The New Nintendo Switch Is Hitting Store Shelves

From <https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidthier/2019/08/12/the-new-nintendo-switch-is-hitting-store-shelves/>

The other week, I issued a rare warning for a product I usually
recommend without reservations: the Nintendo Switch. The Nintendo
Switch is a great little system no matter what version of it you
find, but Nintendo recently announced that it was going to be giving
the Switch a minor hardware revision with a new CPU and, crucially, significantly improved battery life. This isn't the long-rumored
"Switch Pro" or the upcoming "Switch Lite", but a revision of the
standard base-model Switch. So we found ourselves in a weird moment:
if you were to buy the Nintendo Switch last month, you'd get a great
console. But if you were to buy it after the new model rolled out,
you'd get a better one. So is it safe to buy one yet?

I called a few GameStops, and they all told me that their inventory
had totally turned over to the new model. So it seems that by and
large, it's safe to buy a Nintendo Switch from a GameStop, though be
sure to ask the sales associate if you are indeed getting the console
you want. Everyone I talked to was well aware of the version upgrade,
so whoever is working will likely be able to make sure you're getting
Version 2. You can also notice slightly different packaging: on the
front of the old one, both Joy-Cons are firmly attached to the grip.
On the new one, the Red Joy-Con is being slid off. You can see the
new packaging in this video here:

Ordering a Nintendo Switch from the Internet could be a little bit
dicier. You can't look at the box art to confirm what you're buying,
and I'm fairly certain that you can't order specific serial numbers
from any major websites. You could always just order one and return
it if it's the old model, and by the time you wind up getting a new
one you might end up with Version 2. It's a gamble, but at a certain
point every non-used Switch on the market is going to be Version 2,
so it shouldn't be a problem.

System bundles or special editions could be a little bit dicier,
because inventory doesn't turn over as quickly and because I'm not
sure if there's new packaging.

So if you've been waiting for a new Nintendo Switch, I'd say to get
out there and start looking, but just to be a little bit cautious.
There are old models still out there, but they appear to be getting
rarer and rarer.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)