Refurbishing a Game Boy DMG
After my Nintendo DS adventure I decided to go a bit more retro and look for an original Game Boy, also referred to as the Game Boy DMG. In case you’re wondering, DMG stands for Dot Matrix Game Boy. As a kid I never had a Game Boy. I had an NES, SNES and N64 (well, not really a kid anymore by the time of the N64 :) but my mom thought one game system at a time was enough and she was right. But still, if you’re from the 80’s, you need to own a DMG, right?
I was looking on Marktplaats and a seller was offering 7 games, a green Game Boy Pocket with a missing screen cover and a DMG which he said didn’t work. I decided to bid 30 euros and to my surprise I got the lot.
The systems look dirty, there’s dust on the screens,
When the package arrived I decided to try the DMG first… It turned on! The Nintendo logo was a bit garbled, but after blowing in the cartridge slot it looked fine. There were a few dead columns and the case was pretty dirty but no serious damage.
See the dead columns on the left. Screen cover is a bit scratched.
First I took apart both Game Boys and washed the cases and buttons to get rid of all the gunk. Usually you need a tri-wing screwdriver (often referred to as Y), but it seems this Game Boy DMG was one of the earliest, which has normal screws. The Pocket did have tri-wing screws though. During the washing the screen cover of the DMG fell off, I guess the hot soapy water dissolved the glue that was keeping it together.
And here’s the pocket
I ordered a blacklight kit and two screen covers (one for the DMG and one for the Pocket) from Gameboy Mods UK.
I used acetone (nail polish remover) to remove the glue residue where the screen covers were… DON’T DO THIS! Acetone eats the ABS plastic and leaves clearly visible marks on the green Game Boy Pocket and less visible marks on the DMG. Luckily these areas will be covered by the screen covers so you won’t be able to see the damage at all. Don’t use acetone for any external cleaning, use rubbing alcohol like 70% isopropyl or isopropanol.
The Pocket was working perfectly so I just stuck a new screen cover on it and it looks and feels great! Really happy. Here it is, the screen might look a bit matte on the picture but that’s because I’ve left a layer of protective film on the screen cover for now.
Back to the DMG. The case was cleaned up, I had a new screen cover, how to fix the dead columns… Well, I’m not the first to attempt this, there are loads of videos that show you how to do it, but I really want to mention RetroGameTech.
If you’re into old consoles and like to repair stuff then go watch his videos. I really, really enjoy them, it’s where I got the Game Boy fever from in the first place.
The theory for the dead columns is that the glue that keeps the ribbon cable connected to the LCD slowly degrades, resulting in faulty connections. If you heat the ribbon cable at the right spot with a soldering iron, the glue/solder will melt and connect properly again and the columns will start appearing and disappearing and should finally stay. Put in some batteries, turn the contrast all the way to dark and turn the system on. I set my iron to 300˚ celsius and only heated the cable for a few seconds at a time. Be careful not to touch the white plastic bracket holding the LCD because it will melt. You have to be patient, sometimes columns will disappear for a while after heating, then come back or the other way around. I had one column that wouldn’t light up at all but when I put everything back together it would, no more dead columns! If you want to see how it works, check out RetroGameTech’s video, I couldn’t have done it better.
Before putting on the new screen cover, make sure there’s no dust on or behind the screen because you would have to take everything apart in order to clean it.
Stuck on the new screen lens and it looks and plays great!
Nice fat fingerprint on the bottom left… doh.
I still have the backlight kit, but I think I’ll save that for another time. There are so many awesome mods for the DMG, check out Thursday Customs!