Technical Difficulties

Well, this kind of bites. I recently bought a PSP-2000 for a reasonable price, on the understanding that the screen was slightly buggered up and needed to be replaced. The problem is, while I did manage to remove the screen, I also managed to remove the tiny latch that holds the backlight cable in place. When I mean tiny, I mean it's literally a square that's a couple of millimeters high and wide. So when that replacement screen (finally) arrives, I'll have to make like MacGyver and glue the backlight cable, also rather small, in place so it doesn't jostle around after the system is reassembled. Cue groan of frustration.

Let me just state for the record that I kind of hate hardware mods. Software mods, those aren't a problem... I rarely screw these up, because it's just a matter of having the right equipment and following instructions. Hardware mods, though, that's a different story. They require the sight of a hawk and the dexterity of a neurosurgeon, and I have neither. With electronics being as small as they are in 2022 (and in the case of that PSP, well before that), you start to feel like Godzilla, trying his damnedest to not step on anyone or break any buildings as he wades through the streets of Tokyo. There's a reason he's had more luck as a force of nature than a hero.

What the radioactive dinosaur said.
(image from The Oatmeal, a web site which you
should already know about by now)

It's really a shame, too, because there are all kinds of situations where modding a game system at the microscopic level would be a handy skill. Take, for instance, my late model GameCube, which could have a digital out port grafted onto it if I had the skill. (I likely don't.) Or the MC2SIO, which lets the Playstation 2 run games straight from an SD card if I had the steady hands to do the wiring. (See previous parantheses.) There's a wealth of exciting possibilities, all well beyond my clumsy grasp.