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For cleaning since the 90s I've used 91% isopropyl alcohol. Originally used a stiff stick q-tip, but after getting a security bit years ago I stopped that mostly. I find just getting a square of paper towel, folding it over, ripping it in 4 strips, and then taking those strips and folding them over some more into a firm pad and soaking it in the alcohol works best. A good bit of thumb pressure and it gets stuff nice and clean. Same strips I use to clean the inside of the cart slot, and the body of the cart as well. If something is so badly messed up you bought used on the pins, a little piece of soaked in alcohol magic eraser does wonders.

I bent the pins back on my NES and clipped the lockout chip about 7 years ago and I very rarely have a problem getting a game to run.

Recently I tried the boiling method on three non-working units and each of them instantly sprung to life. It even salvaged a pin connector that I messed up while bending the pins.

Losing AV and paying all that money for a top loader isn't worth it in my opinion. Especially when you can fix your toaster up and get it playing better than new in under an hours time for little to no cost.

CRTGAMER wrote:

Snatch1414 wrote:I clean every game twice when I take it home. I mean it's understandable given the age but I don't really feel like finding, cleaning, and repairing a new NES every year.

How do you clean the game carts? Disassembly of the shells allows for a much better cleaning of the contacts. The pencil eraser method is the easiest and leaves no chemical residue.

Never use a Game Genie; it has thicker PCB contacts which ruin Top Loader pins.

I use isopropyl alcohol 91% as was mentioned. If something really doesn't want to play I'll take the shell off and use brass cleaner then the alcohol again, which seemed to be a great method if one has the time. Now even those games don't want to play.

I wasn't really aware of the boiling method so maybe I will try that. I'll search for some info on the security chip thing too. Might as well do both if I'm in there working. I need to clean two NES' now (and an SNES) because I have another one I was going to clean and give to a friend for Xmas. Good times. Thanks for the advice though everyone. Anything else feel free to mention it.

Hate to sound like a shill at this point, but you know what isn't a bad idea?

Getting a Retron 5.

No doubt --IF-- you get the revised hardware, the original is playing with fire. Top is durable, pins are better more durable, controller ports stronger and with rubber caps, etc. See for yourself from my system -- https://drive.google.com/#folders/0B_eU ... 1p5TTEtM00

A few weeks back, put my first SNES game into it and just like the NES and FC ports, it's not 'death grip' and is just right. Get all the perks of a top loader, more systems, HDMI output, use original controllers (or not), and with a simple SD card with files loaded you can hack US games something different or better, and then there's stuff where you can put Japanese games into english too. Throw all those emulator features from a/v filters, save/load states, hot saves and more and it's a fair option. The system has no input lag unless your TV is causing the problem and it would on a real old top loader too.

Is that new revision better about not killing saves? I'd love to get one just to back up all my old savegames before the batteries give up the ghost. (My Zelda II is somehow still going 24 years later!)

That was a software problem that was fixed back in the 1.6 firmware I believe it was.

That drove me up the wall causing me 3 restarts on FF6A, and it took much of my interest out of finishing it after re-doing the first 1/4 or so of the game so I've been at a crawl on that one thinking of switching to my sealed copy of FF5 instead.

The R5 in a way is a perfect legit back up device for saves. You can take any save and import it to the system and then you're battery free, but you can copy back to the cart. So you could copy -- remove/replace battery with new -- place old save back on cart with new battery, and you're good for another 20 years.

As a possible alternative to refurbishing your 72-pin or purchasing a top-loader, you could take a look at this Kickstarter project: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/11 ... g-your-nes

Teh Lurv wrote:As a possible alternative to refurbishing your 72-pin or purchasing a top-loader, you could take a look at this Kickstarter project: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/11 ... g-your-nes

Great that someone's making a replacement. That name is terrible though.

Hobie-wan wrote:

Teh Lurv wrote:As a possible alternative to refurbishing your 72-pin or purchasing a top-loader, you could take a look at this Kickstarter project: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/11 ... g-your-nes

Great that someone's making a replacement. That name is terrible though.

That looks pretty awesome! Only question that I have, and it seems no one else has asked, is how easy is it to remove the cartridge? With the ZIF slot there's almost no grip, so it comes right out, and it's angled up so you can grab the edge of the cart. With this one, it's parallel to the opening, and seems like it'd be relatively difficult to get leverage on to remove. Or am I missing something obvious here?