Hardware Bought a faulty 3DS with charging problems. Any idea how to fix?

Harsky · Oct 17, 2015

Today I bought a faulty black 3DS for the grand total of... £8. The description says that the problem is that it doesn't charge. I tried it out with a fully charged battery from my working 3DS. Works perfectly (but no downloaded games left on the system).

Then I tried it with my 3DS charger and as expected, it doesn't work BUT when I place it in the charger crade, it charges without a problem. My ultimate goal is to try and get it to charge without a cradle and then gift the 3DS to my relative but anyone have any idea how to fix it?

SmileCitrus · Oct 17, 2015

Nice deal! That's probably the easiest and cheapest thing to fix with 3DSes. Just resolder contacts 1 and 2 on the charge port. They're the ones needed for the charge port to work with the AC adapter. If it works on the charge cradle, the others are fine, but you may still want to add a bit of flux and fresh solder just for stability and longevity.

Harsky · Oct 17, 2015

SmileCitrus said:
Nice deal! That's probably the easiest and cheapest thing to fix with 3DSes. Just resolder contacts 1 and 2 on the charge port. They're the ones needed for the charge port to work with the AC adapter. If it works on the charge cradle, the others are fine, but you may still want to add a bit of flux and fresh solder just for stability and longevity.

Tried it out and didn't work. Added a little more solder to it and it still refuses to charge from cable. Unfortunately, when I plugged in the cable and tried to pull it out, it actually pulled out the charger port with it! BUT the bright side is that it didn't cause damage to the mother board so I desoldered the remaining charger port and ordered a new part. Looks like it's an anxious waiting game now.

DjoeN · Oct 18, 2015

What you mean with no downloaded games left on the system?

Is it a 3DS with pre-installed game? (Like a Mario Kart 7 3DS Bundle) in that case, you just have to link any nnid to it and you can redownload it.

SmileCitrus · Oct 18, 2015

Harsky said:
Tried it out and didn't work. Added a little more solder to it and it still refuses to charge from cable. Unfortunately, when I plugged in the cable and tried to pull it out, it actually pulled out the charger port with it! BUT the bright side is that it didn't cause damage to the mother board so I desoldered the remaining charger port and ordered a new part. Looks like it's an anxious waiting game now.

Ah, that's too bad. For the future though in cases where the charge port is firmly soldered in place but it still doesn't charge, it's usually because the pins in the port are bent too far downwards. You can fix the issue by bending them upwards with some thin tweezers or a needle. But replacement ports are cheap, so replacing the whole port is a good option, too.

Harsky · Oct 18, 2015

DjoeN said:
What you mean with no downloaded games left on the system?

Is it a 3DS with pre-installed game? (Like a Mario Kart 7 3DS Bundle) in that case, you just have to link any nnid to it and you can redownload it.

I was thinking that the owners would buy games and then... forget to format the system. According to the history, it looks like the owner played nothing but DS games and left it alone since 2014.

SmileCitrus said:
Ah, that's too bad. For the future though in cases where the charge port is firmly soldered in place but it still doesn't charge, it's usually because the pins in the port are bent too far downwards. You can fix the issue by bending them upwards with some thin tweezers or a needle. But replacement ports are cheap, so replacing the whole port is a good option, too.

Thanks, I did look up Youtube guides and they did suggest using the needles and it didn't work because I was afraid of breaking it. Welp, I guess if I knew it was going to break, I would've pushed on with the needle/tweezer method.

DjoeN · Oct 18, 2015

ah, ok

pitty indeed

Justin20020 · Oct 18, 2015

Hope it will work with the ordered one

X_Frost · Oct 18, 2015

Is it an O3DS or N3DS, regular or XL?

In my case, I was too scared to solder so I got a Nyko extendable battery with charge base. But that was for the O3DS (not XL) so I'm not sure if that's gonna work for you

03bgood · Oct 19, 2015

I bought a red 3DS (So I could install custom VC games since it has 7.1 and it stops charging once a turn on the system. Is that normal because it doesn't do that on my other 3DS.

The Real Jdbye · Oct 19, 2015

03bgood said:
I bought a red 3DS (So I could install custom VC games since it has 7.1 and it stops charging once a turn on the system. Is that normal because it doesn't do that on my other 3DS.

That's obviously not normal. Are you using the same charger with both?

03bgood · Oct 19, 2015

The Real Jdbye said:
That's obviously not normal. Are you using the same charger with both?

Nope, only the one it came with.

The Real Jdbye · Oct 19, 2015

03bgood said:
Nope, only the one it came with.

Maybe one of the chargers is faulty then.

03bgood · Oct 19, 2015

The Real Jdbye said:
Maybe one of the chargers is faulty then.

Nevermind, it just needed charged because it still charges while powered on after letting it charge for about 3 hours now. Still charging, though.

Harsky · Oct 21, 2015

£2 later and the charger port came. Solder job was a cautious 10 minute job but now it's all fixed up and working. Not bad for something that cost £10 in total. Guess I gotta spend more money on the little things like a stylus and SD card before I give it away.

RikuKawai · Oct 21, 2015

Harsky said:
£2 later and the charger port came. Solder job was a cautious 10 minute job but now it's all fixed up and working. Not bad for something that cost £10 in total. Guess I gotta spend more money on the little things like a stylus and SD card before I give it away.

Doesn't it come with a 2GB SD card? Can't think of any reason why the previous owner would keep it. It's only 2GB.

Harsky · Oct 21, 2015

videogame57 said:
Doesn't it come with a 2GB SD card? Can't think of any reason why the previous owner would keep it. It's only 2GB.

My guess? Probably they bought another 3DS without an SD card and used their existing SD in the new one. But then again, I think there's several spare 2gb ones in my house if I hunt around for it.

Hardware Bought a faulty 3DS with charging problems. Any idea how to fix?

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