CES: Visteon's dockable entertainment featuring GBA
by James Ransom-Wiley 
{ Jan 5th 2006 at 1:55PM }
Mario was on-hand this morning when Visteon officially
unveiled its latest dockable entertainment
system featuring Nintendo's GBA under a tent outside of the Las Vegas Convention Center. Visteon's Greg Gyllstrom
called the unit the "ultimate backseat babysitter." Available this spring, the docking station features a
drop-down screen with inverted image capabilities and car stereo integration. In addition, the system comes standard
with wireless headphones, wireless (infrared) controller, and wired gamelink capability with a separate GBA. Nintendo's
Peter Eck described the partnership as "a little unusual," as Nintendo rarely licenses its hardware to third
parties.Although this will certainly help to solidify the GBA's dominance in the portable market, we found that the Visteon prototype on display was not up to par with GBA standards. The generic controller features five face buttons (a, b, c, d, and select), "help" and "back-up," and R & L buttons on the rear. Visteon's rep explained that the five face buttons will translate into 3 a-buttons and 2 b-buttons. Huh?
The video resolution also left much to be desired. While the GBA feed will not fill the entire 10.2-inch screen, it has been stretched into 16:9 (from 4:3), making for an awkward transition. However, Visteon claims that the retail model will feature an even bigger, sharper image. Needless to say, the engineers have their work cut out for them.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
pointfour @ Jan 5th 2006 3:01PM
Erm...the gamepad shown is for Sky TV (digital satallite TV over here in the UK). It's so you can play the basic games they have on their interactive service. That's why it says SKY at the top, and has a number 4 on the bottom (you can play multiplayer).
So it's not so much a prototype, more a working product from something completely different.
radjago @ Jan 8th 2006 7:56AM
Actually the GBA's screen resolution is 240 x 160, which is a 3:2 aspect ratio. It's a little "wider" than the standard 4:3 TV ratio, but it still looks bad when stretched to 16:9 as can be seen by using a Gameboy Player on a Gamecube with an HDTV.