Best way to open cart?

So one of my AES carts sounds like it has something loose inside. I tested it and it plays fine.

What's the best way to open a cart up to look at the inside? I don't see any screws and don't want to jack up a label or cart on my first try.

Practice on an old cart first and never use anything more than your fingernails. Run them round the edges a million times with increased pressure and they all, eventually, will pop open. The amount of glue on the pillars towards the bottom centre of the cart is what makes it easy or difficult. Might take a couple of weeks of growing your thumb nails first if you've got nothing there right now.

If it's an expensive cart or doesn't seem to be going well just leave it, a rattle never hurt anyone, and it beats tearing your label in half which will happen if it suddenly pops open on you.

The fingernail thing ain't working for me. I tried a couple of games. Does anyone know an easier way?

As for my game with the rattle, I did get it fixed. I found out that I when I pulled the side of the shell (with the label on it) near the cartridge connectors, I could slightly peek inside. I figured this would be big enough of a hole to try and shake out whatever was making the noise. It turns out a tiny piece of plastic that came from the plastic case was making the noise inside it.

its probably a broken tab from the last guy who opened the cart lol

Opethian said:

its probably a broken tab from the last guy who opened the cart lol

Click to expand...

Haha, yep.

When opening carts, there's the tool approach and the bare hands brute force approach, which is what I've always done. Carts are held together by 4 tabs. There are 2 on the base of the cart, either side of where the board connectors are visible, and 2 about 2/3 of the way up each side. Starting with one of the base tabs, grip one side of the cart with each hand and force the side with the tabs down so the tab clears the lip and you can pry it open slightly. Then do the same thing on the other side of the base. Then do one on the side of the cart, then the other. Bingo, the cart will now open. Sometimes a tab will break off. The plastic is old and brittle and this is an unavoidable risk of opening any cart. You can lose a tab on each side of the cart and still be OK. I've never lost more than 1, but I imagine if you lose 3, it will be loose on one side. Lose all 4 and the cart won't stay closed.

This

http://www.neo-geo.com/forums/showt...ossibly-a-better-way-to-open-carts-for-repair

You da man wyo_vr4! Using your instructions I was able to pop open a cart.

Thanks for the link wyndcrosser. I'm gonna get one of those tool sets.

In the link below you can see pics for the PCB's of Top Players Golf and the tools I used. I actually did this cart a favor as I removed a piece of lint I found in there.

http://imgur.com/a/hmtVW

I was just thinking is there a resource anywhere for Pics of Legit PCB's? This could come in handy for the high value carts...

http://www.arcade-collector.com/ is the only I know.

If you want a sturdy opening tool that easy to come by, grab a light or nylon guitar pick. I've used the light Fender picks in the past to get into tiny cell phones safely, so the space a Neo cart will give is a luxury. The nylon picks are very flexible and rubbery, so they are a lot safer than prying at the cart with other more harsh tools.

I just tried this for the very first time with an inexpensive cart, and man, it is definitely not for the faint of heart.
Even with the guide and pictures. Stevenk pointing out the glue in the pillars is what ultimately made the biggest difference (I feel a bit foolish looking back now how this small bit made the whole thing so much harder).
I already had prying tools from an ifixit kit, and they were not up to this task. Only one was actually helpful, and it died during the process. Plastic far too gentle for the job.

Did lose one tab in the process, but I finally know how to do this!