Hacking Any cfw for ds?

how_do_i_do_that

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Last edited by how_do_i_do_that,

funnystory

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The DS has limited and basic firmware mods, it is called flashme.

You can refer to this: http://gbatemp.net/threads/what-is-flashme.34158/

If your hoping for something like the 3DS custom firmwares etc, your likely to be disapointed.

you can refer to the wiki as well for installation: http://wiki.gbatemp.net/wiki/FlashMe

Just checked that out. I have a Firecard for my ds and I don't even know where to find info on it. I was kinda hoping for something like the 3ds cfw
 

sirocyl

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Here's a real answer.
Some time ago, there was a custom DS firmware, which cleaned things up and, I believe, removed the pictochat and DS Download Play function from the menu.
It's been long since gone to the bitbucket.
I've been looking into making a DS CFW, which includes the WiFi Configuration binary with a custom theme, and possibly a jumping point to a Nintendo DS Browser or other applications on a flashcart through a tag in RAM and a custom bootloader, like the Linux Kernel's cmdline memory block.

Anyway, personal aspirations aside, I recently stumbled upon this. If you're skilled in developing or reverse engineering, these tools will help greatly.
https://github.com/CTurt/CFW-Suite
Note that, despite the name of a renowned 3DS dev on the project, this is for DS AND DS LITE - not 3DS.
If you brick your DS, it's fair game. Don't toss it out - buy a new one, or pull it apart, google ppflash, and do it.
 
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The Catboy

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Technically flashcards kind of are CFW, in that they they use their own firmware to run DS roms on your DS.
Flashme is the best one you can go with since you loss nothing other than the Health and Safety screen and gain the ability to boot into Slot-2 card DS-Mode without a PassME.
But there's also a few other CFW's for the DS, but they aren't very useful.
http://filetrip.net/nds-downloads/other-files/download-creebome-beta-2-f29609.html
http://filetrip.net/nds-downloads/other-files/download-fwnitro-1-6c-f29596.html
http://filetrip.net/nds-downloads/other-files/download-hbfirmware-090807-f29610.html
 
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sirocyl

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you should ask him what features he was expecting to be able to do before making it sound like a CWF on a ds/l is the second coming of jesus or something.
I'm answering the question, not just for the OP, but for anyone who may come across this thread from a search or something.

Hehe, DS CFWs are fun!
Whoa, nice. Custom firmware in general, is fun. :D

Technically flashcards kind of are CFW, in that they they use their own firmware to run DS roms on your DS.
Games which load from the card replace the firmware's GUI program in memory, but the SDK builtins, hardware drivers and system management code are still resident in firmware, and called upon by the running cart.

Finally, it may not be necessary to overwrite the firmware at all. The classic R4DS chip bypasses the firmware and automatically launches its menu program, which can be swapped out with a custom application which is larger, much safer, and a lot more flexible, than a program injected into the DS's firmware.

I'm interested, because I want to make a custom GUI and boot animation based off of the original firmware, with a few added features. It'll take a bit of hex and assembler work, but I'm bored enough. :)
 

FAST6191

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Games which load from the card replace the firmware's GUI program in memory, but the SDK builtins, hardware drivers and system management code are still resident in firmware, and called upon by the running cart.
Be careful thinking along those lines as a lot of that was handled instead by the entirely separate read only/unalterable BIOSes. The firmware is more limited to some wifi settings, some calibration (touch, temperature) and user date (name, birthday, colour, whether you use the GBA on the top or bottom screen, alarm time...) and technically the wifi can be handled externally -- the DSOrganize homebrew had extra wifi settings stored on the flash cart. http://problemkaputt.de/gbatek.htm#dsfirmwarewificalibrationdata has more on firmware, for the BIOS then http://problemkaputt.de/gbatek.htm#biosfunctions
I don't know what the minimums will be for commercial games, though when I was playing with some of the language forcing cheats for various games then it not encountering something it expected could send it through a loop (literally) so I imagine you probably do want to bounce some fake settings for it in there, even if your end user can not change them. Various GBA flash carts actually had things like this -- at times the old EZ4 DS mode would use windirt (the head of the company) as the name regardless of user settings.

Anyway Crystal the Glaceon linked the other non flashme DS custom firmwares. https://web.archive.org/web/20150812074913/http://fwnitro.caitsith2.net/ has a tiny bit more on fwnitro.
 

MadMod

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Hehe, DS CFWs are fun!

Hey CTurt, I've got a question for you since you seem so knowledgeable on the subject. Got any tips on decoding the firmware once you dump it? I'm trying to change the startup sound as well as the color of the main menu gridlines (to match the custom shell i'm making).

so far i managed to get to get the .bin open in devkitpro, but it's completely illegible. Any idea how to get it back to something resembling a coding language so i can make changes? Do you need a decompiler? I can code, but this reverse engineering stuff's all new to me. I'm lost.
 

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I used FlashMe on my old DS lite all those years ago so i didn't have to use PassMe every time i wanted homebrew.

But DS custom firmware is made redundant my flashcards now. Theres no point in modifying firmware these days
 

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