Well, I've had a problem with my N64 for the last few years now. When you start it up, sometimes it starts resetting a few times in a row or in a loop. And, sometimes you play the game for like 15 minutes to an hour, and it randomly starts resetting. I've seen online that this is a common problem with aging N64s, but that there is not one answer. So I began to troubleshoot it...
1.) I checked the power supply to see if it was loose. While this seems to be the problem a few times, it's not the main one, as I jiggled the system and it didn't reset, and I also locked the power supply in place firmer, and it still reset after about 15 minutes of play on Castlevania 64.
2.) I opened up the expansion port, removed the expansion pak, and cleared out a fair amount of dust (did not use alcohol to clean it out, but perhaps I should have?). Just dusting it didn't solve the problem.
3.) I cleaned the game's pins with alcohol, though since the problem started while playing Majora's Mask, this was a long shot and didn't help.
4.) I replaced the expansion pak with the original jumper pak...and I was able to play without any resetting so far (played an hour or more, I think).
5.) PS: The reset button is in fine shape, so that's not it either.
What do I assume from this? It's the expansion pak, right? Is the expansion pak dirty and I need to clean it with alcohol (is it safe to do so?), or is it just bad RAM in that expansion pak? Why would the old-school jumper pak work after not being used since, I think, 2000.
Any advice is appreciated.
(As an aside, I foolishly tried to blow open the wall in Castle Center without removing the seal for the first time...which resulted in me having to do the nitro quest more than necessary. That nitro quest wouldn't be so bad if I was playing with the save checkpoints, but I was trying to get from the end of the villa to the Tower of Execution without saving points, and eventually succeeded).