On the YouTube channel, Today I Found Out, Simon Whistler answers the question of why Nintendo products are more durable than their competitors. For some more information about Nintendo including how they got started, stick around for the bonus facts about half way into the video.
Yeah, Nintendo products are pretty durable, although I broke my first Game Boy and my son accidentally dropped his first 3DS in water. Neither system recovered, but we still have so many other Nintendo products around that still work just fine.
What about you? Do you have a Nintendo durability story to share?
Yeah, Nintendo products are pretty durable, although I broke my first Game Boy and my son accidentally dropped his first 3DS in water. Neither system recovered, but we still have so many other Nintendo products around that still work just fine.
What about you? Do you have a Nintendo durability story to share?
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All of mine still work. I have one Gameboy with a dead line of pixels and my N64 is a little wonky, if there are any vibrations it’ll lock up. Those are both old ass systems though. However I think the build quality has gone down. One of my Switch joycons stopped working after a week and I’ve read a lot of similar stories. I was able to exchange it with no problem. Also, the joysticks on the joycons are notorious for drifting over time but the DIY fix is pretty simple.
That said, I’ve had good luck across the board. My PS3 finally got the yellow light of death but I used that thing so extensively, I can’t really complain about quality there. Otherwise I’ve never had console problems at all than the ones listed.
Cool. That sucks about the drift, I hate that problem. My PS3 is still working, though it still shuts off sometimes. My TV is showing it's age as well.
My NES and SNES are dead but they were under some intense wear while a family member had them and I question how well they were tended to.
That said, Nintendo stuff, I've found, is pretty hearty which is great considering it's the most popular retro game gear around. The Gameboy is legendary for it's durability.
My PS3 and everyone elses I knew that had one. Sadly Sony didn't seem to build a hearty console there but it could have just been everyone I knew that got unlucky.
There's also the Xbox 360 red ring of death we should mention here, even though I got mine later in the cycle once they'd mostly fixed it, every single launch 360 will eventually get the red ring of death, or already has. But that said the 360 I have is probably in that same camp, just on a longer time scale than the launch 360s.
Actually I have three Xbox 360s, the one I bought in the first hardware reiteration, the one that looks like launch but they mostly fixed the thermal problems, and two launch 360s-- both of which came from a friend of mine, both had the RROD, both just for parts. I've tried various fixes I've found online to kinda piece together fixes, but came out with nothing. Microsoft really hosed the launch last gen. Thankfully it seems like they all seem to be better this gen, with the exception of the Nintendo joycon drift.
Two things occurred to me, I've been thinking about this topic a lot.
First, my original NES needed a new connector eventually because it was basically impossible to play any games. That's a design flaw of the NES that they fixed with the top-loader model. It definitely got a few years under its belt before that happened, but it's still a thing. It was probably only a year or two longer than my PS3 lasted, which is a very odd thought. Each year goes by so much faster than the ones before. Measuring my life in when I got consoles makes that feel even faster.
Also, I forgot that I had a Wii go out on me randomly. It cut out on me mid-game and that was that. It just wouldn't power on anymore.
So I guess when you consider percentage of consoles that developed problems, Nintendo has a worse track record than the others for me anyway. 5/9 of my Nintendo consoles/handhelds have developed some kind of problem, 1/5 of my Sony consoles/handhelds, and neither of the two MS consoles I purchased (aside from the two I got from a friend that were DOA to me).