I highly recommend the New 3DS/XL models.
They have the best build quality, and Super-Stable 3D is a significant improvement over the original 3DS models. I never play games without 3D now.
A lot of people here seem to recommend New 2DS XL models because they "never use 3D" but it seems that most upgraded from an original 3DS/XL model and have never used a
New 3DS model with Super-Stable 3D.
I don't really see any reason to buy the original 3DS/XL models now.
If you mostly plan on using the system at home, I recommend getting a grip for it. It's more comfortable and makes the circle pad much smoother to use, since it takes the pressure off it.
Hori's Monster Hunter XX grip is best, but prices of those seem to have gone up a lot now. Most should be an ergonomic improvement, but may lack the buttons/stand that the XX grip has.
I'm not sure why so many are complaining about the SD card slot being under the cover of the n3DS XL. You know that they added wireless file transfer to the New models, right?
The only downside is that the wireless file transfer uses SMBv1 which is deprecated and a potential security risk now - so it's disabled by default on Windows 10. It can be re-enabled temporarily (only do this on your home network) or if you have the Pro version of Windows 10 I recommend that you create a virtual machine in Hyper-V and enable it there. That way you can just leave it enabled and access any SMBv1 devices safely by loading the VM.
N3DS XL, absolutely. The SD card location fuckery is tragic, and lousy yellow-tinted screens are a sad reality, but the button arrangement is what you want if you have adult hands.
Maybe I got lucky, but the screens on my n3DS XL are definitely not yellow-tinted. If anything, they seem slightly cooler than they should be, measuring a few hundred kelvin higher than my iPhone display (using a phone app - so relative differences can be measured but absolute values will not be accurate).
A lot of people seem to complain about "yellow tinted" displays on mobile devices when they're actually used to looking at
blue-tinted displays - so a neutral white looks "yellow" in comparison until you adjust to it.
Or raid an old 3DS factory and get the old-school 3DS XL in hopes of finding some IPS panels, because...
I don't think any of the original 3DS models used IPS panels; only the New ones.
The Hyrule n3DS XL is the system that is most-likely to have dual-IPS displays. I will say that it does look a lot better in person than many of the images online, but my preference would have been to buy a white system.
If I could get these systems with IPS displays, I'd buy all of them.
Most 3DS games feel like "one screen" games to me, compared to original DS games that made more use of the bottom screen for games rather than just menus/maps etc. so if you can only get a top IPS display that is probably fine.
Certain models and serial numbers are more likely to be IPS/TN than others, but it is not a guarantee. This is not a definitive list, but may help:
2DS models
only ship with TN displays, never IPS.
I dont know if I have adult hands, Im 5 foot 2 lol. Would you recommend the regular n3ds?
I'm not sure that the button sizes have any difference across 3DS models. The n3DS/XL buttons seem to be positioned the same too, so I doubt the size would be a problem for most people.
The larger display makes a big difference in my opinion, especially when most people are used to bigger displays on phones and other devices now.
The pixel density is low on either of the displays, but the size bothers me on the non-XL - so I don't think anyone should make their decision based on that.
