Game Boy Pocket is my favorite! I use DMGs live because they're a bit stronger but I write on MGBs.
Better looking LCD, sharper contrast and more true to a black/white monochrome color so when you backlight it you actually see the correct color rather than it being tinted by the DMGs LCD.
The sound is just fine. Not quiet as bassy but if you're using a mixer than there's really nothing to worry about.
Yeah battery life sucks compared to a DMG but thats why I have multiple sets of rechargeable batteries. One set on charge while the other is being used. Plus there is no compatibility issues with the newest 64m Smart Cart.

2 GBs ir enuff for my setup.

SPs do have a nice backlight! But that reminds me. I have two MGBs as well because they're more comfortable to write with and the LCD is easier on the eyes.

chip evangelism +1

I've actually already offered to lend one GB to a friend.

The GB pocket is quite useless isn't it? ... short battery life, bad sound, ... does it have any benefits besides size? I can get a black GB pocket  for free which I will probably take just to play around with, but I don't see a reason to keep it really. Is there any?

i currently have..

- 2 GBA SP's
- 1 GB Pocket, dual prosounded
- 4 x DMG's

... which i still think is _barely_ enough for what i want to do.

The SP's are what i do my main songwriting on - the frontlights let me do so under any kind of lighting conditions.  i also have 2, because if you're using the headphone adapter, you can't charge at the same time -- so i charge one while i write with the other, and when the battery is low i move my cart to the other SP.  the SP's also happen to be discreet and modern enough so that i can write on the commute to/from work without getting weird looks from people because i have a big honkin' DMG in my hands.

as for the DMG's, i want to have a minimum of 2 working at any given time, for syncing 2xLSDJ and/or for transitioning between songs in a live setup.  the other 2 are either backups or for modding practice.  i wouldn't mind having another DMG handy, just for modding practice/experiments.

the GB pocket is just something i picked up because it was cheap.  i may not use it ever but i guess it'll do as a backup unit.

anyway, i used to think more than 2 was overkill, but i guess it all depends on what you want to do with your setup.  if all you're interested in is writing music, you'd need at most 2.   but if you're getting more serious about taking your hardware into the wild, it's good to invest in a larger arsenal.

one other thing i've considered is to have a couple of spare cheapo GBs ready to loan/give to people who are interested in writing chipmusic but find it hard to obtain a GB.  i just think it'd be nice to do as a gesture of chip evangelism.

Personally, I have 3 LSDj carts and some songs require all of them at once. One Game Boy for Music Tech and one for Trippy-H. I also rock Cynthcart. So depending on how rich I want it to sound or which device I'm playing along with it makes sense to have one Game Boy per cart so I don't need to switch them out. All my personal Game Boys are very minimally modded though. Just backlights and prosounds. My Trippy-H Game Boy has a Variable Clock v2 for bending the "samples". And my Music Tech Game Boy has a Kitsch-Bent Easy_CLK half speed switch so I can play two octaves live.
That's why I have so many

In a forum called chipMUSIC I have a very few ideas for needing more than one Gameboy...

I have a 6 way DMG sync box but only kept 3 dmgs... probably all I need, and two are pretty much never used now

It's personal preference. It just depends on what you use them for and stuff. I don't necessarily have a bunch of DMGs (I only have one), but I have a GBA SP, DS Lite, and DS XL and one DMG. They all get good use (mostly gaming). As you have seen further up, people want to mod a lot, and others just like to collect them. You might only need one, but others may need many, just because they want them.

Interesting!

So why would you need more than 3 gameboys?

First of all I'll want to have the security that when I mess up modding I still have backup parts. Then, several Game Boys can be synced. Adding to that perhaps I want to have different mods in different models. Last but not least I need at least one to play games on

Apart from technical reasons, they can also be seen as a kind of accessoire... perhaps I feel like a black gb with teal backlight one day and like a yellow gb without backlight the next ... because I can

I have a minimum of 3 in my live setup.

Why would you need more than one gameboy?

I got a ton off eBay a couple years ago.  I needed at least a few because I'm a modding failure and was bound to screw up a few of them though.

i have about 40 DMG's. qith all the ones that have came and gone, that would put me up in the 100's mark