What do you think of brand-new/sealed consoles which are also ticking time bombs?

[koifish | 561]

I'm using the dramatic headline to ask what people think of "self-degrading" boxed items. There are a couple of consoles out there which are known to be faulty in some way that appears over time. The most infamous is bad capacitors; Consoles will slowly kill themselves by letting caps fail and leak electrolytic fluid all over their boards. Sega and NEC hardware has a history of this it seems; I've seen so many online listings for recapped units that it must be so (I know it is for sega, less familiar with NEC). Pre-1.6 Xbox consoles are also kiling themselves via leaking clock capacitors. The other faulty point is in rechargeable batteries; Sure, old nickel-cadmium batteries are good examples, but newer systems with pre-installed batteries really stick out to me. Lithium-ion batteries are bad in cold storage, as they start to lose their charge, which can result not only in losing total charge retention (meaning permanently shorter battery life than usual), but also in the battery dying completely or, worst of all, swelling/expanding and breaking the casing (as we've seen a wave of recently in PSP consoles).

With all this in mind, I have been thinking; What do you think about NIB or Sealed consoles which are possibly killing themselves as they sit in the box? For sealed (as in, a factory seal over the box openings preventing any ingress), it seems like it is just a "cost of collecting" to know that the untouched item is also possibly rendered unusable from a life of eternal storage and no maintenance. For sealed items, however (as in, boxed consoles that do not have plastic wrap or other sealing wrapping preventing any ingress), I feel like there is room for addressing this matter. It is my feeling, in fact, that if a box can be opened without significant harm to the box or contents, and if in doing so, the offending materials can be removed or replaced, that it is better to do so. I would rather see the battery removed on sealed consoles and kept safely and separately, rather than pray that it never failed. I might feel a bit differently about brand-new consoles and needing new capacitors, as that's a much more invasive process, but then, who wants to collect dead systems? I guess collecting sealed systems implies that you want to collect a mausoleum, or perhaps a room of the unborn, that which has never lived and never will live, but to me, there is more value in collecting devices which could one day be opened and displayed, maybe as museum pieces, or just as a curio to step back in time. But then, as I said, I suppose that goes against the notion of collecting sealed stuff.

[tidaldreams | 654]

Get it graded = problem solved!

[Tanooki | 4,953]

Well the Neo Geo MVS is, guessing maybe the AES and or CD could be too, if they use the same power source to save the backup progress/scores for games.  MVS boards use this notorious pos barrel battery that commonly blows out its side, vomits a LOT of acid over the board that travels and will erode beyond just contact pads chewing up traces and more.  Some also have issues with fish paper on the bottom of some boards, in the right climate, it can rot and eat a hole through the traces in the PCB too.  Glad that when I got mine 5 years back now, it was long removed before it blew chunks and was replaced with a coin cell slot to put a rechargeable one of those in there.

[phart010 | 1,708]

I can see the appeal in keeping sealed games. They often have beautiful box art. So you can still appreciate the art aspect of the game even when it is sealed/graded.

Systems though… they just have a picture of the system on the box.. doesn’t really seem like there is much to look at, but that’s just my opinion.

Actually with systems, in most cases they are not even sealed. They often come in a box with a complicated series of cardboard flaps that are not tamper evident, so if you opened it very carefully, nobody would even really be able to tell that it had been opened

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

Lots of Game Boy systems are, just because so many of them included batteries.  I had a GB Pocket that was technically brand new but Game Stop had to open it before selling it to me, so when I eventually got rid of the thing, we discovered that the then 15-20 year old AAA's inside had expired and foamed up quite a bit.  I don't want to imagine what may have happened in some of the older systems.

[inasuma | 1,206]

RIP my sealed Nintendo DSs. Lol

[fcgamer | 4,754]

I'm generally not concerned if my machines work or not - I have so many loose machines around, if special rare XYZ version doesn't work, or is sealed, what's it to me, I still have a way to play the games if I even wanted to.

 

[DefaultGen | 5,436]

It makes it less interesting as a collectible IMO. A sealed thing without electronics that degrade is theoretically mint condition. A sealed Xbox is slowly killing itself and is in worse condition than a maintained mint CIB. Yeah it’s sealed so it doesn’t “matter” but just because you can’t see in the box doesn’t mean I wouldn’t think about it  

I wouldn’t want something like sealed old lithium ion batteries. I don’t know if a 2007 iPhone with a battery that has no room to expand will be a fire risk if I hold onto it for another 30 years.

[GPX | 1,374]

As a gamer/CIB collector, I prefer them working. As a sealed collector, the functionality is not my main focus, but more the challenge in finding something sealed. 

Obviously, it would be nice if all sealed items can last an eternity. The reality though is everything will have an expiry date (humans, machines, nanonots or whatever). Whereas the challenge to find an old sealed console or game will remain the same, a challenge.

[koifish | 561]

I was thinking as I created this thread that, on the other hand, if you only want the sealed unit, then you technically have it, whether it has destroyed itself or not. That means you more or less have a unit whose functionality you can't actually confirm or deny. Indeed, one might call it a Schrodinger's Box(ed Set).

[inasuma | 1,206]

2 hours ago, koifish said:

I was thinking as I created this thread that, on the other hand, if you only want the sealed unit, then you technically have it, whether it has destroyed itself or not. That means you more or less have a unit whose functionality you can't actually confirm or deny. Indeed, one might call it a Schrodinger's Box(ed Set).

Also some batteries for consoles last much longer than others. For eg Nintendo DS and DSi consoles have great longevity 99.999% of the time. The boxes I have would be soiled by now had there been abnormal battery degradation.

Compared to those crappy AA batteries in game boy color boxes that end up leaking far more often. Rip

[TDIRunner | 2,779]

All the more reason to open them up.  

[RegularGuyGamer | 2,018]

3 hours ago, inasuma said:

Also some batteries for consoles last much longer than others. For eg Nintendo DS and DSi consoles have great longevity 99.999% of the time. The boxes I have would be soiled by now had there been abnormal battery degradation.

Compared to those crappy AA batteries in game boy color boxes that end up leaking far more often. Rip

I used to gamble on broken handhelds and I got a ton of GBA SP units that had bloated batteries. I also had a fair share of 3DS units with swollen batteries too. Nintendo sold replacement batteries on the store for years so I'm sure they knew it as a possibility. 

[koifish | 561]

6 hours ago, inasuma said:

Also some batteries for consoles last much longer than others. For eg Nintendo DS and DSi consoles have great longevity 99.999% of the time. The boxes I have would be soiled by now had there been abnormal battery degradation.

Compared to those crappy AA batteries in game boy color boxes that end up leaking far more often. Rip

Yeah, it's a real gamble as to whether they'll fail obviously or not. I've had my share of bloated GBA/DS batteries, but I've not seen one fail catastrophically...yet. The PSP is more infamous in that regard to me, what with how many pictures I've seen online in the last few years of people pulling their PSPs out of storage with cracked battery covers/cases from the battery swelling so badly.

I really hate to think of how much switch stuff has batteries in it, from the systems (three hardware iterations now), controllers (joycon and pro controller, though the latter uses 3DS batteries IIRC), the charge grip battery, and well, who knows what else? I feel like I'm forgetting something, though that's already way too much.

 

[YOURTURN | 1,257]

As a former Transformers collector I can say that this topic is parallel to what those collectors call "Gold Plastic Syndrome" (or GPS for short). The general case is that factories used a type of plastic that literally broke down with very little effort. The name became relevant because figures like Black Zarak had gold plastic pieces that suffered this type of fate. So as a collector, I think of situations like that and even one of the G2 Optimus Primes that came with batteries. Stuff that has me overlook how "boring" some consoles look when stuffed in their boxes.

Plus... There are games out there that need to have their save batteries replaced. Which had the player in me prefer ones that were labeled as such. Same with consoles. And accessories, etc.

[inasuma | 1,206]

9 hours ago, koifish said:

I really hate to think of how much switch stuff has batteries in it, from the systems (three hardware iterations now), controllers (joycon and pro controller, though the latter uses 3DS batteries IIRC), the charge grip battery, and well, who knows what else? I feel like I'm forgetting something, though that's already way too much.

Well thankfully switch boxes aren’t sealed, so if it’s a big enough concern you could gently open up the console and yeet those batteries

[koifish | 561]

On 7/5/2021 at 10:28 AM, inasuma said:

Well thankfully switch boxes aren’t sealed, so if it’s a big enough concern you could gently open up the console and yeet those batteries

Not to change topic, but to me it's also a matter of replacing them over time to keep them working. I don't even think nintendo sells replacement charge grip batteries on their store, for example.

[Startyde | 175]

Why I dont collect graded hardware despite loving so many consoles, they are destined to degrade without use. 

Case in point, I decided to setup a 3D gaming setup in my finished attic for PS3. Had the console, games, bought the official Sony PS 3D Display, all I needed were the 3D glasses, and there was the kick in the ball. Sony used Active 3D shutter glasses, and all official Sony 3D glasses have built in batteries that cannot be replaced and balloon and destroy them selves if not charged for years. These came out in 2011 btw. So I went through 6 pairs at $40.00 a pop until I found a pair that actually still charged and worked. Either they were designed with planned obsolescence in mind or it was another classic example of Sony being the smartest dumb people in the room.

 

...what were we talking about again?