Nintendo DS broken after 18 months - inherent fault?

Dano

Dano

Dano

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I was asked to look at a Nintendo DS by a friend the other day as it will no longer recognise game cards, a quick look in the card slot confirms that one of the contact pins is just missing, it's not bent, damaged or otherwise mangled, it's just gone. No other pins are bent or damaged in any way whatsoever.

So I start googling the issue and realise it's fairly common for the pins to fail in this way and replaing the card slot is a soldering job which I'm not sure I want to take on. Nintendo are quoting between £30 and £50 odd pounds for repair out of warranty.

Surely this is a case of the device having an inherent fault? It's not like the owner has managed to mangle the pins and they're not what I'd call an above average user or ham fisted at all, the slot is designed to line everything up as the card goes in etc etc.

The only way I can see a pin failing (it has from what I can tell just broken off where it was soldered) is purely down to it never having been attached properly in the first place.

Anybody think it's worth the time of trying to persue a free repair in light of the fact that it's an inherent fault?

Or am I talking rubbish and should I just order myself the bits, a new soldering iron and get cooking :)
 
I think starting some grandious legal action against Nintendo would be a big wasta' time. Your best bet (if you have few scruples) would be to write a begging letter to the company saying about how your 'disabled son's only toy' isn't working and you can't afford the repair etc and he's devastated and Nintendos biggest BIGGEST FAN (whilst posting them the thing).

HR departments love stuff like that, i give it 40% chance they just post you a completely new one ..
 
Last edited:
britboy4321 said:
I think starting some grandious legal action against Nintendo would be a big wasta' time. Your best bet would be to write a begging letter to the company saying about how your 'disabled son's only toy' isn't working and you can't afford the repair etc and he's devastated and Nintendos biggest BIGGEST FAN (whilst posting them the thing).

HR departments love stuff like that, i give it 40% chance they just post you a completely new one ..
Click to expand...

Yeh, I was thinking more along the lines of just pointing it out to them in a letter, definetly will not be going legal on them as that's just going to be a waste of time and effort, just wanted to know that I had grounds for writing the letter really.
 
The contract is with the retailer so any legal action would be against them and not the manufacturer, best bet is to contact the retailer and pursue it that way
 
Heh, think I'm just going to use it as an excuse to buy a better soldering iron to be honest :D
 
As mentioned previously, your contract is with the retailer, not the manufacturer.

After 18 months you'd have a hard time proving it was faulty when purchased, unless you can produce an engineer's report stating why THAT SINGLE pin is the one that fell out due to manufacturing problems present at the time of sale.

You'd be much more successful sending an email or letter to the retailer's customer service department making a claim regarding lack of durability under the SOGA.

18 months is not a reasonable time for a pricy handheld to fail in such a way. This indicates it does not conform to the durability clause of the Act.
 
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