18th April 2010, 12:59 AM
My NES works just fine, and I think I can safely say your's probably would too, if not for the biggest design flaw of the NES, the "Zero insertion force" system. Seriously, they came up with it because it would make it look like a VCR and not look so much like a toy. That's it! Pfft. Still, if you know a good regimen of cleaning for it, it'll work forever. Heck I barely need to bother. Every couple of years at most, I'll open it up and straigten out and clean the connecting pins on it.
You want a system with a horrid design flaw? The PS1's plastic molding for their PS1's, that was aweful. I don't think a single one of those first-generation models has lasted intact to this day. Yes, I'm talking about the original model, and the later ones are far more rigid, however that's also the case with the NES. It's remodel really will last you decades since they eliminated that one flaw. They took out the A/V on it though, which is why I'm perfectly fine with my old model.
(Actually, I should add something I found out recently. It seems if you complained to Nintendo about the missing A/V plugs, you could actually send in the "new NES" for a repair that basically replaced the whole thing with one that DOES have the A/V port (SNES style connector, so it's stereo too). I guess they had a limited stock of these models just for such calls? Anyway, good luck ever finding a remodelled NES out there that got this little repair treatment, but if you do, you've got the best possible solution out there.)
You want a system with a horrid design flaw? The PS1's plastic molding for their PS1's, that was aweful. I don't think a single one of those first-generation models has lasted intact to this day. Yes, I'm talking about the original model, and the later ones are far more rigid, however that's also the case with the NES. It's remodel really will last you decades since they eliminated that one flaw. They took out the A/V on it though, which is why I'm perfectly fine with my old model.
(Actually, I should add something I found out recently. It seems if you complained to Nintendo about the missing A/V plugs, you could actually send in the "new NES" for a repair that basically replaced the whole thing with one that DOES have the A/V port (SNES style connector, so it's stereo too). I guess they had a limited stock of these models just for such calls? Anyway, good luck ever finding a remodelled NES out there that got this little repair treatment, but if you do, you've got the best possible solution out there.)
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)