Like I said. Short commings in the n64 gfx hardware hurt the system more then you can imagin.
1st the n64 is a 64bit Misp Cpu at 93.75MHz. The Rsp is a 64bit Mips Cpu at 62.5MHz. N64 Cpu has a Floating point unit (cop1) & the rsp has a vector unit (cop2). N64 Games could run in resolutions between 320x240 to 640x480. The N64 was a very difficult piece of hardware to work with due to it's unsimplistic nature of working with the hardware.
The DS is a 32bit Arm (Arm9) Cpu at 67MHz with a 32bit Arm (Arm7) at 33MHz. The DS has no floating point or vector units, All 3d is handled in fixpoint math. DS games run at 256x192 resolution. The DS is very simplistic in terms of working with the hardware as much has been simplified by the programming librarys.
Where the DS beats up the N64 is in the Gpu. The N64 Gpu had serious issues by having a very small TMEM area (where textures must reside to be rendered) which was 4KB. The DS has over half a meg of VRAM (when all banks are combind). DS Gpu suported more current features then n64 did (example, stencil buffer for shadows). N64 Had no Vram so Famebuffers were stored in main ram.
If you compair Mario64 & MarioDS. You will notice a few things. MarioDS has much nicer textures yet has more jaged edges, no texture filtering or no mipmapping (stuff the DS lacks yet n64 had). Yet Mario64 does have weaker textures due poor TMem. Sure the geometry in Mario64 is a bit more primitive then MarioDS but you have to consider the fact that mario64 was nintendo's first big 3d game (snes 3d games were not done internaly). If you look at more advance N64 games like Conker's Bad Fur Day you will see much more advance character models then most ds games.
The PSP actualy has alot more in common with the N64 then any other system.
