"Error has occurred. Hold down the POWER button..." Problem.

Hello,

I’ve been having this problem with my Nintendo 3DS for a while…

I bought a second-hand Nintendo 3DS about a year or two ago, after I lost mine. It worked perfectly fine for all of my games, though I mostly used Pokemon Moon and Zelda Majora’s Mask.

I left it unused for about a year, and then reset my Pokemon Moon game so I could start again. However, I was stopped at a random time with this infamous black screen : “An Error has occurred. Hold down the POWER button…” . I didn’t give it much thought, too frustrated that I had lost an hour of progress, and never touched it again.

Now, it has been a couple month since that incident, and I have bought Pokemon Omega Ruby recently. However, I can’t even get to the main title screen without having the Black Screen Error™. Like, whether I try to skip the trailer or let it finish on its own, the error occurs before the main title screen appears.

Now, that’s frustrating.

I have researched as much as I could on the matter of these error screens, but nothing I have tried works. The curious thing is, so far, I haven’t noticed any other software that wouldn’t work (most people say they can’t use the camera, internet, or the eShop, but I can).

For your information, I have tried :

-Formating the 3DS (which deleted all data from the SD card except from photos. There are just 3, I think from the former owner, since I cannot recall taking them)… An error has occurred.

-Using the eShop repair tool… An error has occurred.

-Playing while turning off the wifi connection… An error has occurred.

-Using a different SD card. The game has loaded additional data to it, and guess what ? An error has occurred.

-Removing and putting back the wifi card… An error has occurred.

-Changing the angle of the wire attached to it. You never know.

-Changing entirely the wifi card… You know the drill. An error has occurred.

-Removing entirely the wifi card (nothing ventured, nothing gained) but then the 3DS didn’t recognise the cartridge. Same thing with the SD card, I couldn’t load the game.

-The LRAup thing just opens the camera.

So, well, I’m kind of out of ideas to try now and strongly considering bringing this bloody 3DS to an exorcist.

I really don’t want to spend a fortune on repairing it (or purchasing another), so I’m up to any suggestion if you have any other idea of what is causing the problem.

(Just don’t answer “You should never buy second-hand stuff”, it would be both useless and annoying.)