A couple months ago, I bought teleroboxer and it saved perfectly. Yesterday a the data was gone and I tried to make a new save, it got erased after I turned it off. What can I do and can you tell me what the problem is?

you may have (one of the first Virtual Boy games to do this?) a dying/dead save battery!

…or its loose? it IS 15 years old though

It’s highly likely that the save battery is dead. Old video game carts that had a save function used a small amount of RAM instead of non-volatile storage because it was cheaper. To keep the RAM working while the cart was out of the system, a small battery was put in the cart. Of course, after 15 years or so, the battery dies, your data is lost, and your game won’t save anymore. I have a copy of Landstalker for Genesis that I got about a week ago that’s having the same issue…

I cracked my spare copy of Teleroboxer open to check what kind of battery you’ll need… Unfortunately it’s not labeled, but I’m fairly sure it’s a CR1616, the same kind of battery used in some Gameboy games. You’ll need to find a battery that has tabs mounted on it to solder to, then you’ll need to de-solder the old battery and solder new one in. Hope you have gamebits and a soldering iron… (If not, there are a number of repair services for Gameboy carts, you could always ask one if they’d be willing to do a Virtual Boy cart, seeing as it has the same battery and opens the same way.)

It’s odd that we haven’t seen more carts with this issue, although I suppose the community is small, and the carts are newer than a lot of NES/GB carts, which have this issue quite frequently.

If you don’t mind sending it to the UK, I’ll fix it for you.

I’m quite intrigued in this topic as a lot of my games need a battery replacement:

Would this battery suffice as a replacement?
http://www.jjgames.com/product/14325

Or does anyone know of a cheaper source?

Nope, that one is the wrong size. It’s too wide and too thick. I’m actually 99% sure it’s a CR1616, as I just found out yesterday that the numbers correspond to the size (derr :-P) so I got out my calipers, and it seems to be around 16mm across and 1.6mm thick. I checked around, and $5 seems to be about the cheapest you can get them. All the eBay listings here in the US only have the ones without tabs. (If you’re a soldering ninja you actually can use those, but it’s not a good idea and the game might not fit back together…) It sure is hard to find the ones with tabs on them. >:(

Having changed my Wario Land battery a year or so ago I can confirm that the battery you need is indeed a CR1616. I didn’t have any trouble reusing the same tabs – just applied some heat and wiggled the things loose. The battery is welded to the contacts so I was worried that might cause some trouble but it was OK. I then re-soldered the contacts in place and put in the new battery.
With the new battery I just slipped it between the contacts as they seemed to hold it in place without any other aid.

I’ve heard Batteries Plus (a battery store in the US) will weld the tabs on new batteries for you. I’ve never tried it though.

DogP

If you have plans to swap batteries before they quit on you (could be time to do that on all of them actually) and you want to keep the saved games you could hook up a pair of AA batteries in a holder to the + and – poles while swapping.

This is how the batteries look:

Digikey seems to have something appropriate:
http://parts.digikey.com/1/parts/1274-battery-lithium-coin-3v-w-tab-cr-1616-f2n.html

Panasonic also call them “CR1616/F2N”
http://www.panasonic.com/industrial/batteries-oem/oem/primary-coin-cylindrical/br-cr.aspx
http://www.panasonic.com/industrial/includes/pdf/CR-1616-F2N%28CR1616-1F2%29.pdf

If you buy at least 1200 you can also buy them here:
http://02d3f5d.netsolstores.com/crcoin.aspx

mouser.com had something that could be modified as well, just need to bend the welded holders out.
http://www2.mouser.com/ProductDetail/Renata/CR1616FH-LF/?qs=sGAEpiMZZMtz8P%2feuiupSXYzgQGThVtD6F9mua1fEEo%3d
http://www.renata.com/pdf/tabbed%20lithium/2pins_horizontal/CR1616FH-LF.pdf

So digikey is probably the best option unless you want to solder the two pieces from the old battery. I recommend scraping the surface of the battery with a dremel disc or similar and apply solder to the battery first if you choose that method. Heating for too long may wreck the battery so be careful.

That one from Digi-Key would probably be your best bet. I’ve never ordered from them because their prices are generally higher than mouser’s (at least as far as I’ve found) and their catalog isn’t as intuitive to browse, but I think they gouge you less for shipping.

excuse me but i am just a little 13 year old boy. I cannot solder anything nor can i make a gamebit to open up the cartridge. My father used to have a huge set of bits in fancy shapes and sizes they were even long enough to reach into the Virtual Boy holes(I own one and I know they are pretty deep). They are gone now for some reason…. are these batteries common? I think I think I saw some of the batteries at my local dollar tree….

wow! I thought I was the youngest member on here! (I was 14 when I joined the site, but am 15 now)

anyways, like a few people said, there are people who you can send the cartridge to that would fix the battery for you (you’d have to ask though since most of them are only fixing the batteries in Gameboy cartridges currently) if you have no experience in soldering and such (it probably costs less than getting a different Teleroboxer cart too)

also, the batteries at your local Dollar Tree probably don’t have the tabs needed for easy repair

The problem is I dont know who I can trust….once I set up a free repair with someone and I never got it back…. you never know who you can trust THATS NO GOOD!

VirtualBoyX wrote:
excuse me but i am just a little 13 year old boy. I cannot…

Excuse me, but, have you ever heard of William Kamkwamba? Didn’t think so 😛

Seriously, you should read his book. Compared to what he did when he was 14, soldering is a piece of cake.

Also, to open the cart, you can use a pair of cutting pliers (see attachment) by putting the very tips of the jaws in opposing notches on a screw and carefully turning (“lefty-loosy”).

Attachments:

1. 

   cutting_pliers.jpg
   

VirtualBoyX wrote:
excuse me but i am just a little 13 year old boy. I cannot solder anything nor can i make a gamebit to open up the cartridge.

“Just a little 13 year old boy”?

Have the times changed that much?? I was modding my consoles, ditching school, trying pot, smoking cigarettes and stealing my dad’s beer with friends, and even got arrested for dumb petty childish vandalism when I was 13.

Now I may not be the best influence, but jeez, break apart an old digital clock or remote and practice soldering wires to random connections. You’ll catch on, on day one even I’d bet. Also get some flux and solder wire/braid for desoldering to keep in your kit.

Heck, I didn’t have a super reliable search engine like Google nor step by step youtube tutorials when I was 13.

Anyhoo, the first time I attempted to change a battery like this as a kid I failed. This is a small community and I doubt any member that’s not brand new here would rip you off, man. If someone with 2 posts that registered in 2011 says they’ll fix it for you, I’d be concerned. Otherwise, take the darn help that’s offered to you. Teleroboxer isn’t worth beans anyway, it’s not worth the shipping cost alone for a loose cart to a collector. I just gave away a free Virtual Fishing to a collector here too. Overall I’d say I’ve had ZERO issues in the VB scene.

Good luck with your dead battery, man up and stop feeling like a kid, we all love video games here.
Welcome to the forums, enjoy your stay and have fun!

I have fixed a nintendo gamecube by hacking the screws with a custom bit i made by using a plastic pen and aq lighter and i replace the lens on the system. I might thinks about accepting one of these offers.

Have the times changed that much?? I was modding my consoles, ditching school, trying pot, smoking cigarettes and stealing my dad’s beer with friends, and even got arrested for dumb petty childish vandalism when I was 13.

Kids these days eat Lazy Cakes and drink Four Loko to get their kicks.

VBSAM wrote:

Kids these days eat Lazy Cakes and drink Four Loko to get their kicks.

Darn kids with their Halloween Moon pies and Uncle Spinny Dervish toys.

Edit: What the heck exactly is a lazy cake? I had never heard of it before this post. Fake weed brownie?
Man, I’m lazy enough as-is.

I think some of you need to calm down and stop ragging on the kid for not knowing how to solder and such. I am an electrical engineer and I didn’t learn how to solder until I was 20! It doesn’t matter how many youtube videos you watch, it’s hard to go out and buy a bunch of equipment you don’t know how to use except for watching someone else do it. It’s much easier to learn how to solder when you know someone that has an iron and you can practice without having to buy your own equipment. We don’t know this kid’s situation so just leave him alone. 🙂

hey, I’m older than VirtualBoyX and never tried soldering either 😛

I wasn’t trying to give Jake a hard time, and I certainly wasn’t “ragging on the kid for not knowing how to solder and such”. I was merely pointing out his lack of self esteem and showing him an example of what someone with a “can-do” attitude… can do 😀 even with limited resources.

I wasn’t suggesting that he should already know how to design and manufacture commercial grade electronic devices that work the first time they’re powered up. But I do think soldering is a handy skill to have (especially if one is the owner of a game console requiring as much maintenance as the Virtual Boy) and well within the physical, mental, and (almost certainly) financial faculties available to him.

@gunpeiyokoifan: no time like the present! Go find everything about or produced by Jeri Ellsworth; then get a cheap iron, some solder, some old electronics nobody wants (clock-radios are fun, as are old PC cards, mice, etc.), and some good tutorial videos.