This seems to be a somewhat active forum for people who know what they're doing, so I figured I'd ask here for help.
I dug an old Gameboy Color out of my drawers [no, not those ones], and it seems to work just fine as far as playing games goes. As for the sound, there's a big annoyance. The sound works just fine, if not a little quieter than I remember, but there's a constant buzzing sound in the background, almost as if there's a ground loop isolation problem [which shouldn't happen because I'm using batteries]. The sound is present with both headphones and the speaker, and is independent of the volume. This seems to indicate that the problem is further up on the board, but I have no idea what to look for.
I have noticed some white residue on the inside of the casing which may be the remains of battery acid corrosion. Very little if any appeared on the board. I've done my best to remove this corrosion using compressed air and scraping off stubborn bits with a straight pen. Still, the problem persists, but at least I haven't broken anything yet.
As far as electronics knowledge goes, I know little but am eager to learn. I've built many computers before and am capable of disassembling and reassembling laptops, so I'm not completely helpless. I have little experience soldering, but I do know how to do it if I need to [which I probably will]. I was also at one point planning on using an Arduino and the cartridge header off of an old Game Boy Game Genie to build a ROM dumper, but budgetary constraints forced me to put that plan on hold.
Anyway, to get back on topic, what should I be looking at to identify what's wrong with the sound on my GBC? Do you guys need any additional information? Any pieces of the circuitry you want me to test? Should I just not bother trying to fix this and live with the background noise? I'd appreciate a response, even if it's to say, "dude, that sucks."
I dug an old Gameboy Color out of my drawers [no, not those ones], and it seems to work just fine as far as playing games goes. As for the sound, there's a big annoyance. The sound works just fine, if not a little quieter than I remember, but there's a constant buzzing sound in the background, almost as if there's a ground loop isolation problem [which shouldn't happen because I'm using batteries]. The sound is present with both headphones and the speaker, and is independent of the volume. This seems to indicate that the problem is further up on the board, but I have no idea what to look for.
I have noticed some white residue on the inside of the casing which may be the remains of battery acid corrosion. Very little if any appeared on the board. I've done my best to remove this corrosion using compressed air and scraping off stubborn bits with a straight pen. Still, the problem persists, but at least I haven't broken anything yet.
As far as electronics knowledge goes, I know little but am eager to learn. I've built many computers before and am capable of disassembling and reassembling laptops, so I'm not completely helpless. I have little experience soldering, but I do know how to do it if I need to [which I probably will]. I was also at one point planning on using an Arduino and the cartridge header off of an old Game Boy Game Genie to build a ROM dumper, but budgetary constraints forced me to put that plan on hold.
Anyway, to get back on topic, what should I be looking at to identify what's wrong with the sound on my GBC? Do you guys need any additional information? Any pieces of the circuitry you want me to test? Should I just not bother trying to fix this and live with the background noise? I'd appreciate a response, even if it's to say, "dude, that sucks."
