they started making them again. With cuh-22xx. You can buy the cuh-21xxa discontinued one's on amazon here.

https://www.amazon.com/PlayStation-4-Slim-500GB-Console-Discontinued/dp/B01M0RU6LY/ref=sr_1_3?s=videogames&ie=UTF8&qid=1542403153&sr=1-3&keywords=Ps4+500gb

I then bought a portable seagate backup plus slim 2tb and swapped the hard drives

High end build is not 1-2k lol.. That is mid range.. I would love to see the computer you can put together for less than $269.95 PS4 Slim 500GB (current as of when I posted) that will play most AAA titles and looks better. Hint... You cant..

https://www.amazon.com/PlayStation-4-Slim-500GB-Console/dp/B01M0RU6LY/ref=sr_1_2?s=videogames&ie=UTF8&qid=1526189426&sr=1-2&keywords=ps4+console