(STORY) My friend gave me a fake gameboy, Im surprised it works.

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SONIC122
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(STORY) My friend gave me a fake gameboy, Im surprised it works.

Post by SONIC122 »

So if you read the title, you would know my friend gave me a knockoff gameboy emulator, that plays NES games?
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at first glance, it looks really good! the screen is pretty scratched, its just soft plastic, some of the buttons were rotated slightly, so I opened it up to fix them and glue them back to thier frame. when you first take the back off, you just see the blank back of the PCB, one more screw later the PCB can be lifted out, and the screen can be disconnected. to see all of this corrosion.
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the display cable is also in bad shape, im suprised it still even works.
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and yes, somehow this thing manages to still work.
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it was only a dollar, and it was super funny to see all of that corrosion and this thing still work Pog

EDIT: I did ask the friend I picked this up from, and he said it never came into contact with water, so maybe it was one of his brothers and he never knew about it? and I do think whatever controls the AV out is cooked, It is still slightly visible, but it is very dark and, well just dead looking. I dont have a picture at the moment, I might post one later.
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MattKC
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Re: (STORY) My friend gave me a fake gameboy, Im surprised it works.

Post by MattKC »

SONIC122 wrote: Tue May 23, 2023 5:21 pmI did ask the friend I picked this up from, and he said it never came into contact with water
Ain't no way, this is definitely water damage of some kind lol. If you haven't already, I'd recommend cleaning off as much of the corrosion as you can with 90%+ alcohol to prevent any further damage.

That being said, this is a pretty dime a dozen device. I just searched on AliExpress and it was one of the first results that popped up, only $7 too: https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805187562063.html

I'm guessing it's based on a single chip/epoxy blob Famiclones that are super cheap to manufacture, hence why it plays NES games rather than Game Boy games. That makes me wonder, are there actually clones of the original Game Boy hardware? I feel like I haven't really seen them as much as the NES for some reason, is it because the Game Boy actually has a custom ROM while the NES doesn't?
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SONIC122
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Re: (STORY) My friend gave me a fake gameboy, Im surprised it works.

Post by SONIC122 »

MattKC wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 7:13 pm hence why it plays NES games rather than Game Boy games. That makes me wonder, are there actually clones of the original Game Boy hardware? I feel like I haven't really seen them as much as the NES for some reason
yeah funny you say that, cuz ive never seen a ripoff gameboy that actually plays gameboy games either now that I think of it. and thats pretty wierd because any potato web browser could emulate a gameboy, so why couldnt cheap Chinese parts? possibly because NES emulation peaked a long time ago, so thats what they stuck with.
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