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Comment by nsxwolf | Hacker News Reader

I never liked the SP form factor. It’s too cramped. The original GBA is absolutely perfect. It’s like a DS without the weight of the top screen. It’s too bad it couldn’t have had the SP 101 model backlit screen.

One of these days I’ll do that mod.

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I actually loved the SP, perfect form factor for your pocket.

But I agree that the normal Advance would benefit greatly from a backlight. For what it was, I'm surprised how well the external light you could buy held up (connector & flex cable)

Personally, I find the gameboy advance sp one of the slickest designs ever. You could say that the sp is one of the most iterated on designs in later nintendo products

Before the SP there was the Game and Watch.

Agreed. The DS is a similar size to the GBA, but it’s much bigger and heavier. Even as a kid I could have a GBA in my pocket and not think too much of it. And the horizontal form factor was really nice to hold. The only really flaw was the lack of backlit screen.

I think exactly the same. Even though the SP design was more successful and influential for consoles like the DS series, the shape of the original GBA is not only very comfortable but also pretty darn iconic!

Wikipedia says: «As of December 31, 2009, the Game Boy Advance series has sold 81.51 million units worldwide, 43.57 million of which are Game Boy Advance SP units and 2.42 million of which are Game Boy Micro units.»

So, the SP was the most sold version, but I can't name a single GBA emulator that uses its design as the logo.

I always felt that way too however after coming back to the GBA with now with larger adult hands it's also too cramped for me. its way too unwieldy and heavy but I feel like I would need something like a GameGear these days.

Agree, the gba is the perfect handheld system. I was feeling nostalgic and wanted to play one recently but they were selling for ~$150 so I went with an ANBERNIC RG351P instead. Same form factor

But the thing is, they're _not_ the same form factor. I've been somewhat interested in getting one of these new emulator snc devices like Anbernic makes, and the 351 is the most interesting - but man, if they sold one that looked just like an original GBA, I'd have already pulled the trigger.

While looking into it recently, I kinda came to the conclusion that the best bang for buck was probably to just get one of the PSP Vita models.

To be fair, this has a kind of synchronicity, since the original PSP was my first exposure to homebrew hardware modding.

IDK, either way, I'll probably eventually end up with an Anbernic device or something similar. They're just so neat and the idea of a tiny little Linux box with a built in gamepad appeals. But I can't help but think they could do better.

Anberic: 5.98 x 2.8 x 0.71 inches

GBA: Approximately 145 mm (5.7 in) x 82 mm (3.2 in) x 24 mm (0.94 in) (WxHxD)

Not exactly the same, but very close.

I wonder if you could drop the internals for the anberic into a gba frame

I didn't realize that the Anbernic thing was that close to GBA size, based on the appearance I expected something closer to the size of the Switch (entirely my own bias here).

But still, one of the things I liked about my GBA was how well it fit in the hand, part of that was because the back was somewhat contoured. The new trend of everything being flat rectangles makes devices a lot less comfy for me.

>I expected something closer to the size of the Switch

I see where you're coming from here. I like playing the switch handheld but it's way too big for true portable gaming.

>part of that was because the back was somewhat contoured

It's got very slightly elevated grip pads on the back and the build quality is high so it feels solid.

https://main.retro-handhelds.com/content/images/2021/09/RG35...

I'm increasingly tempted to grab one of these! Might have to just pull the trigger.

Nice! I can't find where I ordered mine from but I remember trying to go through the anberic website and it wouldn't successfully add things to my cart.

I found the Retro Game Corps YouTube channel to be a big help when getting everything setup.

I ended up modifying the behavior to hide everything on the launch screen except for 1-2 games I'm playing and made them always launch from save states on boot.

I did this mod! It is fairly painless as far as mods go, and the result is amazing. It even appears to run longer than with the original screen.

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