Okay, I have perused the forums for help on my topic and thought I would add my two cents.
I bought the system today as I was on a wait list for one to come in. Got it home and first thing it asks me for is a system update. Took almost an hour for it to load the update. Since it's over WIFI, I expected it to take a while. (And boo on Nintendo for NOT adding an Ethernet port to it. WIFI is NOT the way to do system updates unless you want to foobar your system. Take it from me, I am a computer repair tech.)
The update goes off without a hitch and so I proceed to transfer my data from my Wii to the Wii U. So far so good. I get that all done and I am playing Assassins Creed 3. Only problem there is it takes FOREVER to do an update and load the game. Play Final Fantasy 3 from the VC. No problem. Go to make a new account for my sister. Get the first freeze. Tried to shut down through the hand-held console. Device shuts down, but the system is still locked and making a very audible buzzing sound. Had to unplug the unit. Rebooted the system. Go to load Nintendoland. Another lengthy wait for the game to update then play. Get another lockup. Pulled the plug again. Reloaded the game. Same thing. Locked up. Went to backup the stuff on my SD from the transfer. Wound up with corrupted save data. Didn't have corruptions BEFORE I transfered.
Now from my professional point of view, I am seeing the following:
The system is running a rather slow processor. It shouldn't take that long to load or read. Not impressed. Again, WIFI is NOT the way to perform updates. I NEVER suggest to my computer clients to use WIFI to update anything. There is always a huge chance of corruption or missing files, and there is usually an error when doing so. As for the freezing and lockups, that sounds like a firmware and software screw up from the update. What the system needs is a system restore setting where you can go back to a state before the latest update. That would be very helpful. Overall, I don't think this was very well thought out and my first thought when all this occurred was "Holy (fresh manure), it's a Vista screw up." For anyone that is familiar with the term, kudos. If not, its a reference to Microsoft's Windows Vista fiasco.
And to those that are keen to say "send it back for a free repair", not helpful. The only thing Nintendo does is wipe the drive of the updates and send it back to you. They really should make that available to the REST of the public.
Rose.