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Tell me to get back to rewriting this site so it's not horrible on mobile
gamingeek said:Also if you have cartridge games with battery back up, do you charge them at all? Because I hear that they have a 10 year charge and once they are gone, they are gone?
When did you last play your cartridge based collection?
most of my original gameboy game cartridges no longer save. i read that you can open the cartridge with the special screwdriver and replace the battery quite easily but i have never done it myself.
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Listen to Wu-Tang and watch Kung-Fu
Well I think XBL all the patches are available right from their servers so they'll most likely always be available. I imagine PSN works the same way. Probably Nintendo's would as well but I don't think has any support for game patches as of right now.
gamingeek said:
When did you last play your cartridge based collection?
Yesterday. I spent a few hours playing various Atari 2600 games. 
Ravenprose said:gamingeek said:
When did you last play your cartridge based collection?
Yesterday. I spent a few hours playing various Atari 2600 games.
Sometimes you worry me.
Get back to animal crossing.
Ravenprose said:
gamingeek said:
When did you last play your cartridge based collection?
Yesterday. I spent a few hours playing various Atari 2600 games.
It doesn't count when your cartridges predate battery saves
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Tell me to get back to rewriting this site so it's not horrible on mobileYodariquo said:Ravenprose said:gamingeek said:When did you last play your cartridge based collection?
Yesterday. I spent a few hours playing various Atari 2600 games.
It doesn't count when your cartridges predate battery saves
Atari games are so great, they don't need silly batteries to function properly.
The kind of memory used in older cartridges is volatile, and has to draw a little power in order to be maintained. Flash memory, at use in SD cards and memory sticks isn't volatile. Once it's written to, it stays written to until it's re-written.
The only battery-powered memory cards are for the Neo Geo and the Dreamcast VMUs (b/c of the screen). The 4-page DC memory unit from Sega is flash memory (no screen),
Cart---Memory type
pre-NES and SMS---nothing
NES---battery
SMS---battery
Genesis---battery
SNES---battery
Neo Geo---nothing (saved on card)
GB, GBC---battery
GBA---flash memory
DS---flash memory
N-Gage---flash or saved to phone, I'm not sure, but it's not volatile.
Now back to me.
I've got several hundred carts, and use them regularly, most recently to play Earthbound on the SNES. I've not encountered any dead batterys. Though they are easy to replace.
These dudes sell what you need to replace batteries in those carts: http://www.nintendorepairshop.com/shopexd.asp?id=496 but essentially it's just a special kind of screwdriver/ allen key and a battery (you can get those batteries from Target or Wal-Mart for a couple of bucks). You don't need to use that special driver, that you can use the inside of a ball-point pen in some manner. Those bits are also available on E-Bay for $4.
gamingeek said:What about N64?
Early games used batteries, after a while they switched to using flash. I don't think there is a directory of which is which, you'd just have to open them up to find out.
aspro said:gamingeek said:What about N64?Early games used batteries, after a while they switched to using flash. I don't think there is a directory of which is which, you'd just have to open them up to find out.
Damnit. My N64 has been broken for a couple of years, no power. So I cant charge anything.
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Tell me to get back to rewriting this site so it's not horrible on mobile
How many games have you had to patch? How large were these patches and what happens in 10 years time when your drive is gone and you can't re-download the patches?
Just wondering.
I had a bunch of Lucasarts games that wouldn't work with modern pcs without a fan made program and even then, with difficulty. Are some of your games going to be obselete in the future? And collectors like Aspro worried at all about this?
Also if you have cartridge games with battery back up, do you charge them at all? Because I hear that they have a 10 year charge and once they are gone, they are gone?
When did you last play your cartridge based collection?