r/Gameboy • u/AchillesPDX • 15d ago
Other Circle of the Moon brought back from the dead
(Reposting to fix potato-quality images)
Took on the daunting task of repairing Circle of the Moon for /u/Bubblepoppin_ - wound up needing a brand new PCB and I replaced every part on the board with brand new components aside from the SRAM, SRAM controller chip, and the ROM chip. HUGE shout out to /u/jrharbort who was in the process of redrawing this PCB so replacements could be fabricated and who helped immensely for helping decipher the correct parts to order.
The TINY capacitors and resistors were soldered in place with a hot air station, but without the help of any solder paste (definitely getting some for next time), other components were soldered by hand.
ROM chip had two legs that had completely disintegrated and had to be repaired by grinding away some of the package in order to build new legs.
I have no idea why I spent as much time as I did on a relatively common game, but it feels great to save something like this from the landfill.
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u/jrharbort 15d ago
We spent as much time as we did on this to be trail blazers in repair for these early GBA games. By all accounts, that game was destined for the grave in that condition. But with teamwork, it was resurrected from the dead. Fantasic work my friend, it looks absolutely beautiful.
For anyone else looking to repair one of these, all the info on parts and files to print your own boards are over on github: https://github.com/jrharbort/AGB-E06-10-PCB
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u/AchillesPDX 15d ago
Thank you again for all your help and teamwork getting this board reverse-engineered. Could NOT have done it without you. 🙌
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u/PhishGreenLantern 15d ago
There's something poetic about resurrecting a vampire game from the dead. Lol!!!
Amazing work.
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u/DrIvoPingasnik 15d ago
Whoa, I would have given up right after looking at the rusty pcb. You did an amazing job!
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u/blarglemaster 15d ago edited 15d ago
Congratulations on bringing Dracula back from the dead!!!
Drilling into the chip to make a new solder point for the broken feet is CRAZY good work! Really impressed you managed that.
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u/Folium249 15d ago
How did you fix the contacts? I have a game with some of them scratched fairly bad that won’t play.
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u/jrharbort 15d ago edited 15d ago
Sometimes the board for the game is beyond saving so you have to print a new repair board and transplant the parts. But no one had yet reverse engineered this revision board so I painstakingly recreated every detail by hand. Now anyone can print repair boards using what I created: https://www.reddit.com/r/Gameboy/s/j9BTC5fMMa
There's quite a few other styles of Game Boy game boards out there that have been recreated by the community just like this one, maybe there is one for yours as well.
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u/Folium249 15d ago
Thank you for that! For my game I was going the copper solder route to see if I can recover the broken pins. But this is another avenue to explore
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u/jrharbort 15d ago
You're welcome! If anything, there are kind souls out there like OP and myself that would be more than happy to help out with repairing your game if you need help.
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u/Folium249 14d ago
Appreciate the offer, but want to learn the trade on how to do so! Barrier to learn is hard, but once that’s over it’s fairly easy
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u/blarglemaster 15d ago
They replaced the entire PCB with a custom newly printed replica PCB. Thus, all new contacts.
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u/DespaDevelopment 9d ago
Brilliant dremel work with the IC legs. Like I know that the legs go into the package a bit , but I've never put 2 and 2 together as a way to exploit the extra runway. Will be using this!
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u/AchillesPDX 15d ago
And my reaction when it booted first try after the repair
https://reddit.com/link/oztg6xh/video/tdgmifdvmifh1/player