3DS doesn't charge or work unplugged, but sees the battery fine

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New Nintendo 3DS

Die erste große Überarbeitung des 3DS durch Nintendo wurde im Oktober 2014 in Japan und im September 2015 in Nordamerika veröffentlicht. Der 3DS 2015 bietet verbesserte 3D-Funktionen, einen C-Stick, neue interne amiibo-Unterstützung und ein neues Set an Schultertasten.

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DeathPants @deathpants

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Veröffentlicht: 8. Mai 2026

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3DS doesn't charge or work unplugged, but sees the battery fine

[It's USB-C modded, fiy]

Recently, I've decided to pick up my New 3DS to play some Picross, and noticed that it wouldn't power on. I tried charging it over night, but it still wouldn't work, I assume it never charged despite turning on the charge light.

I checked with a multimeter and the battery only showed 1.2v, so I'll assume it's dead dead.

As I've been waiting for a new battery to arrive, I've been playing it with a power bank attached.

Today, it arrived, and the 3DS doesn't turn on with it. It sees the battery, it shows it's fully charged, but when I unplug the power bank, it immediately shuts off.

I don't want to assume I have a new dead battery just yet, but I haven't opened it just yet.

Pertaining to the USB-C mod, it's only become an issue now, despite around a year of using it, it charged the battery just fine.

Edit: Here is a picture of my board and mod. It's not the best, but I'll get a better one when I can

Edit 2: I think I have found the issue... Those cables aren't meant to be crimped, are they?...

Edit 3: I have tested what I presume to be both F1 and F2 fuses (it's the ones surrounded) and they appear, at first glance, to be nominal. There's a slight voltage drop in the F2 fuse (from 4.3 to 3.7 volts), but not being sure about nominal voltages, I'm assuming they're fine.

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@deathpants time to open it up and to check the circuitry. Could Be that some solder connection on your USB-C mod failed or it could also be that you have a blown component on the board. Since it works with an external power supply but not the battery, I would definitely check the battery connector as well. Again, time to open it up. Once you have it open, take some well focused pictures of your circuit board. Post those with our question. That way we can see what you see and hopefully we can get this fixed Bilder zu einer vorhandenen Frage hinzufügen

8. Mai 2026 von oldturkey03

@oldturkey03 If the USB-C connector failed, would it even work with an external power supply? I guess it could have caused something else to fail, but @deathpants says they've been using it for awhile without issues, so I find it unlikely that the mod would cause something to fail this long after it was made.

8. Mai 2026 von Fixer of Stuff

I'll try and get some good pictures either way, to try and help the brainstorming. Thanks for the help so far

8. Mai 2026 von DeathPants

@fixerofstuff lt depends on the wiring of the mod. Most likely its just a USB-C port connected to the USB circuitry of the 3DS but there maybe a separate battery power connection coming of it. That is why we need to see what is going on. Easy enough without the mod. There are a few inductors and diodes that like to fail.

8. Mai 2026 von oldturkey03

I have now added a picture, as per the request. It's not the best, but I'll add a better one as soon as I have the means

8. Mai 2026 von DeathPants

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Leooooo1061 @leooooo1061

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Veröffentlicht: 9. Mai 2026

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Have you ever used fast-charging cables or PSUs on the 3DS? it's not really designed to deal with modern charging protocols, high wattage charging or whatever, and using a modern charging wire might blow some ICs or other components. Even if no fast-charging has been used, type-c is still very likely to damage the circuitry/make it degrade faster by charging the 3ds without using its stock power block. at this point I'd advise you to check the charging-related components, the fuse(although that shouldn't be the issue if it boots up), the voltage of the battery contacts while charging, and the charging port itself. It's also better if you can replace the Type-c mod with the original charging port and test the charging function with the original charging block.
Also the wires look fine but it'll be better to check them or replace them.

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I checked continuity on the cables and yeah, the negative lead is toast, there's none.

9. Mai 2026 von DeathPants

@deathpants my apologies, I might’ve gotten the 3ds and smth else mixed up, it does run without a battery so it’s behavior is expected😂

If the wire doesn’t work tho, you should replace it or just buy a whole button daughter board to save yourself the trouble of soldering

9. Mai 2026 von Leooooo1061

No worries, I went and checked a bunch more and there's no continuity at all between the pins and the negative lead in the USB-C port, so I'm not sure if it's the cable exactly...

I also went looking for wiring diagrams so I could find the IC, but all I get is more people looking for them 😅

10. Mai 2026 von DeathPants

@deathpants I thought you're talking about testing the wire, apparently I misunderstood that😂

I'm not exactly an expert on circuitry(hopefully someone else is), so I'm not really sure whether no continuity between charging port and the pins is normal, but I suggest you to check whether there's any output at the pins at all when the console is being charged, this way it'll be obvious whether there is power supplied to the battery at all. Also, to eliminate the wires, try to check things with the connector on the motherboard instead of the pins on the motherboard.

10. Mai 2026 von Leooooo1061

@deathpants what pins are you checking? Besides your motherboard have you checked your power board? Just an FYI, F1 is on the motherboard and F2 on the power board. Let's see if our game console Guru @dan0 has a solution to this.

10. Mai 2026 von oldturkey03

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@deathpants time to open it up and to check the circuitry. Could Be that some solder connection on your USB-C mod failed or it could also be that you have a blown component on the board. Since it works with an external power supply but not the battery, I would definitely check the battery connector as well. Again, time to open it up. Once you have it open, take some well focused pictures of your circuit board. Post those with our question. That way we can see what you see and hopefully we can get this fixed Bilder zu einer vorhandenen Frage hinzufügen — oldturkey03
@oldturkey03 If the USB-C connector failed, would it even work with an external power supply? I guess it could have caused something else to fail, but @deathpants says they've been using it for awhile without issues, so I find it unlikely that the mod would cause something to fail this long after it was made. — Fixer of Stuff
I'll try and get some good pictures either way, to try and help the brainstorming. Thanks for the help so far — DeathPants
@fixerofstuff lt depends on the wiring of the mod. Most likely its just a USB-C port connected to the USB circuitry of the 3DS but there maybe a separate battery power connection coming of it. That is why we need to see what is going on. Easy enough without the mod. There are a few inductors and diodes that like to fail. — oldturkey03
I have now added a picture, as per the request. It's not the best, but I'll add a better one as soon as I have the means — DeathPants
I checked continuity on the cables and yeah, the negative lead is toast, there's none. — DeathPants
@deathpants my apologies, I might’ve gotten the 3ds and smth else mixed up, it does run without a battery so it’s behavior is expected😂

If the wire doesn’t work tho, you should replace it or just buy a whole button daughter board to save yourself the trouble of soldering — Leooooo1061
No worries, I went and checked a bunch more and there's no continuity at all between the pins and the negative lead in the USB-C port, so I'm not sure if it's the cable exactly...

I also went looking for wiring diagrams so I could find the IC, but all I get is more people looking for them 😅 — DeathPants
@deathpants I thought you're talking about testing the wire, apparently I misunderstood that😂

I'm not exactly an expert on circuitry(hopefully someone else is), so I'm not really sure whether no continuity between charging port and the pins is normal, but I suggest you to check whether there's any output at the pins at all when the console is being charged, this way it'll be obvious whether there is power supplied to the battery at all. Also, to eliminate the wires, try to check things with the connector on the motherboard instead of the pins on the motherboard. — Leooooo1061
@deathpants what pins are you checking? Besides your motherboard have you checked your power board? Just an FYI, F1 is on the motherboard and F2 on the power board. Let's see if our game console Guru @dan0 has a solution to this. — oldturkey03

Fixer of Stuff @fixerofstuff Rep: 1,3 Tsd. 21 6 10 · Answer 1 · 2026-05-08T07:21:52-07:00

Fixer of Stuff @fixerofstuff

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So I looked this up on google and it says that blown fuses could be the culprit here. Specifically, it says that the "F1 and F2" fuses could be blown. Apparently, these are surge protection fuses that prevent damage from power surges. I also looked up the function of the fuses, and the F1 fuse is located on the charging circuit, while the F2 fuse is on the battery circuit. From that, it seems likely that the F2 fuse is blown based on the fact that it still works when you've got it plugged into another power source. I'd take that with a grain of salt (or several), mostly because of all this AI nonsense google has started doing, but I can't get any other useful information out of it. I'd guess replacing that fuse requires soldering based on the very limited information I found, but if you did the USB-C mod yourself, that probably wouldn't be an issue. If you have any questions, please leave a comment!

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3DS doesn't charge or work unplugged, but sees the battery fine

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