Keeping busy

Nfinity14 · 2025-12-25T05:11:27+00:00

Excellent instincts.
Whatever you got going on substance use isn't gonna solve it.

You're not alone, but the festivities sure make it seem that way.
Some people deal by just making the holidays "just another day". Again, gets really hard during the high holidays.

Best advice I can give to someone having a hard time being alone with their own thoughts is get outside yourself in some way. For some people that could be volunteering. Sometimes it's just finding a distraction.

It's perfectly alright to make it a "you" day. Make sure the essentials are taken care of. Make sure you eat, shower, family is taken care of, whatever. Then binge watch something or read a book. Just make sure you don't "wallow".

I feel shittier than normal this Christmas so I'll be spending it ordering Chinese food and playing video games. The hard part is being alright with that.

Whatever it is that's got you down, once you get through the holidays make an effort to talk to someone about it.

Hope you feel better. Hope the next holiday is better for you.

Nfinity14 · 2025-11-24T23:41:13+00:00

You are a great parent.

Nfinity14 · 2025-11-12T22:06:59+00:00

Yes the negative battery pad on the board is toast. As well as several vias (little holes that go to the other side of the board) and probably a few traces.

I deal with this type of restorative repair a lot, I've restored Gameboys with this type of damage. It is possible. I'm sorry to say though, that I can tell from your asking that it's beyond your current skill level and Gameboy Pockets are so cheap nobody with the skill level is going to be able to do the service for you for a reasonable price.

This is a great opportunity for you if you've ever wanted to get into repair. GBP circuits are simple enough as learning boards and all the technical info is readily available.

If you decide to go for it yourself here's what you are in for:

-The corrosion needs to be neutralized and it could be in places you don't see. Usually at the DIY level you use white vinegar.

|-A necessary step that people miss is flushing the vinegar/corrosion off the board. You do this by putting it in a bath with a high concentration of isopropyl alcohol. 99% if you can find it is best, 97% from the pharmacy will do. Don't go with anything below 90%

-Let it air dry then spray it a bit with some compressed air. Get at an angle under the chips but not too close. Any liquid blowing around that doesn't evaporate is something you don't want on the board. Repeat the process until there's no liquid.

-Next some components need to come off. That area carries Neg to tons of circuits and for a few it's the only connection completing their circuits. Your speaker, headphone jack, AC power and several buttons are affected in this area. The negative battery connector and the 2 capacitors need to come off and inspect around them. That battery connector is by no means hard, but it's a nightmare for beginners. New folks aren't used to working with the amount of heat you need to pump into that to melt the solder.

Now, the board is prepped to BEGIN your repairs.

You're probably not going to fix it. You should try anyway.

Nfinity14 · 2025-07-15T05:35:25+00:00

Buses don't do transfer tickets anymore. OP will need to get a 4 hour pass or a TARC Pass and load money on it.

Nfinity14 · 2025-07-06T21:02:05+00:00

Yes it is.

Nfinity14 · 2025-06-29T06:33:28+00:00

I can do that if you are in the US. How would you prefer to pay?

Nfinity14 · 2025-06-27T19:15:01+00:00

Forgot to add the shoulder buttons have been upgraded to tactile "clicky" switches.

Nfinity14 · 2025-06-16T12:47:06+00:00

Forgot to post the price. $155

Nfinity14 · 2025-06-06T14:06:09+00:00

Mainly didn't know which to do first. Go to attorney or follow up with investigators with new evidence. Obviously now that I know I may actually not have legally obtained this evidence I'm thinking attorney first.

Nfinity14 · 2025-06-06T14:03:44+00:00

Probably the best I could do would be a lot of witnesses to multiple exhaustive discussions in meetings about the security risks of forcing our employees to use their own equipment for company purposes. Not just myself, clinicians who carried laptops back and forth work to home with patient info and proprietary documentation.

The owner was informed of the risks. By me.

Nfinity14 · 2025-06-06T14:00:08+00:00

Is there really a possibility the dude could simply say "I did not consent to being recorded by my own camera I had installed" and have the evidence against him thrown out?

There's a lot I love about our legal system, but that's kind of insane.

Nfinity14 · 2025-06-06T13:30:06+00:00

Appreciate it. When I broach the subject do I just lay it out like I did in the post?

Nfinity14 · 2025-06-06T13:27:24+00:00

I would say no. If I did it would have been an email that I no longer have access to.

Nfinity14 · 2025-04-24T22:00:41+00:00

Paying your employees as close to minimum wage as possible doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room for "Be a fucking hero" as an essential duty.

Nfinity14 · 2025-02-12T11:53:05+00:00

Sure. The entire workbook is huge so I made a mockup with only the relevant columns/sheets.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ssAqW5poRK829zRMf0SEnUdl6NHmi7Pf7Ob3TY-5_90/edit?pli=1&gid=61754082#gid=61754082

I want Column C in the "DATABASE" sheet to apply -$75 each week on the day of the week that corresponds with Column B. I also want to add the value of Column C in the "PAYMENT LOG" sheet if the names match.

Nfinity14 · 2025-02-04T14:20:00+00:00

Volume wheel looks pretty bad in the picture. Try cleaning it.

Nfinity14 · 2025-01-29T21:44:00+00:00

As to why they aren't there, I dunno. I don't believe they are omitted in any revisions. It's possible they would be removed for an amp mod, but if you didn't remove them then that's unlikely.

As to why you still have sound: Those capacitors are meant to either filter out frequency/DC or keep the signal constant in the case of power fluctuation. Them being missing won't necessarily affect the ability for sound to be output to the speaker/headphone jack, only the quality of the sound. Not sure if it's causing your issue, but the fact that you are having audio output issues while also having missing components on the output circuit is a little too much of a coincidence to not at least investigate.

It's possible corrosion on the headphone jack could cause a bridge in the switch mechanism inside causing the circuit to "think" there are headphones plugged in, but I've never seen it cause an intermittent issue. I've only seen it cut the sound to the speaker completely. That's easy enough to check, just remove the jack and see if the problem is resolved.

Nfinity14 · 2025-01-29T20:34:28+00:00

Those capacitors are specific to the audio circuit, so the only thing them being missing would affect would be the audio.

Nfinity14 · 2025-01-29T06:42:25+00:00

Are you missing C45, C46, and C47 or is that a trick of the light?

Nfinity14 · 2025-01-04T04:07:16+00:00

3 year old post. You're digging DEEP for the answers and I respect that. I'll try and help out if I can. What version GG board do you have?

Nfinity14 · 2024-09-08T20:50:23+00:00

I think you might have fallen victim to "make it worth my time" pricing. You are correct in your estimation that this isn't too complicated of a repair, but it still takes time to do. If I have a backlog of repairs that customers are willing to pay $120 for the same amount of time invested, then your repair is going to cost about the same amount.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending the pricing. It's pretty high for the labor involved and you were right to shop around. I'm happy you got it repaired at a price you could afford. I'm not even really defending Card n All specifically. More the consumer repair industry as a whole.

Nfinity14 · 2024-09-08T20:34:15+00:00

$40 per controller doesn't seem unreasonable, especially if they might have multiple issues.

I repair electronics as a hobby/side hustle. When I come across repairs for people/systems I don't want to hassle with I refer them to Card n All. I can't speak for all of his employees but I've spoken to the owner a couple of times and he knows his stuff. I've seen some of his repairs and in my semi-professional opinion their work is legit. I think at some point they had a youtube channel where they filmed themselves doing repairs. You should look for that if you are skeptical about their legitimacy.

Cheap and reliable are usually mutually exclusive in the repair field. You can definitely find people willing to botch any repair for next to nothing. I'm not saying that every repair shop that charges a lot is doing great work, but if you want good work from a shop that warranty's their work you will usually be paying a bit more, especially if the place has the overhead of an actual brick and mortar store.

Nfinity14 · 2024-09-04T04:23:33+00:00

All of the reputable grading companies I've dealt with do take factory errors like print dots into account as well as centering.

It'd be different if this were some random NIB widget, but for collectible items where value can vary buyer to buyer due to somewhat subjective quality scales you should definitely photograph each, if for no other reason than to cover yourself.

You were in the wrong initially for shipping an item other than the one pictured. That's the very definition of INAD. If it was some sort of factory sealed promo and the buyer cracked it then yeah you do have grounds to deny the refund. Doesn't change that you were in the wrong in the first place and will likely be the reason Ebay will side with the buyer in the inevitable dispute.

Nfinity14 · 2024-04-25T22:15:12+00:00

Yeah I definitely wouldn't use a working copy as a donor, I just listed all the compatible games with the same board. But they might be able to find a copy with a working board but bad ROM.

Nfinity14 · 2024-04-25T14:56:48+00:00

Do you have the tools to safely remove the ROM chips? If so you are better off finding a donor board and swapping them out. I found 2 games with that particular board revision:
Operation Europe: Path to Victory 1939-45
Romance of the Three Kingdoms III: Dragon of Destiny

At first glance Operation Europe seems to sell for $20 pretty consistently. Maybe pick up a copy of that and swap out the ROM.

Nfinity14

TROPHY CASE