like the baby in a carriage of fictions-past, the little bundle of gadget joy arrived on our doorstep this morning. Regardless, Nintendo has outdone themselves on presentation this time around, seating the console in a large box that emits a sample of cheers and shines bright lights on you when you pop the lid. Seriously. Other than that, the DSi is about what we expected — slimmer, sleeker, lighter… generally a lot more DS-y. We ran into a few issues off the bat, like the fact that it can connect to our network, but not to Nintendo servers (this is an issue addressed in the manual — it makes no sense to us), and we found the menus to be slightly unwieldy to navigate through, but mostly we’re as excited as school children on X-mas morning. Take a look at the vast gallery below to see what’s what, and stay tuned for a more in-depth look at the DSi.

Filed under: Gaming

Nintendo DSi unboxing and hands-on! originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 02 Apr 2009 10:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HP, Lenovo, and Dell haven’t fared too badly in some of Greenpeace’s previous e-waste reports, but it looks like three companies have fallen well short of the organization’s expectations this time around, with each getting called out for failing to live up to their promises. Specifically, all three had said that they would eliminate vinyl plastic (PVC) and brominated flame retardants (BFRs) in their products by the end of this year, but they’ve now apparently told Greenpeace that they won’t be able to meet that timeline, and only Lenovo has come forward set a new deadline (the end of 2010). The big winner, on the other hand, is Philips, which has jumped from 15th place to 4th as a result of some new recycling initiatives, prompted at least in part by public pressure. And, as you can see above, Nintendo is once again dead last, although we’re pretty sure that’s simply a result of sheer mass at this point.

Filed under: Gaming, Home Entertainment, Laptops

Greenpeace slams HP, Lenovo, and Dell in latest report originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 31 Mar 2009 15:33:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Not that we haven’t seen some pretty crazy Nintendo gear fetch some pretty crazy prices on The Bay, but this is definitely amongst the weirdest. Shipping directly from the frigid tundras of Fairbanks, Alaska, this Joystick Test Cartridge for the Nintendo Entertainment System will undoubtedly spend a record low amount of time within your still kickin’ NES console. Put simply, these carts were passed out to game stores for them to test out their NES machines, and after they were done, they were instructed to ship the cart back to the Mushroom Kingdom. Clearly, one renegade employee shoved it in his coat pocket and made a beeline for The Last Frontier. Surely all that’s worth $1,050, right?

[Via TechEBlog]

Filed under: Gaming

NES Joystick Test Cartridge lands on eBay, complete with lowest replay value ever originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 Mar 2009 21:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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While Nintendo has been pretty good so far with the Game Boys of yore and the DS / DS Lite at keeping backwards compatibility pretty much at a maximum, the DSi’s added functionality and processing power is going to test that a bit. Nintendo has confirmed that there will be two new types of DS software, “DSi Cards” and “DSi Enhanced Cards.” The former will only work with the DSi (and with the current DS install base, we’re guessing they won’t be incredibly common, but the DSi’s off to a strong start) and the latter will offer expanded functionality on the DSi (like mapping a photo onto a character) but will still downgrade gracefully to regular DS handhelds. This could certainly cause some confusion, but hopefully anything DSi specific will be very obviously DSi-centric, like a camera app or something to automatically spend thousands of Nintendo Points on classic titles in a flailing attempt to relive your childhood.

Filed under: Gaming, Handhelds

Nintendo announces DSi-only and “DSi Enhanced” software originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 Mar 2009 11:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Nearly a month ago to the day, Sony triumphantly proclaimed that it had sold its 50 millionth PlayStation Portable. Now, Nintendo’s making that figure look awfully small by shipping its 100 millionth DS handheld. The number includes original DS, DS Lite and DSi systems, and clearly, those sales are still going strong. The original DS launched way back in late 2004, while the totally hip DSi is slated to ship here in the United States in under a month. So, who’s taking bets on how long it takes to hit the magical 200 million mark?

Filed under: Gaming, Handhelds

Nintendo doubles up Sony’s PSP, ships 100 millionth DS handheld originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 12 Mar 2009 00:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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