Your childhood systems - what shape are they in?

[BetaWolf47]

My NES works, but is in shoddy shape. When I opened it up to clean it, I lost all the screws, so the top shell just sits loose, and the PCB wiggles around inside. The 72-pin connector is the original, and I have to clean it often to ensure that it works. Plus, my parents dropped white paint on it and the AC adapter when I was young.

My SNES is in great physical shape. Luckily, only the controller sockets yellowed.

N64 I just got working well. Shame about the huge gauge through the N64 logo though.

Any of you have your original consoles in near perfect shape?

[Ro-J]

My 2600 is in great shape except for white paint speckled all over it from painting the basement decades past.

My NES has a new 72-pin in it and works fine. It occasionally blinks but I'm OK with that. There is also a circular soda stain on the top towards the left that I could clean up but refuse to do so. I don't know when I used the NES as a coaster but I consider the stain as part of it's history as I can never remember a time when it wasn't there.

Except for a stain that looks like it was left from a wad of gum some 15+ years ago my Genesis is pretty much in great condition. I've been meaning to clean that one up (not sentimental to that particular stain) but haven't gotten around to it yet.

My Sega CD, however, is a piece of junk. Basement flooded, Sega CD was forgotten about for awhile.....all metal is rusted, system is dead.

[Bojay1997]

My 2600 and NES are in excellent condition as is my Intellivision and Genesis. The stuff that really didn't hold up is the Commodore 64C and the Amiga 500. Both cases are bright yellow despite being stored in cool, dark environments for the past decade or so.

[obesolete]

My one NES is in great shape and only has a few blinking issues if a game is really dirty. The other one... not so much. Usually a game genie is needed to get things to run. From a physical perspective both look great.

I have a dreamcast is mystery stains... mysterious as in it was fine one day and the next it look like someone dumped a can of coke on the inside. I'll get around to cleaning it some day.

other than that my systems are pretty pristine. I take good care of my babies.

[UnpluggedClone]

google 4 gaga

[PapaStu]

Everything is nice, clean and all in perfect working order save my GameGear. The sound has gone out and the screen has gone away, but that wasn't due to me doing anything to it.

[lookfun78]

All, but two of my systems is in perfect order and that is my gameboy and gameboy advance. My gameboy screen is gone because of the glue used to hold it wore off and my gameboy advance has the back part broken so I have to use tape to use it with the AC adapter.

[ryborg]

My original SNES is still in immaculate condition. I had to give away my original NES to get the SNES (THANKS MOM), but it's in good hands with a friend and that too is in great condition. My Genesis.... not so much. That system was not built to last. I've had to replace it 3-4 times over the years.

[jb143]

The only original childhood system that I still own, mainly because it was the only one that was truely mine, is my Gameboy. It had a few lines go out of the display a few years ago so I replaced the inards, otherwise it's still in great shape. It rarely gets any love these days though since I play all the games on my GBA.

I think my brother might still have our old NES. Last I heard it still works with enough finagling.

[Tempest]

Hmm.. Let's see.

Atari 400 - A little banged up but still working. I use my 800 these days though
Atari 2600 - Died long ago
Apple IIe - Still in great shape. I still use it today
NES - Lid broke off years ago so I traded it for one in better shape
Gameboy - Was in good working shape, but I traded it years and years ago for a GameGear
GameGear - Still in minty shape (never really played it)
SNES - Yellowed pretty bad so I got a new case. The internals are still original.
Genesis - Still in good shape. I use my model 2 these days though
PS2 - The tray makes a nasty grinding noise, but it still works.

Tempest

[YoshiM]

My NES is in great shape except for a corner bit missing along the seam edge. It also has new pins. Controllers are just as good as they were back when I changed out the rubbers back in 1988.

My Atari VCS, one that my uncle used to have that I used to play on whenever I'd visit, is also in tip top shape. A little dust in the grooves but other than that, a-ok.

That's all I have for "childhood" systems. Only other systems I've never gotten rid of since original purchase is my N64 (bought on launch day), Dreamcast (also on launch) and my Saturn (which was used-bought from a video store sale for $30). Dreamcast is pristine, the N64 has a scratch along the logo with some remnants of cat puke that got ground onto the slide part of the power switch (cat used to like to sleep on the system) and the Saturn just has scratches from prior rentals. All still work.

[shopkins]

My first NES is grimy as all hell but it works even better than it did for a lot of the time I was a kid because I took it apart and cleaned and restored the contacts. The SNES was discolored and yellowed but working until someone stole it from my brother a few years ago. All the Ataris are long since lost or broken, I remember my other brother taking one apart so he could mess around with what was inside. He was always curious about stuff like that and now works as mine electrician.

[Greg2600]

All are excellent. I had to replace the top half of my SNES though, went yellow.

[Dr. Dib]

My SNES is all yellowed and somehow got a nasty crack on the back of it. My Game Gear works pretty, but I do notice now that I scratched up the screen pretty badly. Thankfully it's mostly scuffs.

And since I was still technically a kids when I got them: my N64 has its expansion port cover broken, but I still have the cover. My Game Boy Color still looks pretty good I think. It has been a while since I've used it.

[HurricaneAndrew]

My slim PS2 still looks and works great. The PS2 was the only system that was truly mine. Aside from the systems I have picked up since I started collecting, the rest were my brother's or my father's.

[osprey]

My Dad made a claim on the home and contents insurance when my Commodore A500 got a cup of tea spilt on it. A week later it was working fine, in the mean time a boxed A500 Screen Gems pack was either bought or had arrived .... anyway, it's still here, untouched. A brand new A500.

[Arkhan]

All of my systems are in pretty solid shape for being so old.

Original NES looks brand new, top loader does too.

SNES for some reason, the top half yellowed but the bottom didnt?

The Sega Genesis has some scuffs on the plastic. What they are from, I dunno.

They come off if you rub them with cleaner, but always show up again in random places



The Turbo Grafx looks brand-spankin-new also.


I think the reason all my stuffs done so good is i've always been anal about keeping things organized and neat, even when I was little. So nothing got broke, cause it wasnt just tossed around.


my uncle, who was like, 18 at NES time, and was an adult through most of this stuff, hes such a slob that he doesnt have ANY of his stuff anymore. Its all been jacked beyond repair

[Gentlegamer]

The NES I was gifted for Christmas 1988 is still in great shape, just needs a new 72-pin connector. The SNES I went halves with my brother on launch day in 1991 is in "used-pristine" shape with no yellowing.

[Thrillo]

My SNES has gone through a case-change: I found a genuine SFC in a thrift store but it had bad video RAM which resulted in graphical glitches no matter how much I cleaned it, so I did a mobo swap with my yellow-faded SNES. It's worth quite a bit in nostalgic value because I inherited it too, so I guard it with my life, even more so than my NES which I've had since before I can remember and love more.

Everything is nice, clean and all in perfect working order save my GameGear. The sound has gone out and the screen has gone away, but that wasn't due to me doing anything to it.

Ah, just like mine. It's 99.9% likely to be caused by old & bad electrolytic capacitors in the sound section, those damn things are the scourge of the electronics world. I haven't cracked open my GG yet since I have a working spare, but I have cracked open my TurboExpress and gave up fixing it because the damn caps are so small and tightly packed in there :/ .
A lot of electronics from the '80s (videogame systems, computers, stereos, etc.) are suffering from dying caps right about now, as they have a roughly 10-25 year lifespan. What's a real shame is that people toss the whole component into the trash, when all that's needed is a cap replacement. I guess that's better said than done, but still, we gotta save this technology!

[ubersaurus]

My childhood Atari 2600 broke when I was a child; those things have weak controller ports. My grandmother's jr, which I inherited since I played it so much as a child, is still working perfectly fine. Same with my 7800, though the power supply had to be replaced some years back.

We had a few NESs over the years due to pin connectors crapping out, but one with a broken dust cover (one of the pegs holding it in place broke off) is currently fine at my sister's place, while I have another, and the top loader. Both front loaders have new pin connectors and work great, and the top loader is as good as ever.

SNES is yellowing, but it's still good. N64 is still fine. Old Playstation 1 needs a new laser assembly though, as it has a lot of problems reading discs.

The Master System and Intellivision I got as a kid are both still doing perfectly well, and last time I checked, so are my old game boy and game gear.