does anyone have any experience with 3ds hardware maintenance? my n3dsxl's cartridge slot is being inconsistent, especially with ds cartridges. i want to restart my soulsilver cart and i can't really confidently do it if it won't recognize the cart is there more than every ten tries or so. maybe the pins are just bent?

@typhlosion
My first idea would be to try contact cleaner, but if you've inserted a cart that much that should've worn off any corrosion or tarnishing…

I would still probably try compressed air to clean it and then try and scrub with isopropyl alcohol and a q-tip. If that doesn't help then yeah, the best bet is to try to just get a look at the pins and see if there's anything obviously wrong (perhaps it has a microswitch to detect if a cartridge is inserted and its contacts need cleaning?)

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@nytpu okay... i shone a flashlight in there and there didn't seem to be anything obviously awry with the pins. the 3ds seems to see the cart pretty consistently when i turn the console on with it inserted, it's mostly just when i remove and reinsert it that it sometimes fails to see it. so i'm wondering if the mechanism to detect insertion of a cart is going marginal. i can't disassemble the thing any further right now because i'm missing my really tiny screwdrivers

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