Nintendo 3DS teardown puts 3D parallax display under microscope

The new Nintendo 3DS hit Japanese shelves over the weekend, and that meant it was only a matter of time before engineers there decided to rip it apart. We've already seen one pre-release teardown of the 3DS, but TechOn is going one stage further and putting the parallax display under the microscope.

Whereas in a regular LCD display the red, green and blue pixels are usually arranged horizontally, as you can see in the close-up above the 3DS has them arranged vertically. When the "3D volume" slider on the edge of the 3DS is switched on, a second layer over the LCD – believed to be Sharp's parallax mechanism – turns on, splitting the image between the left and right eyes.

TechOn is still working its way through the teardown, but they've already praised the 3DS' ease of opening and the fact that the ostensibly non-user-replaceable battery is actually only held in with a few screws. Nintendo has confirmed that the 3DS will launch in the US on March 27 and in Europe on March 25.

[via 3D-Display-Info]