Console Cleanup: Crack House Gamecube Rescue!

There's always room at the Backward Compatible home for wayward game consoles.

This week, I cleared out a spot in the intensive care ward for a rough-around-the-edges Gamecube. The poor little silver lunchbox was picked up as part of a nicely priced bundle I scored from a meth head camped out in the deepest part of the Akron ghetto (clearly, Craigslist knows no boundaries). In his defense, he was nice enough and claimed to repair computers for a living, but his lack of teeth and excess of hair suggested otherwise.

Once I got the little guy home, it was apparent he'd lived a troubled existence; covered in scuffs and scratches, not to mention smelling like the spent diaper of a pack-a-day chimpanzee.

Today I'll show you how to take care of some of the physical scarring--as far as the mental scarring...and the smell...your guess is as good as mine.

Here's our brave little patient. Note the scuffs and scratches:

For abrasions, no amount of Windex Multi-Surface is going to help (although it did go a long way in cutting the "cigarette butt fished out of a urinal" scent). You're going to need something more persuasive, like this:

Being a huge pack rat, I had a bottle of Meguiars PlastX plastic polish in the garage from a headlight cleanup job I did a few years ago. Like any other polish, it's a mild abrasive that--with any luck--will smooth out the scratches on the surface of the Gamecube. 

The trick is to use just a dab, and polish with just enough pressure to get the job done. Pro tip: too much elbow grease and you'll end up polishing the shiny silver finish right off of the console. Ask me how I know.

Done correctly, you'll easily wipe away any light scratches on the system. See? Deep gouges, however, are there to stay.

The cleanup was so successful that, while I originally planned on reselling the Gamecube, I think I'll hold onto it for now. As for the rest of the haul, it's in the game room airing out. Keep an eye out for the games in an upcoming Recent Pickups post.

As a welcome home gift, I believe this little guy needs a Gameboy player and a Wavebird.

In the meantime, does anyone have any good  remedies for stinky plastic? Maybe Oxy Clean? Dog shampoo? I'm willing to try just about anything. 

Just for the fun of it, here's one last picture of my pair of lunch boxes frolicking carelessly through the gameroom.