The following is an unusually long ramble on cleaning video game consoles and cartridges. It's mostly geared around the original Nintendo - as it's really crucial to keep that system clean for it to be reliable. But almost everything also applies to any other cartridge based system. If you keep your console and games clean, you shouldn't have to "fiddle" with anything to get a game to play.
Apologies in advance for the length of this post. I wrote this a while back, but never posted it because it was so long... But, hopefully this could help someone.
We've all had this happen - put a game in the Nintendo, turn it on, and you get a blinking white screen and the power light flashes. Or, you turn it on and the game plays, but with lines in it. Or, on other consoles, the game simply doesn't play at all. We also have all taken out the cartridge, blown in it, and plugged it back in - and that sometimes even works. When these problems get frequent, it's time to clean your stuff!
For the avid game console collector, I feel that one of the most important things you can do is keep your collection, and your console, clean. Also, perhaps even more important, is to ensure that you don't *damage* anything in attempts to clean it. You also need to keep with it, to ensure that once you've cleaned it, it *stays* clean. So, there is an order to things:
- Clean the console/replace the connector. The original NES is famous for it's connector wearing out, and new ones are available. A nice fresh connector makes a huge difference.
- Clean all your games. (Yes, I know this is going to take forever...)
- As soon as you get another game, clean it *before* you play it. Do you want to be importing some random dirt into your nice clean console? And even though a game might look clean, it's still a good idea to give it a proper cleaning before trying it out - better safe than sorry.
So, step one. Clean the console. This procedure depends on the particular console - and if it's an original Nintendo and it's gotten really flakey, don't even bother cleaning the connector, just replace it. You can get a new one on eBay for like ten bucks.
Numerous cleaning kits exist for various consoles. They generally work OK, and you can use them, provided that they aren't already filthy and worn - they'll do more harm than good. I'm going to assume that you don't have one - and cleaning it manually really does give the best results anyway.
For the original Nintendo, take it apart and remove the cartridge connector - for other consoles, you don't need to do this since you can access the connector from the top. For the Atari, you'll need a toothpick or small screwdriver to insert into the small opening to the left or right of the cartridge slot - this opens the dust shield and allows you to access the slot.
Take a thin piece of non-shiny cardboard, like an index card, and fold it in half. Cut it to the width of the cartridge slot you're cleaning. Inside the index card, put another scrap of cardboard/paper - you're trying to make this folded card the same thickness as the circuit board inside a game cartridge. Make up two of these.
Wet the folded edge of the first one with isopropyl alcohol (91% if you can get it). Insert the folded edge into the cartridge slot and firmly press it in - work it in and out a couple times, and pull it out. See all those black lines? That's dirt that won't be bothering your gameplay any longer. If it's really dirty, flip it inside out, reposition the spacer cardboard back to the inside, wet it again and repeat. After that, go at it with the second piece of card - this time dry. You should get very little off on the dry one. Don't slide a narrow piece of cardboard back and forth inside the slot - these connectors aren't meant to take forces this way, and the card can easily catch on a pin and bend it sideways, and the card can also shred and leave fibers jammed into pins. So push it straight in, pull it straight out.
After cleaning, carefully examine the conector for any loose paper fibers or fuzz - if necessary blow it out with a can of air.
In the case of the original Nintendo, it's a pain to get in there - so here's a quick and easy way to get it pretty clean. Take a junk cartridge and disassemble it, removing the board. Get an adhesive address label - the paper kind, not the shiny type, and stick it on the contacts, folding it over the edge and onto the contacts on the other side. You want to cover the contacts of your junk game with the label. Put the board back in the casing, and put this cart into the Nintendo. Push it all the way in, wiggle it a bit, and pull it out. The rough surface of the label will clean away a decent amount of the dirt that has built up on the pins inside the connector. Not quite as well as taking apart the machine and cleaning it by hand, but it does a pretty decent job.
Now that you've got the connector in the console clean, it's time to move onto the games. Before you go attacking your games with solvents and cleaners, I'll try to explain what exactly it is you're cleaning - that is - what a game cartridge is made of.
As we all know, a game cartridge is a plastic case with a printed circuit board inside. A printed circuit board is a base substrate - either fiberglass FR2 or similar, or phenolic. The substrate starts life with a complete coating on both sides of copper. This copper is then printed upon with a resist - a substance that resists acid. The board is then etched - dipped in an acid solution that eats copper - but it only eats the copper where the resist isn't printed. So, by printing a pattern - traces, pads and edge fingers onto the board, eating away everything that's *not* wanted, you get a perfect pattern of copper. But, copper alone is kind of fragile - for one, it oxidizes easily, and corrodes. So, for this reason, the edge of the board - where it plugs into the Nintendo, gets a special treatment - it gets a gold plating. Gold is expensive, but it's an excellent conductor and it doesn't oxidize. But... there's a problem. Gold doesn't really stick to copper so well. So, the coppper gets a plating (nickel, I do believe), that bonds well to both. Nickel is also a fairly hard material - both gold and copper are soft. The contacts then get their gold plating - it's very very thin, but it provides the corrosion resistance and excellent electrical conductivity required. This gold also isn't pure - it's an alloy with nickel and other metals to make it harder.
Over the years, game cartridges get plugged and unplugged into consoles, thrown on the floor, carried in backpacks, improperly stored, had Coke spilled into them... So at this point, many are pretty dirty. You get two kind of damage to cartridge connectors - accumulated dirt, and scratches. Accumulated dirt, dust, Coke, whatever is just the grime that gets on the contacts. Where half of it comes from, I have no idea. Some of the black crud comes from the plating wearing off the Nintendo connector. Scratches comes from inserting/removing the game hundreds of times, and occasionally from idiots trying to use the eraser on a pencil to clean the games (the metal eraser holder does a number on the contacts). Also, I've heard of people using *sandpaper* to clean games... Also, I know some people tried to bend their old worn NES contacts back into shape - well, if you bend them too far, or twist them any while bending them, they'll scratch tracks into the contacts on the games. The new connectors, while tight, don't scratch the games, since they have fresh, smooth contact surfaces - but a rebent contact can get twisted or bent down at the wrong angle, causing scratches.
Anyway, enough backstory on the construction of cartridges - you want to clean them, not write a thesis on them. Your goal in cleaning is to remove the dirt from the contacts. You *don't* want to remove the plating. That would be a bad thing. Remember, that gold plating is very thin, use an abrasive, and you'll "clean" it right away!
So - what should you use? Isopropyl alcohol and q-tips. Avoid other solvents, they can eat the cartridge plastics too. Alcohol won't damage plastic, nor will it damage the electronic parts. I've seen a couple cartridges where someone clearly tried to clean them with acetone... Acetone eats plastic, so the entire bottom of the carts were all distorted and melty looking...
As for q-tips - use the real Q-tip brand ones, not the cheapie ones if possible - some of those just don't have enough strength or cottony fuzzy to do a good job.
If you have a game bit, take the cartridge apart to get at the board and scrub it good. If not, you can just go at it through the opening at the end. You don't have to take every game apart - but on some extremely dirty ones it's almost a necessity. After a while you'll be able to tell which games will need to be dismantled and scrubbed, and which just need a quick cleaning.
Dip a q-tip in alcohol and scrub one side of the board. And I mean scrub it. Don't be afraid to press hard against the contacts - you won't scratch them with cotton fuzz on a cardboard stick. If you're getting a lot of black crud off, you might need to wet the clean end and go some more. Clean both sides, and don't be afraid to use more than one q-tip. Pay careful attention to the edges of the board - it's harder to clean those when the board is still in the cart, but it's vitally important - especially the first three pins on both sides of the board on the end closest to the ridges that run down the cart. That's where the pins for the lockout chip are. If they're dirty, you get the blinking screen problem.
Carefully look at the pins after you've cleaned them - if they still look grubby, clean again. If you see worn scratches down every pin and lots of dirt, then you might need to get a little more serious.
For really grubby games, or games where you can see lots of dirt, take it apart - you need a gamebit, but you really should get one anyway, it's an incredibly handy tool. Get both sizes - the small one works for NES, SNES, N64 and Gameboy cartridges, and the large one works for Sega Genesis cartridges and SNES and N64 consoles.
To get dirt out of scratches going down the pins, soak a q-tip in alcohol and scrub up and down the pins, going in the direction of the scratch (as opposed to the usual side to side). If it's really bad, then you might need to resort to... abrasives.
Enter Weiman's cooktop cleaner. It's a mild abrasive, and also contains solvents and weak acids for cleaning away corrosion. None of the chemicals in it will damage the contacts - they're gold - and you need some serious stuff to dissolve gold. But, the abrasive component (silica) WILL. The trick with the cooktop cleaner is to use a little bit, and gently dab it on the contacts, and don't press hard, let the solvents do the work. Rub *gently* when using it. If you scrub, you'll find that your q-tip comes off very black... and that black is what _used_ to be the gold plating... the contacts will then be silvery - the underlying nickel layer showing through. Wipe the cooktop cleaner off with a q-tip soaked in alcohol.
Another abrasive trick is to use paper. If you have a board with scratched up contacts, you do a fair job buffing it by taking a bit of computer paper or a post-it note (not the sticky part), folding it over the contacts, grabbing it tightly between your thumb and forefinger, and scrubbing back and forth. The plain paper is just rough enough to do a bit of polishing, but it won't take off too much - at least, it would take a LOT of scrubbing to do so. After using the paper, go over it again with the alcohol, you'd be suprised how well this works.
A soft pencil eraser works OK, but I find it to be less useful than the cooktop cleaner or the paper - and the harder pink erasers tend to be too gritty and seem cause more damage. Similarly, I don't like using erasers because they create little eraser crumbs, that get everywhere.
When reassembling the game, here's a trick - back the screws in. The screws used to hold game cartridges together are self tapping. They cut their own threads as they are screwed in. What this means is that if you just blindly screw them back in, you'll cut a whole new set of threads. Do that too much, and you risk stripping the holes out completely, as there's nothing left. So, put the screw in the hole, and turn it backwards until you feel it click into the threads that are already there, then screw it back in. The same applies to the console itself, and any other plastic devices held together with screws. Wood too.
So, in short - things you should ALWAYS use for cleaning your game cartridges:
- Isopropyl alcohol - purest you can get, 91% is great, and easy to find
- Q-tips - get the real ones if possible, avoid the ones with plastic sticks - cardboard ones are sturdier
Things you should use only on really worn games:
- Wieman's cooktop cleaner
- paper as an abrasive
- soft eraser
Things you should NEVER use on games:
- Brasso (it'll take the plating off real quick)
- sandpaper (you want *less* scratches, not more)
- acetone (it'll eat cartridge plastic)
- hard pink eraser (it's a bit too abrasive)
Before using cooktop cleaner on games, I'd suggest you play with it on a junk cartridge and see what it really does, to get a feel for it. Open up a game like Silent Service, Top Gun, or some similar game that the world should really be without and scrub away with it on a couple pins. Notice how quickly you can get them to change from gold to silver - that black "crud" on your Q-tip *was* the gold plating. Brasso is a fair bit more abrasive than the cooktop cleaner, and can very quickly take the plating off. Scrub with that and you can easily get it down to the copper. Practice using the cooktop cleaner gently, so you can clean it without taking away the gold color.
Note that this writeup primarily applies to Nintendo cartridges. Some later Sega Genesis games seem to be made of much cheaper materials - phenolic substrate boards with some other kind of plating on the fingers, not gold. Your mileage may vary on stuff like that. Alcohol is always safe on games, but I don't know how some of those games will respond to the cooktop cleaner. Taking a bit of the gold plating off the cart isn't good, but it's not a death sentance. Getting it down to the bare copper usually is. It'll work for a while, until the copper oxidizes, then it won't - you'll have to clean it more and more to get it to work at all.
Care and feeding of your cleaned equipment:
Take care of your game console. Never put a dirty cartridge into it. You don't know where it's been! Clean all new acquisitions before playing. In the case of the original Nintendo - avoid the Game Genie. Cheaters never win, and in this case, cheaters wear out the connector in their Nintendo. Since the Game Genie is too long to be clicked with a cartridge inserted, the circuit board is thicker to make contact with the connector in the NES. This works OK, but because it puts so much stress on the connector, it stretches it out to the point where normal games no longer fit and make contact. The Game Genies made for other consoles like the Sega Genesis and the Super Nintendo don't have this problem, of course.
Take care of your cartridges. Keep them clean, keep dust out of them. Don't stick your nice clean games into a dirty console. Or, if you must, clean it again quickly before using it in your good system.
Eeek. You actually read this far? I'm impressed. Either I'm a halfway decent writer, or you have nothing better to do
Anyway, hopefully this is helpful to someone.
-Ian
