Vince's Repair Thread - (Console Repairs & Mods)

Og switch is a no go. It had a short on the PI3 video IC. I removed the IC and the short is still there. I then removed all the main power IC and battery charge IC and we still have a short, tracked it back a bit and the short appears to be coming from the Nvidia SoC, I might take the soc off for science and see if the short goes but in terms of repair I think it's too far gone. I may get a re-ball template for it though and try my luck. Will be interesting to see if it can be done with the tools I have. In the meantime I stole all the resistors/caps around m92 and used them on the switch lite, I also took the charge port off of the og switch and put it on the lite so we can see if it works, so far by doing this I managed to get all the main power rails working:



But it still won't turn on so I have traced the fault back to the area around the Fuel gauge IC MAX17050, I removed that and am waiting for parts again :( Still a 50/50 on this lite as so many components seemed to get damaged by the faulty charge port. I guess we just have to wait and see :D

Fuel gague IC and resistor removed ready for replacement parts:
 
Last edited:
replaced that fuel gague IC and the resistor - We now have signs of life but it turns on then straight back off... More troubleshooting required on this one... getting there though:



I think the charge port I stole off of the OG switch may be to blame so thats the next thing to look at.
 
Couple of pics of how I'm set up and the parts replaced on the grey switch, I'm not a fan of tiny bga chips but this time it worked out perfectly... This one still only charges one way around so I've ordered a usb-c tester board to see if its my noob soldering skills on the port or a different issue. Mind you it's not really an issue it's just annoying me.

Big screen makes tiny chip look massive!!



I think I put a pic of this above but honestly this thing is tiny!


Some streets of rage to test!


Total cost on this one

Switch - £65
M92T36 - £5
MAX17505 - £3

resistors etc - Stolen from OG switch donor board so no costs there and means that I can still make a bit off of that OG switch which cost £50.

Total spend £73.

I might do a little google sheets to show you guys what each one costs, cost to repair and any profit in them. Kinda like a running "is it worth it" thing.
 
Last edited:
teenwolf said:
loving this
Click to expand...

Perfect because it isn't going away any time soon :D

I have ordered the following toys:



That's right Gents we are doing a 3DS as well! That adapter board is for testing USB charge port replacements, I should be able to work out if the switch is me not being able to get that usb port on perfectly or a fault at the console side... Again its not a massive deal but I would quite like to know! Oh and another switch! Because why not.
 
Craterloads said:
Have you got any fume extraction going on? Soldering fumes from flux and solder is nasty stuff.
Click to expand...

I do, but its a desk fan pointing towards a window right now... Something better is probably smart!

Anyway... Back to it, do you remember I said I have a water damaged megadrive mini that wouldn't power up? Today I spent some time with it. Given it's an all new device that I have no idea how to troubleshoot and a massive lack of info online I just jumped straight in. First thing I did was strip it down and probed the entire board VS a working board, with some help I managed to work out that the Power management IC generates 4 rails, these rails are 1.19, 1.19, 3 and 1.7v rails with the supply voltage being 5v usb my broken water damaged board however wasn't generating all the rails and also wasn't pushing the rails to all the correct places on the board. I measured the inductors and one of the rails was only coming up 0.31v for now and until I can get the correct inductor I give you the bodged megadrive mini :D





Another missing rail :(






The wires are simply pushing voltage to parts of the board that didnt previously have the correct rails apart from the one up front, that wire is bridging the two 1.2v rails, now its not smart to leave it like this because there are two 1.2v rails for a reason either for sequencing or for load so ive ordered in the correct inductor and ill pull the cap that sits next to that inductor as well to make sure its not pulling the rail down. This repair stuff is massive amounts of fun!
 
Turns out I only needed the one jumper on the mini as that was the rail not coming up so I stripped all my testing jumpers back and re-did it for now. Im curious if the inductor or cap (they are paired per rail) is at fault so may remove that power stage entirely and see what is going on. I'm also very much stuck on finding what I need and the ratings so I think ill go with a 1uf Cap and whatever inductor I can find that looks roughly the same. If anybody knows what type of inductor these are then help a brother out :D



Given there is little info out there I started looking at other boards and ran into this...



This is a switch board from that OG switch and this power stage produces the same sort of voltage... I'm thinking ill steal it and see what happens if I add it to megadrive mini. What is the worst that can happen? Might fix our broken power stage, might not.
 
Last edited:
Two extra switches arrived this morning... let the games begin!! I have already added these two to the spreadsheet if you want to know what they cost. Feel free to update the spreadsheet if you do not agree with final valuations but please don't edit the sell price column. So far though based on what we have done we are up approx. £200 on 8 items.



Been also looking at some no power GPU's... I may give one a repair shot... How hard can it be?
 
Last edited:


Those switches that came this morning, I managed to get the Turquoise one working in about 20 mins, plugged it in, it was only showing 5v 0.05a so probed around m92, found a shorted cap, replaced m92. Put it back together and we are good.

The yellow one is a whole different story.

They said they said m92 was missing but when i put it under the scope this is what I saw:



After about 20 mins of rework:


Then I spotted something we still had a short and its over where they knocked something else:


Now this is a bigger problem as I cant find any data on the chip :(



Let me find a link to the scope and I'll post it up.
 
Last edited:
[Death] said:
you are on a roll fella! lets hope it continues, u got a link to that microscope? , Been many years since i have done this old repair stuff and my eyes definitely are not what they used to be!
Click to expand...

One scope, search the bay for this:



Mine is already looking used :D

Few thread updates, firstly I updated the OP with the google sheet which I have also updated for the Turquoise console.
 
Spacedeck said:
Are you selling these after repairing? Looks awesome.

So where would someone who's never repaired anything before start?
Click to expand...

Some of them are for me, some of them I am selling. It's more about the doing and sharing for me at the moment than it is really making any money although if you check the spreadsheet I made you will see that the switches in particular have quite a bit of meat left on the bone in terms of a bit of profit, as does a properly sorted game gear, game boy or Atari. Getting started for me was just stumbling across a lot of 3 faulty consoles so I bought them, did a bit of reading up and decided to repair and mod them and that's where it all started a few months back. You don't need any special knowledge and you learn as you go, I am no electrical guru but am learning new stuff all the time about how certain things work, what you really do need are some bare essentials such as a soldering iron, solder, multimeter, flux and a rework station all of which can be had for cheap, I think I spent probably £70 on everything mentioned above so you can be as cheap as you like. For more modern stuff with much smaller components you wont get far without a scope but on something like a game gear your eyes are plenty good enough!
 
pingwing said:
We've been promised 20 switch lites and we expect 20 fixed switch lites :p
Click to expand...

Well I don't disappoint then... Made a lowball (compared to what they were listed at) offer on these:



a little higher than my normal 65 limit but at 69 each there should be some profit in these! Plus that illusive coral one is in there... ive done 2 Turquoise already plus a black and ive got a yellow on the bench so hopefully ill have a full working set :D Think I may need some more ports and M92 chips! I am getting a lot closer on the yellow, managed to reball that tiny chip and its taking all the right power now but just not booting... Next mission work out why it isn't booting.
 
[Death] said:
many thanks for that buddy!, the GBA arrived today, very tidy condition until i got inside, seems some corrosion around, and its blown the F1 (0603) fuse off the board, going to have to wire an inline direct from feed to the pad thats left. The power switch is also inoperative and will need removing and fixing. thats before i can even get to testing the rest :)

gameboy.jpg
Click to expand...

That really doesn't look too bad! id be tempted to clean up the battery connectors and test with a bench supply :D you can then test the switch with the board out of the housing. To me though that one looks like it will clean up nicely. What you thinking? IPS display? With a decent IPS these sell for silly money somewhere in the £150 region. BTW that F1 fuse looks like the pad is still there, scratch that bad boy back a bit and you should be able to slap a new fuse in. I'd try not to bridge it if possible and put a new fuse in. One other thing Gel Flux make sure you have the Gel stuff, everything else is pants in comparison imo. Ive got liquid stuff as well but that stuff just burns off way too easily and leaves a ton of nastiness.

Really looking forward to the GBC IPS mod and the 3DS tbh, the 3DS will be a total ball ache but im ready for it!
 
Last edited:
@Maccy can I have another title change please sir, this thread has evolved into something I didn't think it would so the title must evolve with it.

Vince's Ebay Repair Thread - (Console Repairs & Mods)

Also I thought we used to be able to change thread titles but since the forum upgrade I cannot do it... No biggie but im sure it used to be there at least for me.
 
[Death] said:
Ye going to clean up the pad with a fibreglass pen and see if I Can get some contact, got a few nice soft brushes on way for the ipa. Have the fuses on order already :) .

Definitely going to be an IPS screen upgrade if I can get it running nicely, the case is in great condition.
Click to expand...

Good to see a few others picking up the tools and repairing old stuff :) - Seems to be a nice community around repair in general and plenty of info out there for most things. Feel free to share any repairs/mods of your own in here at any time :)

About brushes, don't mess around with soft brushes they don't work, straight up use a toothbrush!

Im still looking for cool stuff to fix at the right price but all that seem to be coming up is switches I mean I enjoy a switch but I think im going to be on the lookout for more retro as well.
 
Last edited:
Tonight updates are not much really, I put one new analogue stick in the green one and one new in the grey, while I had the grey apart for a proper clean I thought I would revisit that one way charge issue and reflowed m92 again but this time with a lot more pressure on the chip. What do you know, it only went and fixed it! So thats the grey one 100% sorted now as well.

Spent another half hour looking at the yellow one but i'm writing the main board off as that bga is not available anywhere. The screen, daughter board etc are all good so ill have it for parts and as a donor. It's a shame as thats the only thing wrong with it im sure. Still a good £40+ left in parts so after a few more switches or selling on the parts it shouldn't be such a loss.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom