Hardware Heavy corruption on GBA only games, GBC games play fine

[Cuelhu]

Guys, I've got this faulty GBA cheap in hope to repair it, but this problem I've never heard of. The system plays GB and GBC games like it should, but when I try to play GBA games, It loads the tiles ramdomly, making the screen garbled, very messed up. The sound is terrible as well (watch out, headphone users). The GBA carts play on other systems, as I have 1 AGS-101, 2 AGS-001, and 1 AGB-001 to test.
Ez-Flash IV doesn't even boot on it, I get just a blank screen.

I've got a video of it, so you can see what happens:



Though, the mess is random. The screen where you should choose your save slot sometimes have a dying Mario (instead of the one swimming on the video). I thought of BIOS corruption, but the GAMEBOY logo from the boot up is OK, and GBC games work fine (tried the two aspect ratios as well).

GBATemp, you're my only help!

Thanks for your attention.

 

[Dionicio3]

Guys, I've got this faulty GBA cheap in hope to repair it, but this problem I've never heard of. The system plays GB and GBC games like it should, but when I try to play GBA games, It loads the tiles ramdomly, making the screen garbled, very messed up. The sound is terrible as well (watch out, headphone users). The GBA carts play on other systems, as I have 1 AGS-101, 2 AGS-001, and 1 AGB-001 to test.
Ez-Flash IV doesn't even boot on it, I get just a blank screen.

I've got a video of it, so you can see what happens:



Though, the mess is random. The screen where you should choose your save slot sometimes have a dying Mario (instead of the one swimming on the video). I thought of BIOS corruption, but the GAMEBOY logo from the boot up is OK, and GBC games work fine (tried the two aspect ratios as well).

GBATemp, you're my only help!

Thanks for your attention.

Open it up and send nudes pictures of the mother board

 

[Shadow#1]

Open it up and send nudes pictures of the mother board

Yea good idea

 

[Cuelhu]

Sorry for the delay, as I was at work, but I'm at home already.
Pics can be seen here or inside the spoiler.
Warning: Big images! Broadband only.

Spoiler

As you can see, there is a lot of manual solder, and the cartridge slot was probably replaced.

 

[Coto]

I had a GBA SP that didnt load flash/sram/eeprom, while carts were OK.

turns out I had to resolder ARM AGB CPU pins, everything is fine now.

If the GBA bios shows up then it's likely what I said!

 

[Dionicio3]

Sorry for the delay, as I was at work, but I'm at home already.
Pics can be seen here or inside the spoiler.
Warning: Big images! Broadband only.

Spoiler

As you can see, there is a lot of manual solder, and the cartridge slot was probably replaced.

Also, just to let you know, the reason why GB&GBC games work fine is because they use the CPU AGB arm chip, which is completely different from the chip GBA games use

 

[Coto]

Also, just to let you know, the reason why GB&GBC games work fine is because they use the CPU AGB arm chip, which is completely different from the chip GBA games use

 

[Cuelhu]

I had a GBA SP that didnt load flash/sram/eeprom, while carts were OK.

turns out I had to resolder ARM CPU pins, everything is fine now.

If the GBA bios shows up then it's likely what I said!

Gosh, if I'd have to solder such tiny spots, I have to buy a smaller pointer.

Also, just to let you know, the reason why GB&GBC games work fine is because they use the CPU AGB arm chip, which is completely different from the chip GBA games use

Just wanted to rule out video issues, as the screen works OK with them, so GBC part is fine.