Nintendo’s set to announce a new GBA here, with some “revolutionary” (organic?) screen technology. Looks like all of the folks who bitched about the shitty GBA screen are finally exonerated. Press releases should be showing up in a couple hours, here.
Still, won’t this really irk the kids who got one of the many, many GBAs sold this Christmas?
Hasn’t this been tossed around before?
I already posted about this new screen, here:
http://www.quartertothree.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1630
fifth post.
I’m sure their “revolutionary” display is one that you are able to see with normal indoor lighting. Great stuff! Anyway, Voltaic and I have been using the Gameboy Advance TV Adapter from Innovation and it’s pretty good so far. Making my way through Metroid Fusion, what a great game![/quote]
Nintendo wouldn’t do this to them, would they? They’d offer some sort of rebate for recent purchasers, right? They’re our friend, right?
Nintendo wouldn’t do this to them, would they? They’d offer some sort of rebate for recent purchasers, right? They’re our friend, right?[/quote]
Well Microsoft is the Evil Empire ™, Nintendo is run by a kindly old man, and Sony is a friendly family business ;)
So, no Nintendo wouldn’t do that.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/techreviews/games/2003-01-06-game-boy_x.htm
Highlights:
Clamshell design, backlit screen, rechargable batteries. Called the “Gameboy Advance SP” (or GASP).[/quote]
Given this quote from the Money article, you get one guess:
“The current GameBoy Advance (which sells for $70) will continue to be sold for a while longer, though Mike Wallace of UBS Warburg said he expects the company will eventually begin to phase those out.”
here are the pics taken from posts on EA
The Last of the Red Hot Mamas
http://www.mainichi.co.jp/life/hobby/game/news/news/2003/01/img/07-1.jpg
and
Kitt
http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/game/docs/20030107/nintendo.htm
I have to say even though it looks like one of those makeup kits, it still looks pretty nice and I’ll most likely get one when they arrive (probably black or blue)
the italics denoted the posters who posted links on EA
-Contrai
That article by Kent says it is side-lit, not backlit. I know this sounds trivial, but there is a huge difference between the two. Hopefully Kent is wrong about this, as side lighting offers less light and unevenly across the surface. However, given that I think the GBA is relatively useless for me with that screen and too small for my meaty, ape-like hands, I might actual give this one a try…if only for Advance Wars.
That article by Kent says it is side-lit, not backlit. I know this sounds trivial, but there is a huge difference between the two. Hopefully Kent is wrong about this, as side lighting offers less light and unevenly across the surface. However, given that I think the GBA is relatively useless for me with that screen and too small for my meaty, ape-like hands, I might actual give this one a try…if only for Advance Wars.[/quote]
Well, the CNN tech article on the organic screens says that they are “built on organic molecules or polymers that glow when they’re electrified”, so the screen itself emits some light.
Looks cool! Definitely an attempt to make the design more like the cell phone, which is interesting since that Nokia thing looks more like a GBA than a phone, IIRC.
–dave
Organic LED screens aren’t lit in the traditional manner. Go to your local cell phone store and find one of the Motorolas with a two- or three-color LCD. Those were first-generation OLEDs. The lighting actually comes from the pixels, at least by appearance.
This would make the new GBA one of the first high-volume OLED devices. Cool.
All this and I still don’t have my Afterburner in. Nevertheless, I’m not sure the new design looks that comfortable in your hands, so maybe I’ll just get the Afterburner installed and stick with that.
Where has there been any official announcement that the GASP will use OLEDs?
Dammit, I wanted two more buttons on the thing. Why the hell do we have SNES hardware with a cripled SNES controller?
Oh well, I guess a light and rechargeable battery for thirty bucks aren’t bad, but I already have both of those for my current GBA.
It’s all my fault. I sacrificed myself for the community of GBA owners. I’m the one who installed an Afterburner last December, knowing full well that Nintendo would announce a lit GBA within a month. And it worked! :wink:
For those looking for a good lighting solution without having to perform surgery on your GBA, this light is getting great reviews. I checked it out at the store (you can push a button to turn it on), and it’s super bright. While it uses its own batteries, it might be a good option for some of us.
–Dave
Organic LEDs are really freaking cool. I had a link to a great article about them, but I seem to have misplaced it. These things are likely to replace both LCD displays and CRTs, though, once they figure out how to manufacture them larger.
They are self-lighting, consume far less power than an LCD backlight, and look better. That’s good news for portable devices. They manufacture the things in some weird sort of ink-jet printer–basically they just “print out” the displays. Remember the scene in Minority Report where the images on the box of breakfast cereal are animated? That’s the sort of thing that this technology will be capable of doing.
I’ll definitely buy a new GBA if it incorporates this display, although I have to say that I don’t much care for the new form factor. The existing GBA fits my hand perfectly. I think it was a good move on Nintendo’s part to design the GBA to be held horizontally rather than vertically, since it better mimics a regular gamepad. The new clamshell design looks similar to the old Gameboy design, which was decidedly awkward to hold.
I have the flood light, and I think it works exceptionally well. It gives off a very bright light that illuminates almost the whole GBA screen for several (4-5) hours before starting to slowly dim.
The drawback is that it is HEAVY. It easily doubles or triples the weight of the GBA when it’s attached. You also can’t use it at the same time as some of the link cables.