⟐ Commented May 30, 2025 at 1:16 MST

⟐ Commented July 12, 2023 at 4:28 MST

⟐ Commented November 06, 2022 at 14:13 MST

1. Check the charger. Charger puts out 5.7VDC.
2. Check battery terminals. Good Contact, outputting 5.7VDC
3. Check F2. Good continuity. I was unable to find "F1" on the board, but this is NOT a DS Lite.
4. Check and replace EM10. New EM10 installed, continuity verified.
5. Reflow all solder joints on the charging port.
6. Verify VDC on charging port. Second leg from the right putting out 5.7VDC.

What am I missing? What other steps could there be? Does anyone have a schematic that I could use to chase down the circuit path?

Thank you for your help!

⟐ Commented June 09, 2022 at 9:10 MST

I have uploaded an image of the touchscreen damage on my Nintendo DS. I have felt the texture of these areas and found that the top layer is chipped, not raised.

Accuracy is horrible, especially very close to the center of the screen, and certain areas of the touchscreen are inaccessible.

I’m ordering a tri wing screwdriver to look into it, but I want to know what my next step of action is: do I try to fix the digitizer layer in place (is it dislodged), or just replace it completely. Or would it be easier to just replace the entire touchscreen?

I also have a DSi touchscreen with less visible damage but a more grave condition of permanent input just off center in the screen, making the touchscreen essentially unusable. What should I do with that?

The second photo shows what I’m using as a stylus when I need it. My hands are very large and make it very hard for me to use the stylus’s that come with the consoles (and my NDS just didn’t come with one). Its an apple pen clone. But I think I’ve had some aggressive play that has chipped the screen over the course of about 5000 inputs or more. I am open to other tall styli that might not damage the screen like this in the future (it is all metal), and if you have recommendations I’m all ears.

I’ve been unable to diagnose this: the bottom screen of my phat Nintendo DS is blank (with maybe the faintest outlines of the display, in a bluish-green). The backlight still works, as does the touch panel. The large LCD ribbon, which I assume outputs the display, seems to be connected properly, and the socket looks fine.

I’ve tried swapping the screen with a new one, and made sure the ribbon was connected properly, to no avail. Any ideas?

-take a cheap sacrificial cartridge apart

-make a silicone mold of both sides

-pour resin in the custom molds

-add decorative glitters and paints and papers and whatnot

-cure the resin

-switch the inner chip and sticker label to the new resin shell

-put it together somehow????? (glue?)

-test the end result to make sure it still functions

-reuse the mold and repeat steps 3-8 for future projects

-happy sparkly gaming days

I just got the Essential Electronics Toolkit earlier today for my birthday, so I immediately used it to pry apart a cheap DS game I had laying around. I got it apart, but only through brute force. I ended up leaving scratches and scuffs and even cracked the plastic. Any bits of damage done to the shell will end up transferring to the mold and final resin piece, so I want to be able to minimize that. Since the first one ended up being such a disaster, it’s clear to me i’m going to have to try again with other cheap games until I can get it apart without breaking the whole thing.

So aside from sticking tools into a groove and prying and slicing at the plastic seal until the two halves separate, does anyone have any better ideas on how to take these things apart?

Checked all ribbon cables are seated properly but reseated anyways. Checked power button contact and that looked to be fine. Any ideas?

⟐ Commented February 06, 2021 at 7:38 MST

I assume it’s a different problem, because when I disconnect the top screen it goes back to flashing only once, I didn’t manage to find anyone having the same problem.

I know I messed up by apporaching the screen replacement very confidently, I would appreciate any suggestions on what to do, thank you for reading.

Recently I got a Japanese Original DS from Japan with a broken hinge in hopes of repairing the system with a new shell. Afterward while testing the system, everything appeared to be in working order, except the upper screen would gain an orange hue around the edge of the screen and a bright orange pixel would display in the middle. However, this ONLY happened while a game was running; on the main menu, pictochat, etc. the problem was non-existent.

I was hoping to find an answer on this forum before I take apart the system again to hopefully resolve the issue. As well as hoping a simple cleaning of the motherboard or contacts may be the issue, however, if cleaning can not resolve it I am fully prepared to purchase replacement parts.

Thank you.

Some background on the issue… the problem began yesterday.  I was attempting to enter the system config. menu, but found the console would freeze after clicking the menu icon (this worked fine the previous day!).  After only few repeated attempts and reboots later, the NDS suddenly began to freeze during boot up as described above.  Interestingly, I have a “Super Card SD” and the content on that cartridge (slot 2) successfully loads/plays flawlessly. Am I correct to assume the system reads slot 2 first by default? Because the “Super Card SD” works, I believe it’s not an issue with the screens themselves, or those internal connections (which were suspect as I’ve replaced the bottom screen a few months ago).  I’ve also tried fully charging and then switching the current battery with a spare, and no difference.  To add to this, I just recently acquired, setup, and have been using a new R4 card, for the past few days with no issues.

Could the R4 card have corrupted something internally?  Is there an alternative way to do a “safe boot” and access the system menu/files?    Is there some type of firmware I can use in place of the system interface? I’d love to salvage this thing and get it to work if I can. I’m about to open it up and examine the boards/ribbons for anything suspicious. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.   Thank you!

⟐ Commented July 29, 2020 at 14:19 MST