The DS lite, everyone knew was coming. What nobody would know is that Nintendo would quietly announce the lite without any publicity or gung ho. The "DS Lite" which is intially to be launched in Japan (as usual) on March 2nd is a redesigned and compact version of the DS.

Very few details of the DS lite have been posted on the website and official comments from the company are still awaited. The dimensions are one of the few things that have been posted; the DS lite will come at 133 x 73.9 x 21.5 mm considerably smaller (nearly half in size) as compared to the original DS which is almost 150 x 85 x 29 mm. Consequently the weight of the console device has also reduced though not by the same measure. The DS lite weighs 215 grams as comapred to the original's 275.

Experts seem to have been caught with the wrong foot forward since they were predicting extremely advacned capabilities which would include voice communication etc; none of which is present on the Lite version. The company has been so secretive of the device that no details were forthcoming earlier and even now, there is just this single image posted on the official website. The price of the DS lite at approximately 120 Euros is slightly more than that of the DS.

Considering that the Nintendo DS is still very much a hot item in the markets, it seems surprising that Nintendo released the DS lite at this time with few additional features. Perhaps people are ready to pay more for a smaller console, and more importantly really want a console which is easier to carry around; something that may have prompted Nintendo to come out with the Lite immediately.