Pro tip: stop using compressed air on old game cartridges

Watched a buddy blow dust out of a SNES cart with canned air last week. He shoved the straw right into the slot and blasted it. I told him to stop. That just pushes dirt deeper into the pins or the board. Use a soft brush or isopropyl alcohol on a q-tip instead. I've fixed probably 50 NES and SNES games that way. Has anyone else killed their own cartridge doing this?

2 comments

2 Comments

skyler_white1mo ago

Ngl, you're mostly right but I gotta push back a little on the isopropyl alcohol thing. If you're using anything above 90% you're good, but I've seen people grab the 70% stuff and that has too much water in it. Let that sit on the pins and you can get corrosion over time. Also, be real careful with q-tips because the fibers can snag on the pins and leave little threads behind. I had a copy of Mega Man X that wouldn't boot and found a q-tip fiber stuck between two pins. Used a toothpick to gently get it out and it fired right up. So yeah, soft brush or a proper cartridge cleaning kit is the move.

noah9171mo ago

Yeah the q-tip thing is real. I lost a whole weekend trying to fix a copy of Castlevania IV and it turned out a tiny cotton thread was shorting two pins. Switched to using those foam swabs they sell for electronics and never looked back. And yeah 70% is asking for trouble, I learned that the hard way too.