How To Fix the Original NES Red Blinking Light

In this video I show you 5 different ways how to fix the red flashing light on the original Nintendo Entertainment System. Some of these you may of heard of, some you may not. Watch to find out which methods are used and hopefully one of them will help you with your nintendo entertainment system.

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[AndyK]

Wiggling the cartridge from side to side fixed it for me. Thank you!

[FourKaiju]

Thank you I get to play with my NES for the first time in 10 years.

[BarclayMagoo]

This guys sounds like Toby from the office, thanks Toby!

[atranfanatic]

Most of the time after cleaning the cartridge, I push reset and while keeping it pressed, I move the cartridge to either the left or right gently then release the reset button. And 9 out of 10 that works for me and has for over 20 or more years. And of course if it is real bad, I take the NES apart and clean the 72 pin connector.

[omegaman]

Your video is going to be used as reference for eternity. These consoles suffer from the same symptom. I bought one 4 years ago used it for a little while then stored it. I recently took it out and the trouble began. I have to play with it by moving the cartridge. It works sometimes. I am now thinking of following your method of cleaning it and ordering a new 72 pin since they run cheap.

[SSPspaz]

I've got 2 old NES consoles that work intermittently but that sometimes get the flashing red light. The flashing red light is actually why I have 2 of them. Growing up, my brother and I would just rotate them if one wasn't working haha. I'll have to give all of these methods a try. Thanks so much for the tutorials!

[shdon]

You can also boil the 72-pin connector in water for 15-30 minutes, which causes the contacts to spring back to their original positions and thus grip the cartridge more tightly. Better than replacing it with a potentially inferior replacement which might fail rather quickly due to oxidisation.

Another option is to cut one of the pins on the lockout chip. I did both, actually: boiling the connector and cutting the pin.

[gloriaschwazenhag]

Perfect video! Thank you so much for the concise video without all the “I love to listen to my own voice” ones out there (tho I must say, your voice is pleasant to listen to). I’m so glad I decided to just do it and clean the inside as there was plenty of dust in it. One thing I want to share is that when I tightened the lower front right screw to the lower plastic tray when reinstalling, I must have gone a bit too much as the tray wouldn’t lock. I loosed it up about 1.5 turns and it was fine. So much better than jiggling every game.

[mariosion]

Great video, personally, I use a cartridge connector called blinking light win. It’s a full 72 pin connector replacement which will make it so that the cart just snaps in and you don’t press down, it just connects. Only bad thing is that the cart is gripped really tight, which can be good, but also bad when removing the cart. It makes the nes region free!

[Peelster]

The wiggle the cartridge around in the slot method worked for me. I knew it wasn't the cart itself because the light was blinking when no cartridge was in it. Thanks!

[Orbacron]

Removing the 72 pin connector, brushing it with alcohol, along with q-tips and alcohol cleaning the motherboard pins and any grounding surfaces worked. There was haze of corrosion on the motherboard pins and motherboard grounding points👍

[itsitzybee]

Quarantine made by family bring out the old nintendo we had hidden in the garage but we had a hard time getting the games to play. Each time we had to call my older brother in or wait 15 minutes to get it working. This helped so much, thank you!!!

[theedventures]

Followed your guide and my Nintendo works again just like brand new! Thank you for putting this out there it was quick simple and easy to follow

[markm]

Scrubbing bubbles works too. They work hard so you don't have to.

[Catylino]

Yes! This worked! The 3rd tip! I'm happy I didnt have to try #4!

[SirLucas]

Thank you so much. These little tutorials have brought back to life my NES. Simple, yet so effective!!

[podcast_smitty]

Here I was about to do open heart surgery on my NES only to find out that the second way worked the whole time. I appreciate this a lot!

[faithmatters]

That was pretty good and i feel confident in taking mine apart to clean it! But i think i made a few thing's loose when i was transporting it in a box and i put it down roughly. Now the area that holds the game won't stay down. But even if i hold it down the light blinks and the connections area seems loose because it gets static if i move the wire's. No picture just a pink a then black screen blinking off and on again. Do you have any idea what i can do or what it might be? Thank you, JC

[DG-czhv]

I just bought two second hand NES consoles. One had a blinking white screen and one had a blinking red screen. Followed this guide to clean the contacts of the game cart, inserted and removed a a bunch of times and did the little jiggle the game cart move once you push down the 72 pin connector to the locked position and now both work one the first try about 70% of the time (probably because the panther is too strong)

[daviebaggins]

Thank you so much! I have two nes that were giving me the blinking light treatment and were inoperable. Your tips helped fix both of them .