Welcome to the toy aspect of your purchase

The DSi brings with it some significant bullet points when it comes to multimedia functions: it can play your music, it has two cameras, and it supports SDHC cards. But when you dig deeper, these things become less impressive very quickly.

Let's start with the audio aspect of the hardware. You can do some basic recording, and you can play the resulting file in reverse, slow it down, or add an effect, but that's about it. This is neat in a bullet-point sort of way, but it doesn't add much to the experience. I had fun playing with the sound functions for about ten minutes, and I doubt I'll ever go back to fiddle with them again.

If you want to listen to your music on-the-go, you had better really love the AAC format, because that's all the DSi supports. If you're an iTunes user, this is good news. If you're not, then be prepared to do some converting. Songs can be read from SDHC cards, and again you can add some effects, slow down or speed up the music, do that trick that makes the vocal track quieter, and even make the song sound like an old 8-bit tune. But you'll have to add the songs directly to your SDHC card, as the DSi doesn't have a USB connection. In other words, the system can play music OK, but it's not exactly going to replace anyone's iPod, or even anyone's $50 knock-off PMP.

The camera is the same story: at 0.3 megapixels, or 640X480 resolution, pictures look fine on your DSi screen and nowhere else.

The included software allows you to do funny things with camera shots, like adding mirror effects or putting silly sunglasses on your images. You can also do a few neat morphing effects, and you can add frames, so you can put your face on a playing card or inside a flower. It's all light-hearted and fun, and my five year-old had a blast taking pictures and doing goofy things to them with the stylus, but I can't myself using the function past the first few days. If the camera gets used in games, great. But for taking actual pictures, this isn't as good as the cameras included in most cell phones these days.

It is kind of neat to have both a forward and backward-facing camera. You can switch between the two by hitting a button, and this gives you some freedom when playing with all the filters and effects, but right now it all has very little point. Could that change in the future? Sure. But adding hearts and paw-prints to pictures isn't worth $40 over the cost of a regular DS.

Incidentally, am I the only one hoping to see some video support in the near future? The screen's resolution is 256X192, so video files would be small, but SDHC card support means you could bring a ton of content with you. You could use the top screen for video, and the button for touch-screen controls. Such functionality would have added a fair amount of value, and perhaps we'll see a for-pay app that adds these functions soon, while offsetting the cost of something like DivX licensing. Would you pay $5 or $10 to watch videos on your DSi? I'm guessing many would.

Hands on with the DSi's Opera Browser

The system's browser works relatively well on the hardware, allowing you to type in the URLs with a few quick-keys. You can set up favorites, and also adjust webpages into one long column so you need only scroll up or down. There's no flash support though, so don't expect to be watching much video on your DSi. 

Browsing the Internet with the DSi

Also, remember that you can only connect via Wi-Fi hotspots, and as the video shows, it's not the fastest way to browse.

Let's go shopping!

The biggest update, and arguably the most important for Nintendo, is the addition of DSiWare, a service that allows you to buy games and applications wirelessly, downloading them directly to the system's internal memory (256MB built-in) or an SD card. If you have a Wii then all this will be second nature by now, since the menus are nearly identical. You can browse games at different prices: free, 200 points ($2) 500 points ($5) and 800+ points ($8 or over). While I wouldn't call navigating the menus zippy, it works well.

Buying a game isn't as quick as it could be....

Note that the line effect on the screen was added by the camera, and is not visible on the hardware itself.

As you download a game, Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess drop balls into a basket that fills up, which is a cute and Nintendo way of handling the progress bar. When the game is done downloading, it gets wrapped up and sent to your main menu. Yes, I admit it's oddly pleasant to see those little presents pop up after you've bought a game.

While Nintendo said in a press release that points would only be available in $20 blocks, we were pleasantly surprised to see the ability to buy points in $10, $20, $30, or $50 blocks. You can also use points cards you buy in retail stores. The system will only use Visa or MasterCard to purchase points directly. Remember, for a limited time the system dumps 1,000 points onto your account just for connecting online, a $10 value. Free games!

Keep in mind that neither the system nor the online store will keep your credit card information saved, so you'll have to fill out the credit card numbers and your address each and every time.

Downloading games is a breeze, and if you delete a title to free up space there's no need to worry: you'll be able to re-download the game again with no fuss. This seems like it would be a given, but I'm glad to see it confirmed. With only 256MB of built-in memory, you may find yourself juggling games rather frequently, as you can back up games and applications onto an SD or SDHC card, but you can't launch them from the card; you'll have to copy them over to the system's memory before you can play. The Wii was just recently given the ability to launch games from SD cards, so hopefully the DSi isn't far behind.

Above everything else, this digital distribution platform is what you're paying for when you plunk down your $170. The smaller games that the platform features cost less to make, are impulse buys, and can't be put on the used market. If they start adding Virtual Console games to the DSi, Nintendo will have re-monetized their classic game collection yet again, at almost no cost. While the first batch of games for DSiWare isn't much to get excited about, I have no doubt that innovative, fun games using Nintendo's stable of AAA franchises are coming, not to mention third-party games. This is the future of the platform, and I'll eat my hat if there isn't at least one game released in the next six months that doesn't have you tempted to pick up the hardware.