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For good reason. Dreamcast, GameCube, and XBox were all 32-bit consoles, and PS2 was 64-bit*. None surpassed the N64 bit-wise, so the bits were kept quiet.

Actually the Dreamcast was definitely NOT 32-bit. It had a CPU with a 64-bit FP unit, a 64-bit external bus and had a 128-bit graphics computation engine. The only thing that was 32-bit was the sound card.

Gamecube was designed with this issue in mind. It has excellent disk spanning capability, darned if I can find a reference to it at this time. I'm sure if you looked though this you would be able to find some reference somewhere. They may be small, but Resident Evil on two disks works fine for me.

Sega didn't design the graphics in the Dreamcast. Powervrused their pvr series 2 chip in there with tile based renmdering engine, currently I have a pvr series 3 chip in my computer right now that rocks. I'm waitng for the mysterious kyro 3 to come out soon and whoop some ass for a hundred and change. Anyone that pays upwards of 200 dollars plus for a graphic cars is insane.

I was going to post a story on Ben Heckendorn's SNES portable, but I decided to wait until he is finished with something far more interesting.

The Gamecube is already a very much portable unit, considering it's external and internal size, carrying handle, and detachable screen. This is Ben's next un/confirmed project over at his site. I found his comment on this in the forums. While the portable aspect of the Gamecube is nifty, Ben focuses on making consoles into handheld units (so yes it is portable already, but not handheld). The SNES is interesting, but I'm waiting to see how this turns out.

The link is already slashdotted. I couldn't find a cache on Google. Here is an alternative link to another gutting of the Gamecube. All this Gamecube gutting reminds me of Ben Heckendorn's next project at VCSp to make the Gamecube into a portable... watch for it.

Remember, however, a cartridge means instantly playing -- no load screens

Not necessarily. You could have compressed data, which takes time (that feels like "loading") to decompress. You could have coprocessors that cannot read the cartridge but instead interact over a slow bus with the CPU; this caused the 1-second loading pauses on Super NES games whenever a game changed the background music. However, given the speed of the disc drive (130 ms access time, transfer rates equivalent to at least a 15x CD) (source), most of the loading will occur before the game begins, behind legal screens that they have to put up anyway; in-game loading shouldn't take more than 2 seconds (like FFVII room-change) if developers write their disc code carefully. Did Half-Life's loading really bother you?

check here