while I´m waiting on some parts to work further on my other project I got a pretty cheap Fortnite Switch with BlueScreen.
I´ve asked the previous owner and he told me that his son punched the switch and then it got to this state.
So after disassembling and checking the obvious spots of other faults i pushed down the APU and was able to get it to show the loading icon while on a charger.
So i tried a reflow of the APU and i think that i did a decent job.
The Screen then showed the loading Icon so i let it sit there for a while for charging.
Charging at around 0,4A worked and also 1,5A.
After the Battery got to around 40% i tried a first start but it just went past the Nintendo Logo and froze.
I then started to check for shorts around the APU and found what at least I identified as a cap shorted.
Can anybody confirm me about my observation that this is not meant to be?
I´m now worried that it isn´t the MAX next to it that´s causing it but some joint points under the APU.
Wanted to ask what you think before getting new stress to the board by removing the Max to check if the short is gone.
I don´t know if this is common due in never experienced it while powering down the switch after the freeze by holding the power button for 15sec i always get a little scratch noise out of the speaker sitting next to the apu.
The cap near the Max IC and the associated rail is normally somewhere in the region of 10 to 20 ohm (may read less due to current high ambient temps) relative to ground, so is likely not your issue.
So from your description the fault is impact damage, as a result ball and/or joint issues has occured.
When it freezes is this at the second boot logo? If yes, could imply WifI IC issues which seems to be quite vulnerable on all switch revs to impact damage or possibly even the EMMC at fault.
While my usual course of action isn’t to randomly reflow ICs without further diagnostics your pretty limited on Mariko without homebrew, or building an inverted EMMC adapter to probe certain lines at the Wifi IC while the unit is on…so it might be worth reflowing the Wifi IC first, though this wouldn’t truly validate the IC being good if this didn’t solve your problem.
Might also be worth going over the board and looking out for any component (specifically passives) which may have been knocked off which is also not uncommon but sometimes hard to spot.
Hi,
thanks for the response indeed it got 22,8 ohm on my fluke.
It freezes right after the first boot Logo Nintendo sign.
If i get you right you suspect an emmc fault. If so when i remove it there should be a scimilar error while powering up.
I´ve already gone over the board but wasn´t able to spot any missing components.
Did this especialy after the reflow/cleaning.
Ah, so if you don’t see the Second logo at all then that changes things slightly and would have me leaning more towards another open line somewhere leading to the SoC, as this has been my experience of consoles which don’t clear the first logo but fast charge, primary CPU has engaged (believe it’s the inductor and cap which you highlighted) which will read approx 0.8/1.2V.
Failing that the secondary boot stage where GPU ultimately is enabled and other misc things etc.
Hard to say, maybe a ball pooped off below SoC in impact. Still could possibly be Wifi or EMMC but just less likely now.
Unfortunately not as the EMMC houses the OS which produces any onscreen errors.
I suppose it was BSOD prior so there could also be joint issues below Ram, though I wouldn’t expect fast charge in most cases if that was the issue as I beleive there is a power on self test.
I would avoid touching the SoC again as it’s very sensitive to excess heat and it’s almost certainly not going to resolve any issues if the original cause was a loose ball which will have certainly merged elsewhere during prior reflow, that is unless the SoC wasn’t completely up to reflow temp prior, and/or there is a pad related issue.
What it might be worth doing is gently heating the board to about 60/70C and see if you can change any symptoms due to the thermal expansion and contraction of the board which may further help narrow things down.
Yhea the sensitivity of this chip is an issue. But I tried anyways.
I´ve got an interesting reaction afterwards.
The Nintendo boot Logo shows up it gets dark and then reappears just to disappear again and freeze.
I probably won´t come around to take it out and get a look to the balling.
Yhea I think i will give it a try tommorow to remove it out of the board.
Hopefully i wont kill it in the process.
On the other hand it wouldn´t be a big loss as i can still use the parts of the board battery and the screen.
I quite don´t know if if i butchered it while removing the chip or during cleanup.
But i also can´t see any trace leaving /going from there.so I hope that´s just a fixation point.
Also some spots need a little bit more solder removing.
I´ll have to wait for the stencil I´ll keep you updated.
