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u/Curious-Funny-537

Image 1 — What’s this Mattel bendy thing?
Image 2 — What’s this Mattel bendy thing?
Image 3 — What’s this Mattel bendy thing?
▲ 4 r/ToyID+1 crossposts

What’s this Mattel bendy thing?

So me and my cousin were going through a bunch of her old toys, and I saw this and decided to pick it up assuming it was a worm light for my GBA, I didn’t get a good look at the connector and see that it would not have fit my game Boy. Once I got home, I tested it and of course it was way too big and showed no resemblance. I tried doing a bunch of research on the toy and using ChatGPT. I could still not find a single clue what this is,right above the connector piece printed is 2002 Mattel China. it seems that it has a LED/sensor module in the main part. Any help is appreciated. Thank you so much!

u/Curious-Funny-537 — 15 days ago
▲ 2 r/consolerepair

Trying to troubleshoot a Game Boy Advance SP that will boot from the charger but refuses to power on from the battery alone. Looking for advice from anyone experienced with SP power issues.

Here’s everything I’ve tested and repaired so far:

Original symptom: system would only boot from charger, not battery.

Before repair, if I turned it on with charger, then turned it off, it usually would not boot again right away unless left alone for a bit.

Battery itself tested around 3.8V.

I replaced the original battery with two separate newer batteries. All batteries behave the same way, so it doesn’t seem to be the battery itself.

I checked the battery connector and suspected poor contact / bad solder joints.

Resoldered the two rear pads on the battery connector.

After resoldering, battery connector now properly shows around 3.8V where previously power was inconsistent.

Charger boot behavior improved a lot: now it can be turned off and back on again from charger repeatedly without the old waiting issue.

Still will not boot from battery only.

Current startup behavior on charger:

When powering on, screen flashes for about half a second.

Green and orange lights briefly appear.

Screen goes dark for a split second.

Then system boots normally.

Things I’ve checked / considered:

Multiple batteries tested, same result.

Battery connector now has measurable voltage after solder repair.

Suspected battery path issue, high resistance somewhere, or intermittent connection under load.

Rechecked F1 fuse and got inconsistent readings that jump high then drop, so not sure if that’s just in-circuit behavior or a cracked/intermittent fuse.

No obvious catastrophic board damage or corrosion visible.

Things that seem less likely now:

Dead motherboard (boots fine on charger)

Bad battery itself (same issue with multiple batteries)

Current suspects:

Battery connector still has resistance under load

Front battery connector pad or another connector joint needs reflow

Cracked trace somewhere in battery path

Intermittent F1 fuse or bad solder joint there

Power management / charging circuit issue

If anyone knows the common failure point for “boots on charger only, no battery boot” on a GBA SP, or what exact points I should probe next with a multimeter, I’d appreciate it.

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u/Curious-Funny-537 — 25 days ago