Batteries? Are you serious? You want a downgrade? PS3 charge controllers last pretty long, and batteries are expensive. Also a 2nd controller plugged in charging while playing works fine just swap back and forth.
Slow downloads? Must be an old issue with older models, PS3 Slim has no problems with wired connection. I dl 18mb paches in 10sec and 200mb patches in 2-3min. If you just want to play the game right away, cancel the patch and play offline then let PS+ DL the patch overnight.
My Slim also runs quietly unless you put a DVD in initially it's loud but quiets down, but all blu-ray are all quiet though. Wombat got that right, and the bigger hard drives out of the box.
Also it is so easy to upgrade the HDD on your own (it does not void the warrenty, heck it tells you how in the PS3 manual) with a laptop HDD. And mandatory game installs are gone yes, some do offer optional installs but I haven't seen a forced install either in a long while.
I haven't downloaded or installed a firmware update in over a year. You guys have to be doing it wrong. PS+ does it automatically, just set the settings and it DL+installs it overnight. Even recent played games PS+ will auto download and install newest patch before you wake up. Cheapy is in Japan so maybe that's why, but I don't know why Shipwreck is downloading a firmware update every week. (The PS3 system has to be off for PS+ to do auto updates at the time you selected)
If you want it to auto DL+Install everything on your DL queue, just click "turn off" and check the box auto install after background updates and it will finish downloading then install every game/DLC and turn off the system after. Sure you'll have to turn it back on, but it seems you set it and leave it anyway. So when you go back and see PS3 off, you'll know it finished.
Hopefully Friskytanuki will chime in and explain it better, but your complaints are outdated.