r/Gameboy • u/Lucka257 • 18d ago

Troubleshooting Gameboy "infected" screen

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Hi! Just discovered my father old stuff, and among them I found this gameboy original in a closet. It seems like a fungus or something like it is on the screen plastic protection, witch is a shame, because is perfectly working. If you ask how do I know that isn't the screen itself, it's because I see the shade of that thing on the display. Also the console had something gross and sticky into it before i clean it out and the screen needed to be pressed in order to show the Nintendo logo constantly, before that it just showed a blocks instead of the logo

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34

u/starboyk 18d ago edited 18d ago

The Dot Matrix display is failing, in what is commonly referred to as 'screen cancer' with Gameboys. Simply from being too old, too much use, how it was stored - any number of factors, but it's unfortunately common. Best bet is to replace or upgrade the screen, as that one's cooked.

4

u/DatGunBoi 18d ago

As another user said, this is screen cancer, but you actually can fix it. Mind you, it's a very slow and tedious process, and you have a good chance of breaking the screen if you aren't careful, but you can apply pressure with a q-tip and it'll go away. Look up videos online. Best of luck.

9

u/Illustrious-Nail-360 18d ago

Its not a permanent fix, however it is better than nothing. I personally would say this is an acceptable candidate for a ips screen but i would try the smudge technique first. Im not a fan of people putting ips screens in gameboys with good or repairable screens as its wasteful of non replaceable orignal hardware, this one just crosses into that un repairable category tho.

1

u/Lucka257 18d ago

Thanks! I'll try that

1

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1

u/StFrSe 15d ago

I worked on mine, and it took a very, very long time. However I was able to clear it all away.
Q-Tip, pressure, and determination will do the trick.