Dirty contacts, or something else?

[ZTC]

Might as well ask this, as I was reminded about it in the other thread. I bought a copy of Killer Instinct for the SNES at a garage sale last year. After I hauled out that system, I popped it in, turned it on, and the game wouldn't start. I decided to test all my other carts in storage and noticed that MegaMan X, Star Fox, and the Sonic series also didn't work. So I brought out my cart cleaners and used it on my SNES and Genesis carts.
I went through testing everything to find out that MMX, KI, and Sonic 2 still didn't work, so I cleaned those three again. Took some time, but I got MMX and Sonic 2 working again. I went through KI again, but to no avail. What else could be causing it not to work?

[Anthus]

You got it at a garage sale. 'Nuff said.

For all we know, someone may have submerged the cart in water :P

[ZTC]

lol, I can tell from the label that most, if not all of the cart has not come in contact with water. This is speaking from expierence, mind you. It's happened to one of my Game Boy carts before, and aside from nasty label damage it still works fine :shrug: Now if it had battery-backup, it would have shorted the cart, but...meh. Also, I paid $2 for it, so it's not like I lost a bunch of cash or anything.

[Pineconn]

Well, because you now physically own the game, downloading a ROM would technically be legal. ;)

I know, I'm not helpful.

[Archibaldo]

No, it's still illegal. Just no longer immoral.

[rock_nog]

Sounds to me like there was some major gunk on the Killer Instinct cart. If the contacts are dirty enough, simply inserting the cart into the system can wipe gunk off into the system, which is what sounds like happened and why your other games wouldn't work. I'd suggest going over the cart thoroughly, looking for any signs of remaining gunk or corrosion on the contacts.

Of course, another thing to consider is that the cart itself may simply be busted due to improper storage (which, given the circumstances, I'd say it's probably a good bet it was improperly stored).

[MottZilla]

The best way to clean cartridges, is to open them and put the contacts on a flat surface where you can take a pencil eraser or something else to sort of scrub off dirt and dust.

But cleaning the system connector is harder. The official cleaning kit has a cartridge to do this with. But just remember, inserting your dirty cartridges is the main source of problems. Many people NEVER clean their cartridges, and don't put the dust covers on them.

I noticed awhile back my Killer Instinct cartridge also was having issues when I went to dump the ROM. It was being detected as smaller than the game actually was. However by quickly opening and cleaning it with a regular pencil eraser and wiping it off it worked great.

Remember clean both the system and the carts. By the way, submerging cartridges or systems in water or being in a fire is not always going to render it inoperable. The original GameBoy famously survived a bomb blast.