/vr/ - Retro Games

From the google

https://itstillworks.com/12609518/how-to-fix-the-r-button-on-a-gba-sp

>>6226780
Could've fried it. That happened to a Super Metroid cartridge of mine once, I think after using it on Game Genie or some other third-party device.

Here's some pics of the board.

A buddy of mine replaced the capacitor on the upper left corner of the board, but it had no effect on the problems the game is having so I don't think we did any damage to it.

>>6226790
As in, the chips are toast and its a goner?

That would suck. I got the game like this and wanted to play some punch-out

>>6226812
"Dirty or misaligned game cartridges may cause a “blue screen” condition when operating the NES. ... Insert the cartridge into the NES and press the power button. If the problem persists, shift the cartridge to one side, with the game still in the console and press the reset button"

Try using a pencil with a red eraser on the contacts to gently rub away anything. Alcohol doesnt get off everything, use a little friction

>>6226803
This cart has been abused

>>6226812
>As in, the chips are toast and its a goner?
Yup. I've tried everything to get it to work again. I think once, early on after it stopped working, I got the Nintendo logo to appear, but then the game would immediately freeze and the title screen wouldn't even load. I still keep it around just for display.

Christ almighty you had to scratch it to shit to replace a simple capacitor?
1. I don't know if it's the lighting but your second board pic the contacts look like they're worn to nothing. Are they?
2. Most of the time the problem is in those contacts one way or another. There can be a oxidation film that develops over the contacts. The only way to remove it is either physically by inserting the cartrige into your system and use it to clean the system's contacts like it was a cleaning cartridge. Or getting something like lime away. I've heard of alot of people using something like that to make an unreadable cartridge come back to life.
As far as the physically using the cart as a cleaning cart in your system I successfully did this with a genesis game that appeared to be brand new. It was spotless, but refused to play at all. Eventually I wore through that oxidation layer by wiggling the cart in and out of the system's socket that it wore though and then the game worked perfectly like that.
The solder joints of all the chips look fine. I've fixed a few gameboy carts by reflowing fresh solder on questionable joints before.

>>6226795
>i tried to fix it my replacing a capacitor because i "know" everything always needs to be recapped but i did such a disgusting job i'm going to blame it on a friend

Whew lad, that's some grade A dogshit soldering. DESU, your bro may have fucked up the vias doing that replacement. Hard to tell in that lighting. Looks mangled.

>>6226884
>>6226889
>>6226874
Make no mistake, I am a moron and a novice solderer. We both had a hand in the mangling. I tried to get the original cap desoldered myself, so some of the scorch marks right around the cap are my doing. I just think the scratching on the back was him using a desoldering tool, since I didn't have one myself. Not that it matters... its superficial stuff. Nobody will see it once the shell is closed and its not going to ruin the game so I'm not mad.

I gotta learn how to do this sometime. This basically was the literal first time I've ever operated a soldering iron so its going to be shitty.

>>6226874
I think its the lighting. The contacts still look copper on my end. But, that's interesting about an oxide layer. You think just trying it some more might wear through it, or trying an abrasive or something like Brasso might do it?

That stuff is kinda like the nuclear option, so I'd be nervous to try it

>>6226980
Don't do Brasso. Okay. Just wet the contacts with half Distilled Water and half 91% Isopropyl and put the cart in the system and push and pull it with as much friction you can get inside the console's socket. Then clean cartridge's contacts and repeat a couple times. You'll be cleaning the cart and the console doing this.

The nuclear option is a fiberglass pen.

>>6227024
I did this with a Front Loader and it worked great. A Top Loader would be even better like the Genesis.

>>6226980
Something else you might want to think about doing is using a multi-meter to check for shorts with that soldering job. Couldn't hurt. Don't listen to these people about blown chips. They're pretty tough. Just don't go shoving voltage where it doesn't belong.

>>6227031
That's a great Idea, I can pick up a multimeter from work tomorrow. You can tell I'm a novice b/c I haven't thought of this yet lmao

Is there a place I can look up a schematic of the board for continuity, or is visually following the physical trace on the board the best option? I suppose the main thing to test is if the leg of the cap has continuity with the backside of the via, but like I said, IDK exactly what I'm doing here

>>6227031
Jesus. If option A doesn't yield results I'll report back with this.

Thanks Lads. I'm off to bed.

>>6227087
Meant to also quote >>6227024

>>6227087
Visually. You're just checking to make sure the connections you want are there and the connections you don't want "shorts" aren't.

>>6226780
it's good to learn to repair stuff yourself.

>>6226980
If you're gonna get into this, grab yourself one of those chink Hakko clone vacuum desoldering guns. Zhongdi I think is what mine is. Makes removing components a piece of cake.

>>6226795
>A buddy of mine replaced the capacitor on the upper left corner
using what, a jackhammer?

>>6226795
Check for broken traces in between the cart connector and the pins on the ROM chips.

>>6227806
I still need to do this. I have an old Xytronic de-soldering station that works, but needs to be retired. Which is a shame because the heating element in it is top notch.

Now I remember what I was going to write. This piece of advice is from the Commodore Amiga crowd. Don't practice on the real thing. Find cheap junk and practice on that. Once you're confident then you can WORK on the real thing.
Which why I still haven't changed the surface mount caps in any of my expensive shit yet. I got soldering tweezers, but I can't seem to make them work for me worth a shit.

>>6229061
>This piece of advice is from the Commodore Amiga crowd.
What did the zoomer mean by this? Are you saying you're just parroting something you read on an Amiga board? How do you even fap if you're too retarded to use tweezers?

>>6229061
>but I can't seem to make them work for me worth a shit.
tried applying some fresh solder first?
no, not joking.

>>6226795
Check the resistors, make sure they're in spec, get your hot stick out and reflow the solder on the board, then make sure that cap is proper spec, clean it up, make sure hamhands didn't break any traces, and cut those fucking legs down, there's no reason for them to be that tall

>>6230269

OP here

I got my multimeter and haven't found anything on the board that isn't already connected to someplace else yet. Yes, this includes our horrible soldering job with the capacitor. I don't think there's any shorts but I am a total novice so I suppose that's TBD.

I do, however, think that I've found a problem with the resistors. There are three that are basically identical to pic related (one of them has its stripes smudged a bit but you can tell they're the same colors). Each one measures about ~5 kiloOhms. One of them is about 4.9 kΩ, and the other two are about 5.1 kΩ.

Now its been many years since I've learned how to read the colored bands on a resistor but I'm pretty sure that these are not labeled for that amount of resistance. Calculators and guides online also seem to agree to these being wrong/faulty as well.

Am I correct in this? Should the resistors be replaced? What is the intended resistance on these guys?

>>6233410
>resistors
>C3
see >>6232091

>>6233410
posting of the day.

>>6226780
>>I've thuroughly cleaned the pins of the cart, and the board looks okay to me, though I am an amateur with this sort of thing.
Get on ebay and buy an old cleaning kit. Use sd alcohol on the pin cleaning cart and it will be fine. They are $15, just buy one already.