In an interview with Opera CEO Jon S. von Tetzchner, Techtree was able to confirm that the DSi will come with more RAM specifically for the Opera browser. Below is the quote from the interview, which can be found here.

The Nintendo DSi has Opera embedded. The DS Lite had Opera as a separate cart which came with additional RAM. Does that mean that the DSi has more RAM than the DS Lite?

Yes, the DSi has more RAM than the DS Lite. In addition, with integrated Opera coming with the DSi, it will use RAM more efficiently.

As said in the above quotation, the Opera Browser for the Nintendo DS required an additional cart to enhance the RAM, not unlike the add-on released for the Nintendo 64 for games like Donkey Kong and Majora’s Mask. The cart went into the Gameboy Advance slot – a slot missing from the DSi. Loading some extra RAM into the DSi seems necessary, but it might have an unforeseen cost. Not an actual cost, mind you, but developers might wish to tap into this new resource, which would make old Nintendo DS systems obsolete – a situation I don’t think Nintendo is looking forward to anytime soon. As of now there aren’t any games announced to use this extra hardware, and hopefully it will stay that way. If it offers slight graphical improvements for old games I'm fine with that, but I don't want to see the next Imagine series require a DSi, it would just be kind of insulting to early adopters, an audience Nintendo is usually good at appeasing.

I also hope that the built-in RAM works better than the pack that came with the DS Opera Browser. That thing stunk. Expect to hear more on this in the coming months leading up to a complete information overload in December when the DSi is released in Japan. 

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