Hardware Old 3DS battery and wireless and other issues

IC_

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Is my 3DS dying? I'm having some issues with it recently
It started a few weeks or months ago when I noticed that the battery doesn't last very long anymore but I thought it's normal because I use it so much
Some time after that the low battery warnings started acting really weird, sometimes the power LED goes red and starts blinking in a few seconds and turns off really fast before I can save or do anything or the battery percentage keeps jumping between 5 and 10 or more percent so the power LED changes every few seconds and when it turns off the LED goes back to blue
About 2 weeks ago when I opened my 3DS it wouldn't go out of sleep mode and I had to hold the power button for 10 seconds but I thought that it happens sometimes because something like this already happened 1 or 2 times in the past 2 years and I didn't worry about anything
A few days ago I tested how long the battery will last on both my 3DS and 2DS with max brightness and my 3DS lasted only 1 hour and 5 minutes while the 2DS lasted 3 hours and I think I'll swap the batteries
Today I had issues with the wifi
It started in the morning when I opened my 3DS and went to the friend list and waited for it to go online but nothing happened so I tried pushing the wireless switch to restart the wifi but wireless wouldn't turn off even with luma menu and then I pressed X to go back to the home menu but it got stuck on the white screen with the home menu text and wireless still didn't want to turn off and it didn't even want to go into sleep mode but the 3D and luma menu still worked so I restarted with the luma menu and the wireless worked again then I played a bit and closed it
When I came back after a few hours it didn't want to go out of sleep mode again and after restarting the wireless didn't work but it sometimes said that it's connected to the internet and even after restarting multiple times it still didn't work but the wireless switch worked
When I went to the settings to try doing a connection test on multiple access points it would get stuck on connecting to access point but the status on the top would alternate between enabled and internet and I even got a generic luma error when connecting in the friend list but I didn't see anything else it said because I was pressing buttons in the friend list and it instantly restarted
I thought it was a problem with the wireless card and maybe reconnecting it would fix it but I'm not home right now and can't open my 3DS so I thought I'll just be offline for a few days and turned my 3DS off
My 3DS already had a problem with playing online half a year or more ago I think it was error 018-0201 and reconnecting the wireless card and cleaning the contacts with alcohol fixed it
I came back now after a few hours and the wireless works again but I'm really worried that there's something wrong and my 3DS might be dying
Is the not going out of sleep mode caused by the wireless card? Should I replace the wireless card? Should I transfer to my new 3DS before this 3DS completely dies?
I use my 3DS a lot so I understand that some things might break faster but this is bad

Here's a history of issues and things I did to my 3DS
  • I bought my old 3DS used in October 2017 and installed homebrew on it with soundhax
  • A month later I installed b9s and luma and updated to the latest version
  • In December the R button stopped responding while playing smash and my friend told me to blow into the button and that fixed it
  • A few months later the issue came back on both trigger buttons and blowing would only fix it temporarily and it kept getting worse so I opened my 3DS and tried to clean the buttons from the inside but it didn't do anything
  • I bought new buttons and replaced them in May 2018
  • My SD card died in June 2018 but I was able to recover all files and replaced the card
  • In October or November 2018 I couldn't play online and had to reconnect and clean the wireless card
  • Around the same time the circle pad felt weird so I took it apart and there was hair inside
Everything was fine after that until the recent issues
 
Last edited by IC_,

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Is my 3DS dying? I'm having some issues with it recently
It started a few weeks or months ago when I noticed that the battery doesn't last very long anymore but I thought it's normal because I use it so much
Some time after that the low battery warnings started acting really weird, sometimes the power LED goes red and starts blinking in a few seconds and turns off really fast before I can save or do anything or the battery percentage keeps jumping between 5 and 10 or more percent so the power LED changes every few seconds and when it turns off the LED goes back to blue
About 2 weeks ago when I opened my 3DS it wouldn't go out of sleep mode and I had to hold the power button for 10 seconds but I thought that it happens sometimes because something like this already happened 1 or 2 times in the past 2 years and I didn't worry about anything
A few days ago I tested how long the battery will last on both my 3DS and 2DS with max brightness and my 3DS lasted only 1 hour and 5 minutes while the 2DS lasted 3 hours and I think I'll swap the batteries
Today I had issues with the wifi
It started in the morning when I opened my 3DS and went to the friend list and waited for it to go online but nothing happened so I tried pushing the wireless switch to restart the wifi but wireless wouldn't turn off even with luma menu and then I pressed X to go back to the home menu but it got stuck on the white screen with the home menu text and wireless still didn't want to turn off and it didn't even want to go into sleep mode but the 3D and luma menu still worked so I restarted with the luma menu and the wireless worked again then I played a bit and closed it
When I came back after a few hours it didn't want to go out of sleep mode again and after restarting the wireless didn't work but it sometimes said that it's connected to the internet and even after restarting multiple times it still didn't work but the wireless switch worked
When I went to the settings to try doing a connection test on multiple access points it would get stuck on connecting to access point but the status on the top would alternate between enabled and internet and I even got a generic luma error when connecting in the friend list but I didn't see anything else it said because I was pressing buttons in the friend list and it instantly restarted
I thought it was a problem with the wireless card and maybe reconnecting it would fix it but I'm not home right now and can't open my 3DS so I thought I'll just be offline for a few days and turned my 3DS off
My 3DS already had a problem with playing online half a year or more ago I think it was error 018-0201 and reconnecting the wireless card and cleaning the contacts with alcohol fixed it
I came back now after a few hours and the wireless works again but I'm really worried that there's something wrong and my 3DS might be dying
Is the not going out of sleep mode caused by the wireless card? Should I replace the wireless card? Should I transfer to my new 3DS before this 3DS completely dies?
I use my 3DS a lot so I understand that some things might break faster but this is bad

Here's a history of issues and things I did to my 3DS
  • I bought my old 3DS used in October 2017 and installed homebrew on it with soundhax
  • A month later I installed b9s and luma and updated to the latest version
  • In December the R button stopped responding while playing smash and my friend told me to blow into the button and that fixed it
  • A few months later the issue came back on both trigger buttons and blowing would only fix it temporarily and it kept getting worse so I opened my 3DS and tried to clean the buttons from the inside but it didn't do anything
  • I bought new buttons and replaced them in May 2018
  • My SD card died in June 2018 but I was able to recover all files and replaced the card
  • In October or November 2018 I couldn't play online and had to reconnect and clean the wireless card
  • Around the same time the circle pad felt weird so I took it apart and there was hair inside
Everything was fine after that until the recent issues
Not sure about the other issues but all the power issues sound like they are just from a worn out battery. The way battery percentage is measured is by measuring the voltage, but the voltage curve isn't linear, and when the battery gets worn out this curve changes so you can end up with the battery seeming good from 100-50% but then dropping from 50 down to 0 in a third of the time it took from 100 down to 50. This is not at all unusual. Also, the current power draw affects the measured voltage as well, which gets worse as the battery wears out, so that would explain the percentage jumping all over the place.
 
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First try replacing the battery to see if that remedies all of the o3DS problems.

The dangers of bloated or swollen battery and how to dispose.
Judging the quality of a generic battery versus official battery by mass comparison.
This has info about buying generic or 3rd party brand 3DS/2DS batteries, especially for those who are not in the North American market. Also see the testing for the Cellonic brand.
Substituting the [ o2DS / o3DS / n2DSXL / Switch Pro Controller ] battery on the n3DS (not XL).
 

IC_

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Get a replacement battery and TL;DR
The battery in my 3DS is dying and I have other issues with wireless and stability and power and I don't know what to do and if my 3DS is dying
First try replacing the battery to see if that remedies all of the o3DS problems.

The dangers of bloated or swollen battery and how to dispose.
Judging the quality of a generic battery versus official battery by mass comparison.
This has info about buying generic or 3rd party brand 3DS/2DS batteries, especially for those who are not in the North American market. Also see the testing for the Cellonic brand.
Substituting the [ o2DS / o3DS / n2DSXL / Switch Pro Controller ] battery on the n3DS (not XL).
Should I put the 3DS battery in my 2DS or is it better to buy a new battery? They're both original batteries and the 3DS battery looks normal but it's used
 
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The battery in my 3DS is dying and I have other issues with wireless and stability and power and I don't know what to do and if my 3DS is dying

Should I put the 3DS battery in my 2DS or is it better to buy a new battery? They're both original batteries and the 3DS battery looks normal but it's used
A battery that dies before the red light starts blinking or 3DS shuts down too soon before you have time to save should be replaced.

Swap in the o2DS battery to the o3DS. You'll want to use a known battery to determine if the o3DS WiFi issue is separate from the battery.

Because official Nintendo replacement battery might not be readily available in Europe, you may need to go with a 3rd party brand like Cellonic or Cameron Sino.
 
Last edited by TurdPooCharger,
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My 3DS didn't want to go out of sleep mode again today and I can't swap the battery until I'm home in a few days
I've noticed several o3DS / o3DSXL / o2DS systems with Luma3DS v10.0.1 and 11.10.0-43 firmware that have been having a wide range of game crashes and boot problems lately.

If your o3DS is currently using Luma3DS v10.0.1, see if its stability improves with the older Luma3DS v9.1.
 

IC_

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I've noticed several o3DS / o3DSXL / o2DS systems with Luma3DS v10.0.1 and 11.10.0-43 firmware that have been having a wide range of game crashes and boot problems lately.

If your o3DS is currently using Luma3DS v10.0.1, see if its stability improves with the older Luma3DS v9.1.
I downgraded to luma 9.1 I'll see what happens
How does luma 10 break so much stuff? I thought it's an update that added some new features and didn't change any important things
 
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I downgraded to luma 9.1 I'll see what happens
How does luma 10 break so much stuff? I thought it's an update that added some new features and didn't change any important things
Programming is like playing Jenga. Creating increasingly complex software is much like stacking a growing tower of bricks. At some point sooner or later, something that use to work fine breaks because the base code was updated. To add more features, you have to streamline your code or else your program becomes too bloated.

This problem is not unique to Luma3DS. This sort of thing frequently happens for many big projects when they start including stuff that wasn't originally conceived or intended from the beginning. We call this feature creep.
 
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Shadow#1

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Programming is like playing Jenga. Creating increasingly complex software is much like stacking a growing tower of bricks. At some point sooner or later, something that use to work fine breaks because the base code was updated. To add more features, you have to streamline your code or else your program becomes too bloated.

This problem is not unique to Luma3DS. This sort of thing frequently happens for many big projects when they start including stuff that wasn't originally conceived or intended from the beginning. We call this feature creep.
It's called regression
 

IC_

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My 3DS didn't have any issues after downgrading to Luma 9.1 but now I swapped the batteries with my 2DS and my 2DS with Luma 10 didn't want to go out of sleep mode
I'll try downgrading my 2DS to Luma 9.1 too but this is weird and I don't understand how an old used battery could cause this
 
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My 3DS didn't have any issues after downgrading to Luma 9.1 but now I swapped the batteries with my 2DS and my 2DS with Luma 10 didn't want to go out of sleep mode
I'll try downgrading my 2DS to Luma 9.1 too but this is weird and I don't understand how an old used battery could cause this
So your o3DS battery put in your o2DS system causes your o2DS to behave like the o3DS with the failure to wake from sleep mode?

Put back the o2DS battery to the o2DS system and see if waking from sleep mode returns to normal.

You'll then know from this A/B testing that your o3DS battery needs to be replaced.
 

IC_

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So your o3DS battery put in your o2DS system causes your o2DS to behave like the o3DS with the failure to wake from sleep mode?

Put back the o2DS battery to the o2DS system and see if waking from sleep mode returns to normal.

You'll then know from this A/B testing that your o3DS battery needs to be replaced.
It only happened once it doesn't happen every time
 
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It only happened once it doesn't happen every time
If your o3DS battery can't maintain a steady power supply when it approaches low battery life, I think the 3DS system records fluctuated readings during sleep mode where this triggers power off sequence. However, because the battery life does not stay low for too long, the o3DS switches back to staying in sleep mode. The 3DS then crashes in sleep mode with its last command is to stay in sleep mode.

You will have to see how the o3DS fairs with the o2DS battery.

TBH, you're better off replacing the battery since it has a measly ~ 1 hour duration, and it shuts off too quickly once the LED blinks red.
 

IC_

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If your o3DS battery can't maintain a steady power supply when it approaches low battery life, I think the 3DS system records fluctuated readings during sleep mode where this triggers power off sequence. However, because the battery life does not stay low for too long, the o3DS switches back to staying in sleep mode. The 3DS then crashes in sleep mode with its last command is to stay in sleep mode.

You will have to see how the o3DS fairs with the o2DS battery.

TBH, you're better off replacing the battery since it has a measly ~ 1 hour duration, and it shuts off too quickly once the LED blinks red.
The battery was fully charged or above 50% every time it happened
I bought another old 2DS and a DSi a few days ago and maybe that 2DS will have a better battery
 

IC_

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I just opened my 3DS (with a good battery and luma 9.1 and the battery was about 60%) and it didn't go out of sleep mode but it only happened once and there doesn't seem to be any other issues
I'll update if anything else happens but I hope this was just one random time and there won't be more problems soon
 

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