technology Video Game Console Repair

[Phosphor 11,522]

I'm pretty good at troubleshooting electronics and replacing bad components on circuit boards, except the tiny surface mount stuff. A few years ago, I had to replace the electrolytic capacitors on my model 1 Sega CD. It would power on, but only the sound effects could be heard. The CD audio was dead. Bad leaky caps on the audio board were the culprit. I replaced them with new ones, and that restored the sound. The repair was actually pretty easy.

I've also replaced the game save batteries in my SNES games. There's even a way to replace it without losing your save files. Just use an extra battery with wire leads and solder them to the correct traces on the board to maintain power. Replace the old one and remove the extra battery when finished.

A lot of vintage gaming consoles are still in use and still have the original capacitors and such. As they age, these components will fail and have to be replaced. So, anypony else on here maintain and repair their own video game consoles? If so, what repairs have you had to perform?

[Splashee 28,537]

I will have to remove the clock capacitor of my original Xbox sometime. I am just lazy. I also don't like breathing in too much solider fumes. I don't have a good place to do my solider.

As for capacitors, while I haven't broken anything yet, I haven't been able to repair anything either. It is one thing knowing when to switch components, and another to know when they are faulty.

For Nintendo stuff, you need special screw drivers, and I don't have those.

[Brony Number 42 9,898]

It makes me sad to know these consoles will break down.

[The Kaeya Simp 13,953]

I sadly dont know how to soulder, need to fix one of my ds's wih the parts from my original one that I owned (meaning he 1st one)

As well as my fat PS2 as the drive is tempromental

[Splashee 28,537]

Everything with electrolytic capacitor in them will eventually die. It is a difficult future for many of us, that collect old hardware such as computers. I still have my 8080 IBM computer 4 MHz, and I don't want it to fall asleep. The electrolytic capacitors do fail with time without visible signs, or worse, might leak and corrode the other components that cannot be repaired.

 

 

Also a warning to anyone trying to touch electronics, be aware that electrolytic capacitor store electricity, and when the device is turned off, might still have the electricity charged to a dangerous voltage that can kill you! Never touch the internals of power supplies etc even when the power is off!

[Pentium100 2,056]

1 hour ago, Phosphor said:

A lot of vintage gaming consoles are still in use and still have the original capacitors and such. As they age, these components will fail and have to be replaced. So, anypony else on here maintain and repair their own video game consoles? If so, what repairs have you had to perform?

I do not have any video game consoles, but I have a lot of other electronics. And yes, electrolytic caps and paper caps (in vacuum tube devices) need to be replaced most of the time. Especially if the device was made in the 80s or 90s in USSR (or ex-USSR) - they had some caps that were pretty much guaranteed to fail.

 

1 hour ago, Super Splashee said:

The electrolytic capacitors do fail with time without visible signs, or worse, might leak and corrode the other components that cannot be repaired.

At least most of the caps in newer devices bulge. But still, a cap may be bad even if it is not bulged.

 

1 hour ago, Super Splashee said:

Also a warning to anyone trying to touch electronics, be aware that electrolytic capacitor store electricity, and when the device is turned off, might still have the electricity charged to a dangerous voltage that can kill you! Never touch the internals of power supplies etc even when the power is off!

Now THAT makes for a readable text - red text on orange background. And yes, you should first discharge any high voltage capacitor and check if it is discharged. An interesting part is that a CRT can slowly build up the charge back, so if you have disconnected the anode wire, you should short the CRT anode connection to the aquadag to avoid getting zapped some time later.

Regular capacitors can build up charge as well.

Edited May 16, 2020 by Pentium100

[Phosphor 11,522]

1 hour ago, Pentium100 said:

I do not have any video game consoles, but I have a lot of other electronics. And yes, electrolytic caps and paper caps (in vacuum tube devices) need to be replaced most of the time. Especially if the device was made in the 80s or 90s in USSR (or ex-USSR) - they had some caps that were pretty much guaranteed to fail.

Vacuum tube radios are my favorite to repair. I usually keep a few spare tubes on hand and a small stash of common capacitors and resistors. A lot of those old radios have carbon resistors that will go open over time from the heat. I pretty much have all the test equipment needed, except for a signal generator. I'm looking to get one because I will eventually run across a radio that will need to be realigned.

I have no idea why I keep the old caps from radios I've repaired. 

[Pentium100 2,056]

28 minutes ago, Phosphor said:

I usually keep a few spare tubes on hand and a small stash of common capacitors and resistors.

A few. I probably have over 100 different tubes. The reason is that if I need one, usually the price of shipping is higher than the price of that tube, so I might as well buy 10 or whatever. I also usually buy spares for any device that I have (so, I bought a new receiver - time to buy some tubes for it in case I need them).

I also have some caps and resistors - some bought deliberately, some because the shop only sells small (0.25W, 0.5W) resistors in groups of 10, some because I bought them for some project that I ended up not doing.

What I do not have is a proper signal generator for FM alignment, especially the stereo decoder. I have one signal generator (modern) that goes up to 20MHz and another (tube based) that goes up to 110MHz/220MHz, but has fewer functions and is a bit inconvenient to use. 

[Splashee 28,537]

15 hours ago, Pentium100 said:

Now THAT makes for a readable text - red text on orange background. And yes, you should first discharge any high voltage capacitor and check if it is discharged. An interesting part is that a CRT can slowly build up the charge back, so if you have disconnected the anode wire, you should short the CRT anode connection to the aquadag to avoid getting zapped some time later.

Regular capacitors can build up charge as well.

Yea, I don't want anyone to get hurt. You'll find capacitors in every electronic device, and touching them with your fingers can be done by mistake.

I mostly have problems with humming in my power supplies because of age, meaning I probably need to replace one of those big boys that will fry you if you are unlucky. I have not done it because I don't have the right tools to discharge a capacitor.

[Pentium100 2,056]

13 minutes ago, Super Splashee said:

I don't have the right tools to discharge a capacitor

You do not have a resistor? Also, you can just measure the voltage on the cap before touching it.

I have repaired quite a few power supplies no problem. However, if you are trying to measure the "hot" site of a switching power supply with an oscilloscope, you need to connect the power supply to an isolation transformer because the scope is grounded. Also, try not to touch the high voltage caps while the power supply is on 

[Rainbow Cloud 16,114]

I've opened up and cleaned a few old consoles but the only things I've replaced parts in have been the speakers in a couple of game boy colors and some batteries in the Gen 2 pokemon game cartridges.

Edited May 17, 2020 by Rainbow Cloud 🌈

[DixonTheAdversary 1,631]

I bought a lot of 5 Broken PS2 consoles a while back, deemed 2 of them good for now, and used 2 consoles to make 1 functioning one. The last console from that lot wasn't working, and had no parts I could use, so it's just sitting in my basement, a potential future project.

[zerox 1,050]

I repaired a friends gamecube more than 10 years ago. The optical part of the mini "cd" drive died. Replaced the laser and that was that. Just btw I did install a solderless modchip into the original xbox.