Nintendo☐☐DS
Nintendo double dash DS.com

Nintendo has confirmed that "DS" will be the official name of the unit, as well, and it should ship in Japan around November 4th for around €140 (~$170) and follow in the US a week later for just a little more. The DS also has been confirmed to include actual stereo sound without headphones and an integrated storage place for the stylus.

This FAQ is for people who are looking for a quick reference to Nintendo's many classic systems. Much of this information has been available on Nintendo's system page for some time, but this will condense the information in to one handy guide.

Nintendo Handhelds/Portables:




Released: TBA 2004
Uses: Rechargeable battery, with power management features such as Sleep mode and Standby.
Screen: 3-inch dual screen vertical setup. Lower Screen uses touch pad for a new form of input. Both capable of 3D and backlit views.
Game List: Check here for early demos.
Game Page: Check here for early coverage.
Technical Specifications (click for more):

• CPU : Two processors, one ARM9 one ARM7.
  
• Software : Fully compatible with Game Boy Advance Game Paks, plus uses new media for DS only games.
  

Released: June 11th 2001
Uses: 2 AA batteries. (GBA SP uses a lithium-ion rechargeable battery, 10 hours continuous play with light on, 18 hours with light off, 3 hours recharging)
Screen: 32,000 color palette
New Model: March 2003, GBA SP. The SP stands for "special." New flip-top design, rechargable battery, and lit screen.
Game List: Ongoing, check here for current list
Game Page: Available Here
Technical Specifications (click for more):

• CPU : 32-Bit ARM with embedded memory
  
• Memory : 32 Kbyte + 96 Kbyte VRAM (in CPU), 256 Kbyte WRAM (external of CPU)
  
• Screen : (diagonal) reflective TFT color LCD
  
• Resolution : 240 x 160 pixels
  
• Color : Can display 511 simultaneous colors in character mode and 32,768 simultaneous colors in bitmap mode
  
• Software : Fully compatible with Game Boy and Game Boy Color Game Paks
  

Released: 1998
Uses: 2 AA batteries.
Screen: 32,000 color palette, up to 56 colors on screen at once.
Game Format: Cartridges, up to about 128Kb
Game List: Available Here
Game Page: Available Here.
Technical Specifications:

• Processor: Z80 Sharp processor at 8 MHz
  
• RAM: 32K
  
• Video RAM: 16K

Released: 1995
Uses: 6 AA batteries.
Screen: Red and Black
Game List: Available Here
Game Page: Available Here.
Technical Specifications:

• CPU: 32-bit (20MHz)
  
• RAM: 1Mb DRAM 512kb P-SRAM
  
• Resolution: 384x224 pixels
  
• Sound: 16-bit stereo
  

Released: 1989
Uses: 4 AA batteries.
Screen: 4 shades of gray.
New Model: Game Boy Pocket in 1996, much smaller, with only 2 AA batteries. Shown second.
Game List: Available Here
Game Page: Available Here.
Technical Specs:

• CPU: 8-bit Z80 CMOS (4.19MHz)
  
• RAM: 8KB
  
• Resolution: 160x144 pixels
  
• Sound: 4 channel audio

Consoles:




Released in: August 1985
New Model: Top loading deck, shown second.
Video: RF Switch
Game Format: Cartridges
Game List: Available Here
Game Page: Available Here.
Japan: Known as the "Famicom," short for Family Computer, shown below.

Technical Specifications:

• 1.97 MHz processor speed.
  
• 256x240 screen resolution.
  
• 2kb Memory.
  
• 52 colors, 16 on screen.

• Central Processing Unit: 16-bit, 3.58, 2.68, and 1.79 Mhz
  
• Maximum Colors on One Screen: 256
  
• Total # of Colors Available: 32,768
  
• Maximum Screen Resolution: 512 pixels X 448 pixels

• CPU: 64-bit R4300i RISC, 93.75MHz
  
• Co-processor: 64-bit RISC, 62.5MHz
  
• RAM: 36MB, additional 4MB with expansion pack.
  
• Graphics: Pixel Drawing Processor (RDP) built into co-processor
  
• Resolution: 640x480 pixels
  
• Colors: 16.7 million, 32,000 on screen
  
• Polygons: 150,000 per second

• MPU ("Microprocessor Unit")* : Custom IBM Power PC "Gekko"
  
• Manufacturing process : 0.18 micron IBM copper wire technology
  
• Clock frequency : 485 MHz
  
• CPU capacity : 1125 Dmips (Dhrystone 2.1)
  
• Internal data precision : 32-bit Integer & 64-bit floating-point
  
• External bus : 1.3GB/second peak bandwidth (32-bit address space, 64-bit data bus 162 MHz clock)
  
• Internal cache L1: instruction 32KB, data 32KB (8 way) L2: 256KB (2 way)
  
• System LSI : Custom ATI/Nintendo "Flipper"
  
• Embedded frame buffer : Approx. 2MB sustainable latency : 6.2ns (1T-SRAM)
  
• Embedded texture cache : Approx. 1MB sustainable latency : 6.2ns (1T-SRAM)
  
• Texture read bandwidth : 10.4GB/second (Peak)
  
• Main memory bandwidth : 2.6GB/second (Peak)
  
• Pixel depth : 24-bit color, 24-bit Z buffer
  
• Image processing functions : Fog, subpixel anti-aliasing, 8 hardware lights, alpha blending, virtual texture design, multi-texturing, bump mapping, environment mapping, MIP mapping, bilinear filtering, trilinear filtering, anisotropic filtering, real-time hardware texture decompression (S3TC), real-time decompression of display list, HW 3-line deflickering filter.