Hacking Repairing a DS lite shoulder spring VS. paying Nintendo 75 dollars

[Dardon]

Okay heres the story. I got my hands on a busted black DS lite last week from a buddy of mine. It's touch screen is busted, but it has a good R button still. Now my DS lite is white, everything but the R button is fine. The R button requires me to press very hard down on the DS for it respond. I was thinking about just swapping out parts, but I've never done something like this before

The other option is paying Nintendo 75 USD (or 85 for the 'other' service). This is because my DS is over a year old. In return I'll most likely get a refurbished DS when it comes back to my home.

 

[pokemongalaxy]

think u should repair it urself. try finding a guide for doing so...

 

[science]

Fix it yourself. All you have to do is remove a few screws and then the back of the DS to get at the shoulder buttons. Not a lot of work. You just have to be careful of the power switch

 

[Splych]

fix it your self ! it'll save you money and you'll learn something

just be careful when you take apart your DS though

 

[Rock Raiyu]

I'd rather do it myself then pay $75 to get something thats not even that broken. (I mean, its just the R-Shoulder button

 

[Splych]

who voted " Send to Nintendo "

but but but ... if you are scared that your DS might break or you wont be able to put it back together and your self esteem is low ....

then you might as well Send it to Nintendo ?

or or or ....

pay someone at GBA Temp ( that has experience of course ) to do it for you xD

i heard science got his DS modded by thieves like us for $50 ( shipping back covered as well )

so yea ...

 

[kobykaan]

What your all forgetting with a NINTENDO repair yes it may cost you ...but ..it does come back with a Warranty !

 

[Splych]

lol yea it does xD

but that warranty is only good for the people that haven't modded or flashed the DS . Once it is flashed or modded you will never have a warranty from nintendo again with your DS ...

that warranty is only good for people that haven't modded or flashed their DS though so keep that in mind !

 

[Monster On Strin]

Fix it your self if you know how to or buy a new touch screen and fix the black one and keep it

 

[AndreXL]

R button busted? Blow on it... Should work afterward.

 

[Dardon]

Yeah the 1 year warranty from Nintendo is a nice feature encase of future problems. My DS is unflashed and not modded so unless they can detect I use a flashcard I'm fine. As for the black DS, it does have worn out A button much like my white DS R button, so I would have to do something like what I want to do with my white one to the black using white ds parts ontop of fixing the screen.

As for the R button, Mario Kart and NFS: Pro Street are unplayable because its impossible to hold down the R button for a long period of time. I've also tried everything to clean it thinking it was dirt. I've taken toothpicks, cotton swabs, putting my lips sealing around the R button and blowing, and even a can of compressed air. I even tried banging it on a desk because my brother's DS also had a busted R button because it dropped on the floor. He banged it against a desk and has worked since. so far the pros/cons I thought of for both sides are:

Self-fix Pros:
-Cheaper. I only need 5 dollars (buy the tr-angle screw driver) and my time
-I can learn something new for myself

Self-fix Cons:
-May damage something else in the DS, rendering it unplayable
-If I do the above, I'll need to shell out at least 100+ for a new DS system.

Nintendo fix pros:
-I get a new warranty for a year.
-I don't have to risk doing something I've never done.

Nintendo fix Cons:
-a new DS = losing that information (though I thought about using the broken black DS as a medium to store all of that by transferring it over)
-75 dollars is pretty steep for a little fix, if it was a screen or hinge issue I wouldn't mind, but to fix one little button for 75 dollars is a scam.

 

[Tanas]

All that the R button needs is a spay with WD40.

 

[Sweater Fish Del]

Well, from your thread title, you seem to be assuming that the problem with your shoulder button is in the spring somehow, but from my experience and based on your description of the problem, it sounds more like the microswitch for the R-button has become dismounted from the PCB. That's a somewhat common problem with DS Lites. Unless you're very very handy with a soldering iron, you won't be able to fix this problem. So the solution would be to swap out the entire lower half of the PCB from the black Lite into your white one. That should be possible and honestly not that hard once you've got the system open, but since the black Lite also has a problem with touchscreen, you'll want to also keep the working touchscreen from the white one and connect it to the PCB from the black one, which may be harder (I don't know, actually, since I've never even tried to detach the touchscreen from the DS Lite PCB).

EDIT: Actually, Tanas may be right. Maybe you just have some lint in the microswitch mechanism and then WD-40 (a very tiny bit, I imagine) or compressed air would do the trick. That's the most common problem with DS shoulder buttons. I guess I'm just pre-occupied with the part becoming dismounted since that's what happened to my DS Lite.

In my opinion, the best solution is just to open up the system and see what exactly is wrong with the shoulder button. Maybe it's not detached from the PCB afterall and the fix really is simple, but if it isn't and you don't want to deal with removing the touchscreen, then just close it back up and send it in to Nintendo.

Yes, technically, opening up the system voids your warranty, but I don't think Nintendo checks or has any way of checking, so as long as you don't do anything dumb like leave a wad of chewing gum inside the system or something (actually, that probably wouldn't even matter either), you should be fine.

Same with the issue of a FlashMe'd DS. FlashMe may or may not void your warranty (I don't think it's clear from the warranty description), but either way I've never heard of anyone having their warranty repair request turned down because of a FlashMe installation and lots of people have sent Flashme'd DSes in to Nintendo. Besides, no one even uses FlashMe anymore, do they?


...word is bondage...

 

[mcp2]

Fix it yourself and while you are you can mod the case, have a black and white thang goin on.

 

[JPdensetsu]

Repair it self

 

[704jaffer]

My vote is on do it yourself. If you haven't done so before I would be very careful when putting the DS back together. The power switch and the volume switch both break very easily if the sliders aren't in the position they should be (the power switch in particular.)

EDIT: oh I should add, I also had a sticky L shoulder button, took the DS apart and carefully compressed air'd out the actual button; Things work fine now.

 

[phony]

I actually have the same exact problem with my white DS and R button, it just happened yesterday, I have to press down really hard now for it to even recognize my R button... about a year ago, I did spill mountain dew on that side of the system, I've wiped it off the best I could, but I don't think my R or A button have ever quite been 100% sense. Also, I spotted a hairline crack on the hinge of my DS lite.

Anyways, right away I started looking into case mods and was thinking about buying a couple things off dealextreme, that triwing screwdriver and a clear case would make things different... but that would be a real waste if I bust the power-on switch in the first 5 minutes.. I have to prepare myself more for this, like looking at a ton of photos of people who did it wrong. I'm going to just take my frustration and try some CPR on my R button for now.

 

[BakuFunn]

put your mouth on the R button and blow for like 5 seconds as hard as you can. Rinse and repeat, and it should be fine.

 

[kirby145]

put your mouth on the R button and blow for like 5 seconds as hard as you can. Rinse and repeat, and it should be fine.

I have tried this and still it only fixes temporarily, and I evened opened the case and blew it and cleaned but still it won't fix it completely...

Will WD40 be ok?