thinking about buying a sp, what to look for?

[hecker_isaac]

theres this retro game store not to far from my home and they have SPs for like $75, they r not like DKoldies bc they are at least honest and say they dont refurbush there consles lol. i just want to know what i should look for for buying my first sp!

 

[RAHelllord]

Bring a game where you can test the shoulder buttons are working reliably, something like Metroid for example where you can very easily tell whether it reacts quickly and reliably. Those in particular like failing and they're annoyingly hard to repair right. I would also test that the speaker works well and that it charges without problem. The battery itself is probably going to be trash anyway but you can get good replacements easy. However the screw might be stripped so have a quick glance at it that the head of the screw is still in decent shape.

Otherwise there isn't much sneaky that should fail. Test the buttons, test the light, do a quick sweep across for the volume to ensure the speaker works as it should. If you want to use the link port that might be worth checking as well.

Personally I'd recommend grabbing one with a backlight instead of a frontlit one, the quality with the light on will be much improved over the earlier front lit versions. However they'll probably want more than $75 for those, if they have one.

 

[hecker_isaac]

so i bough 3 SPs today and 2 of them had the backlight and they were only $10 more and I got a nes classic! id say today was a great day!

 

[Sora de Eclaune]

Future reference for buying used (as opposed to "sealed in box" or "like new"): before going to see the device, try to figure out how the hinge feels in an original SP. When you're there looking at the device, do a test of the hinge. The farther away it feels from "original", the more likely you have a refurbished/repaired or bootleg device.

As far as distinguishing the difference between repaired and original, you just need to have an eye for detail. Use the knockoff-identifying skills you learned from Redd in Animal Crossing as a kid. Bootlegs always have some sort of tell that identifies, visually, whether it's fake. Just be careful, as aftermarket shells can also carry the same tells as a bootleg console.