Help Me Please

My brother's GHIII Kramer guitar for PS2 is acting weird. The strum bar seems to be broken or stuck, because at any of the menus it just continues to scroll and he can't get it to stop on an option. He can't even play the game with it; he's gone back to using his old wired GH controller from the first game (which is on his last legs as it is). I tested it on my system, and it did the same thing, so we're pretty sure the system's not to blame here.

We're not sure whether this is a wireless interference problem, or with the strum bar. We've cleaned the bar, used a tiny vacuum for comp keyboards to get anything that might've been stuck out, even changed the batteries, to no avail. Has this happened to anyone? Do they know how to fix it?

He's insisting on taking it to Gamestop to have someone look at it, but I don't know if he can do that there because the warranty's expired (I think....90 days?)

I almost thought it was a system thing because his PS2 had trouble reading me on my wired GHII controller, but I've had no trouble playing here on my system. I don't know if that helps anyone there, but I figured I'd add it anyway.

 

Ok, here's the scoop.

We did go to Gamestop after all, and while they couldn't do anything themselves (partially because they can't, and partially because no one thought to take the dumb thing with them. Durr.) they suggested that perhaps a part is loose inside. So we're going to open the back up and see what that does.

Anything I should look for, if anyone's ever done exploratory "surgery" on a Kramer controller before?

 

Before opening it, I would try to contact customer service for the company that made your guitar. There might be a limited warranty on it, where you can send it in to them and they fix/replace it, but if you open it up, that could be deemed invalid and if you cant fix it, would have to buy a whole new one.


one thing I suggest is, an offbrand one that works fantastically. its by a company called the "Ant Commandos" it works better than my wired GHIII controller, and takes 4 AA batteries. It's VERY nice

 

It was Red Octane's Kramer guitar that came with the PS2 bundle, and the warranty is long dead. he got it as a X-mas gift, it's July, and the package said 90-day warranty. So I'm guessing maybe it doesn't matter?

I hope it doesn't, because I cracked it open today to see if I could do anything on my own, and after 5 tries the strum bar played normally, but now the guitar's playing green notes where there aren't any. Say I have a passage of red notes with an occasional red/blue chord. It'll randomnly throw in green and make it a triple chord, messing it up.

I'm fiddling with it some more, because I'm close, but that was just odd.

 

ah yeah, thats fine then the warranty dead, no worries really then, like I said worst case scenario you have to buy a new guitar lol.

check to see if you might have crossed the wire on the green button with the wire to red or blue. what might happen is the wires might touch sometimes, and it causes green to spaz.

 

When you open it, just check to make sure everything is connected right, and connected to the right places. ._.

I dunno, sounds to me like your doing it right so far. You might want to get one of those air spraying can thingys, and clean out the inside of the guitar.

 

you don't have to use the Guitar, you can use the PS2 controller it tells you what to buttons to use in the game book

 

Like one of those air can thingy you use to get unk out from under your keyboards keys? I hope I have one of those lying around somewhere...

I'm double-checking the cables inside, as it's still doing the thing with the green fret. I guess to give a sort of visual idea, the screen's fret flashes as if I'm pressing the green fret on the guitar (even though I am not). I'm trying to see now if there's either a missed connection, or something's pressing somewhere.

Thanks for the help thus far guys.