Dreamcast-Talk.com

Many years ago, when I had my very first Dreamcast from ebay, I bought a brand new Gameshark CDX from Toys R US. I remember I was playing the game Soul Fighter with the Gameshark memory card in the controller when the controller suddenly stopped working. After that, the control ports never worked again. I know now that the controller ports blowing on the Dreamcast is a relatively common thing. I also read on this forum recently that 3rd party accessories can draw too much power from the controller port and cause them to blow. This got me thinking, did the Gameshark CDX blow the controller ports on my first Dreamcast many years ago? At the time, I didn't think it was the Gameshark, I thought it was just because the Dreamcast was old, and that it was going to happen anyway and that it was just a coincidence. This had to be around 2002 or 2003, when I was 7 or 8. It was after the Dreamcast was no longer being sold, but my local Toys R US still had a small selection of Dreamcast games. I no longer have that Dreamcast, it's long gone, and I've had at least 3 or 4 other Dreamcasts since then. I also no longer have the Gameshark CDX, it is also long gone. The controller ports never below on any of those Dreamcasts.

P.S. Most of my memory cards are 3rd party Performance brand memory cards, I only have two official Sega VMUs. Are these safe to use?

It could have been the CDX dongle/memorycard being faulty and thus blowing up the fuse of your controller board of the Dreamcast. It could also have been that your controller board was already broken and that the CDX usage just was the final nail in the coffin .

When I used to use my cdx I never had an issue with it. But I also haven't used it in years. Still have it though.