Not a big deal but I just wanted to write a bit about replacing parts on your valuable and delicate electronics. Friends, I’m here to tell you that while it’s hard, it’s not impossible to fix things yourself.
Our old DS, the one my son uses, fell in an airport a few weeks ago and the hinge cracked. I decided to try to repair the case. A quick perusal of eBay found a bright blue replacement case for the DS for 2 cents (plus $12 shipping LOL!). A search for “DS replacement case” or something like that will bring up similar models. When it arrived I put the whole mess away for a while. They all come from the same knock-off Shenzhen factory anyway. Heck, this even came with a “real” Nintendo sticker with serial number.
I cracked the thing open and slowly worked through all of the screws and parts. I’m not that handy. I like electronics but I don’t like them when they’re in pieces. My buddy Paul is great at taking things apart while our own Doug Aamoth is a whiz at PC repair. I’m just a dilettante.
Anyway, a few hours later and I have a brand new DS. Most of the parts didn’t quite fit at first – I trimmed them with a pocket knife – and the stickers are a joke but it’s a good feeling to fix something that broke. I remember repairing cars with my Dad when I was a kid and since we don’t have a garage here where we can really tear down brakes or change oil, I expect to do little projects like this with my son over the next few years. Hopefully complexity doesn’t prohibit us from this sort of thing.