Eldoug here. Cleaning wizard, polymer knowledgeable, and germophobe! So there are some methods, approaches, and “tricks” that I really strongly don't recommend for the average users. BUT! I will explain why!

Now, if you are reading this and think “this guy doesn't know what he's talking about, I've done it for years and years and it's worked fine” that is absolutely acceptable too! I've never tried chainsaw juggling, but I suspect that I shouldn't give it a go with wet hands! Meaning that you might see a method or approach that has worked for you in the past, and continues to work because you've practiced with it! This guide? This is for people starting off fresh. People who are just now getting into game preservation or repair and want to start learning from the ground up! So let's get into it!

This one will take some explaning, so let's get it right out of the way to begin with. You really really shouldn't use alcohol (or any solvent) when cleaning plastics. Now, I promise I won't bore you with the science and chemistry behind it all (unless you are interested….), but you just don't want to do it. So much so that Nintendo put a warning on the back of their carts saying so!

(imagine me tapping that cart) Says so right on the box. Do not use alcohol or solvents. But Eldoug, I've used it for years, every store I know uses it, whats the big deal? Every video on YouTube uses it. Even you mention it at times???

And you are correct, but let me explain. Solvents will dry out the plastics. Nintendo knew this back in 1985 and it's still true today. Alcohol and other solvents dry out plastics. And since these games are OLD we need to make sure we keep them as fresh and saturated as possible. (I should really do a longer explanation about plastics, but we'd be here all night). So in short, the dryer plastics get, the more brittle they can get, and the more likely they are to get damaged. Alcohol speeds that up. We want to use softer cleaners, usually just warm soapy water if possible, to clean plastics. Then saturate the plastics with a silicone based cleaner or protectant (ArmorAll is weirdly perfect for consoles, go figure). But it doesn't stop there! You need to repeat that process often to make sure that plastic stays healthy for as long as possible! In the same realm as Alcohols and solvents….

Now look…. both have alcohol in them. So re-read above. But see the other problem is that Windex is a glass cleaner (they do make a multisurface cleaner, but even that has alcohol in it) and RainX has a decent amount of alcohol in it as well. (You'll see a trend where the “Do not use” stuff, usually just has alcohol in it.

You'll often find Brasso (or similar brass cleaners) in game stores. They usually use it for cleaning pins (you know what I'll say about that), but I've seen more than a few stores use brasso on plastic to remove dirt and smudges. Brasso is a whole bunch of “stuff” you don't really want around your games. (hey weird fact, Brasso and some lighter fluids have similar compounds), but safe to say, it's another thing on the list you just don't want to use. It's an inhalation risk, a fire risk, doesn't really work to clean things, just all around sort of useless for video game cleaning. (It can work to clean brass in PCBs, but it's way more aggressive than what most pins need! We'll get into pin cleaning I promise!)