---
title: The Gameboy Mod My Younger Self Always Wanted
description: The backlight LED mod on GBA's is literally so good
date: 2026-06-21T20:32:08-07:00
draft: false
category: article
image: /media/img/gba/opengraph.jpg
---

## The Starting Point

A while back I decided I wanted to get back into some retro mobile games because
it feels comfy and gives me an excuse to do some basic resto-modding.
My first target in this case was the Gameboy Advance that I've had since I was
just a lad :3


{{< pic "/media/img/gba/basic-off.jpg" "Close up of Gameboy" >}}

As soon as I turned on the thing though I realized that the total lack of
backlight completely sucks. For those that don't recall how bad, here's mine
before doing any modifying and in the sunlight ;-;

{{< pic "/media/img/gba/saphire-save-closeup.jpg" "Saphire save closeup" >}}

_Ignore the custom buttons, this pic was taken during my testing period :3_

## Opening Up to Replacing the Old and Dull with New and Bright

It seems weird in hindsight but I intiall ythought that a backlight mod would
require soldering and modifying the original screen when in fact the "easier"
way of doing this was just replacing the old screen with a newer more modern one.

The one I picked was the {{< link "No Cut IPS Backlight Mod Kit" "https://retrogamerepairshop.com/collections/gba-displays/products/gba-game-boy-advance-drop-in-ips-backlight-mod-kit" >}}
from {{< link "Retro Game Repair Shop" "https://retrogamerepairshop.com/" >}}  which
is an awesome kit and comes with nearly everything to do this mod.
The only thing that it's missing is a tri-wing screw driver which makes doing 
this substantially easier. I didn't have one and **thought** that Harbor Freight
would help me here but as you can see below the  tri-wing that you can get
required some..... sharpening to make it fit into the **tiny** screw heads.


{{< pic "/media/img/gba/hf-tri-hex-fixing.jpg" "Closeup of tri-wing" >}}

I did manage to sharpen the bit by clamping some 80 grit sandpaper to my
workbench and **slowly** removing material until I had a good enough fit.
Luckily once the tri-wing screws holding the case are gone we are greeted with
phillips head screws securing the motherboard to the front of the case which
are easily removed.

{{< pic "/media/img/gba/internals.jpg" "Closeup of tri-wing" >}}

{{< pic "/media/img/gba/internals-close.jpg" "Another closeup of the internals" >}}

I didn't get any pictures of the process for replacing the screen but I did get
one of the testing phase. :warning: Testing ended up being super crucial because
the first screen unit I bought was actually DOA. Luckily the second unit was fine
and I was also able to get some nicer buttons becaue I ended up not really liking
the clear button aesthetic.

{{< pic "/media/img/gba/testing-led-screen.jpg" "Testing the new screen" >}}

Closing everything back up _should_ have been easy though one thing I had to do
was shave down some of the after market buttons since they were **just barely**
too big. Other than that however just going slow led to a very smooth re-assembly
process. Turning it on I'm greeted with this :)

{{< pic "/media/img/gba/gba-splash-led.jpg" "Closeup led splash screen" >}}

Also going with black buttons was definitely the move I think because it just
looks _so much cleaner_ :3


But of course what good are pictures when you could _watch_ this lovely little
thing in action.

{{< youtube "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENgrivaA4gY" >}}


conclusion: very nice and epic :3