Battery replacement

Rear view of a Dreamcast controller board; note the battery by default is a soldered-in ML2020, or sometimes a larger ML2430.

The Dreamcast uses a soldered-in, rechargeable battery to store the console's time and date settings. The battery recharges whenever the console is powered on, takes about 2 hours to charge from empty to full, and should hold date and time settings for about 20 days. The batteries on most all Dreamcast consoles should be totally dead by now, so one can desolder the original battery and replace it with a plastic battery holder to allow easy replacement of the ML2032 in the future. It is recommended not to use the LIR2032 battery type as the Dreamcast does not output the voltage necessary for it to properly and fully recharge. Specifically, the ML2020, ML2032, and ML2430 are 3V batteries, with ML2020 being the smallest, ML2032 in the middle (recommended), and ML2430 being the largest (it may be too physically large to fit with an appropriately-sized reusable coin cell holder, however), while the LIR2032 type is generally 3.6V or 3.7V.

Parts

• Standard vertical CR2032 battery holders such as these have the same footprint as the stock soldered-in battery: https://console5.com/store/vertical-holder-for-2032-batteries.html
• ML2032 batteries can be found online from various places.