Mate, my numbers were for a $50 portable hard drive, I know they are cheap, learn to read. I am saying though they aren't $15-25 cheap, and even a $50 hard drive makes a Wii U even less cost competitive with existing PS3 or 360 consoles.  And I don't know about you, but I wouldn't be particularly thrilled having to further clutter up my TV stand with external hard drives and power packs (which that hard drive you linked requires). Its a poor implementation, and a poor design decision on Nintendo's part. 

anybody who complains and acts all shocked at this news is stupid.. Nintendo fans or not.. 

although the typical haters are in here that are complaining..

Wow that's an epic mistake. Consoles should be easy to use and not require external extras. Why they didn't include a 2.5" HDD is beyond me. I've never heard someone saying they need a micro-console. If people bought the PS3 original and 360 with the power brick, then adding a HDD should have been simple.

Wow. That's SO suprising :D

IMO they should have gone with a small flash chip for the system (maybe 8-16 GB) and a normal HDD for the other stuff. I know the WiiU is all about power consumption, but the small internal storage bugs me.

pointless discussion over nothing!

If people don't want to buy an external HDD then then go buy the fucking game at a store!

haters are like a nagging GF/BF FFS!

Hahaha, true :D

But don't forget download-only games do exist on the WiiU and also take up some space. Also, demos. I don't download games on the WiiU either (got nothing to do with the HDD space - as long as the games are bound to my console instead of of the NN account I won't buy ANYTHING from the eshop), but it is a legitimate concern for those who do.

Nintendo could have included a slot for an optional Harddrive on WiiU. I remember the first PS2 models had a slot for harddrive but it did not come with one.

Not selling proprietary hard drives so consumers can buy better ones for cheaper is a bad decision?

The following should be thrown in the face of every person complaining about the SSD drive:

The PS1, Gamecube, PS2, and to a certain degree the N64 ALL used memory cards and had NO internal storage. You HAD to buy them to even be able to save your games. What a bunch of inconvenient, horrible consoles those were. Especially considering how ridiculus the price/space ratio was. Fuck Nintendo for giving consumers the freedom to go and buy the cheapest, most cost efficient storage option.

This is what I hate about what consoles and console gamers have become. They don't recognise a proper console anymore. Everything is supposed to be a dumbed down PC.

A non proprietary internal hard-drive that you can just push in a sled would cost less to the consumer than a non-proprietary external drive with casing, controller, vcabling and maybe external power. And it would be faster. And it would be neater.

Really, the decision to leave off a replaceable HD option has no advantage for the consumer. It was an upfront cost cutting decision.