Power consumption of Game Boy flash cartridges

Re:Power consumption of Game Boy flash cartridges by richeyryan on Tuesday April 20, 2021 @08:38AM (#26873748)

I've changed the battery on my copy of Pokemon Gold twice. I wonder if whoever designed those cartridges expected anyone to still be playing the game twenty years later.

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Re:Power consumption of Game Boy flash cartridges by aidenn0 on Tuesday April 20, 2021 @10:57AM (#26875576)

I've seriously considered replacing the SRAM with MRAM so as to not require battery replacement. It would need level shifters though.

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Re:Power consumption of Game Boy flash cartridges by treesknees on Tuesday April 20, 2021 @04:28PM (#26881130)

Meanwhile my Blue version is somehow still ticking along on its original battery nearly 23 years later.

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Re:Power consumption of Game Boy flash cartridges by meowster on Wednesday April 21, 2021 @11:49AM (#26891224)

My red and yellow carts still have original batteries too, and the saved games still work perfectly (as of two years ago when I last checked). The only thing I might say "oh well" about losing is the official Mew I got from some Pokemon event at a mall, but I don't even have the certificate that it came with so it doesn't really matter.

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Re:Power consumption of Game Boy flash cartridges by genocidicbunny on Wednesday April 21, 2021 @12:15AM (#26885367)

Gen II (Silver/Gold/Crystal) had a time-of-day thing going, which I expect probably required more battery power due to also needing to maintain a clock along with the save data. Gen I only needed to hold the save data. That would be my guess for the difference in battery life.

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