Can't wait to see if tomodachi life will extend that perhaps borrowed time. 

I wish rol would just come back and tell us what will happen so this can be settled

One thing to be mindful is the stock Nintendo would have in warehouses. This time last year the Switch was Nintendos primary console and, they probably would have about 2 million consoles in warehouses worldwide. Now that the Switch 2 is the primary console the original switches in warehouses is probably 0.5 to 1 million (probably closer to the 0.5 million). So even if the Switch ships 4 million for the current fiscal year, It's true sales are probably 1 to 1.5 million more then 4m. 

So if you use the your 50% reduction prediction. It becomes a lot more interesting if your going off a 5m to 5.5m figure instead of 4m. 

Double post

A console (or handheld) can't go on "forever". At one point old components become more expensive again. At that point you have no choice than to retire the system.

I'm pretty sure actually a console can go on forever. Nintendo could manufacture the NES or SNES or N64 today and it's not like it would kill them to do so, and you know what? There definitely would be a market for that. The real reason is they want to force/push people into buying the newer hardware. 

Id buy another nes snes or 64 just to add to the totals

Sure, but then they’d also have to put the games and cartridges for those systems back in production.

Which would be cool, don’t get me wrong. It would also serve as a huge middle finger to scalpers and pirates. 

But they’re not going to do that if it takes away from Switch 2 or even Switch 1. And ESPECIALLY NSO, That service, more than anything, would take the most damage from all their old games and consoles being put back in production, even if it’s on a small scale.

Well that was the point I was making, today you don't have to have physical carts in production because you have digital distribution. 

That used to be a reason why consoles had to phased out in the past, retailers couldn't hold a ton of shelf space for old system libraries, that isn't a problem today. 

In the mid-90s in Japan for example Nintendo actually did things like allow consumers to buy blank cartridges for the Super Famicom (SNES) and Game Boy where you could download games on the blank cartridge from kiosk in the store as those systems got older, the thought process being that stores didn't want to give those systems a ton of shelf space for the games. Obviously today the internet and digital storage solves that problem entirely. 

The Switch Lite especially could be kept being made for another 3-4 years IMO. 

So .. with the recent price hike of the one of the current gen systems, and very likely the Switch 2 soon, Switch 1 will be the most affordable system by a long shot. At just 230$ for the Lite or just 340$ for the OG model, this might be enough to prolong it sales .. for how long however? The Switch 2 price will most likely go up if not by 100$, then surely by at least 70$. So the cheapest gaming system above the Switch 1 will be close to 200$ more, and if you look at handhelds, then around 300$ more, which is big. And even if you compare the OG model instead of the Lite, the difference will again be a whopping 200$.