Which R4 card to buy for DS roms.

[daskallu]

Hello.
I've recently bought a New 3ds XL and I'm wondering what R4 card I should get, to play DS roms.
I've never owned such a console, so I bought a DSi XL, new 2ds XL and now a new 3ds XL, but I'll probably just keep the n3ds XL.

Currently, I have an Ace3ds Plus card from a friend that works just fine on the DSi and 2ds XL with v11.15, but I want to get my own one.

I'm just lost between all these versions on the r43ds website:
R4-3DS-Dual-Core
R4-3DS-RTS
R4i-Gold-3DS
R4i-B9S
R4i-Gold-3DS-Plus
R4i-Gold-Pro

Can you recommend me one?

Also, for 3ds roms, I plan to just buy game cards whenever I find them.

Thanks!

 

[Pk11]

Buying from "R4" sites isn't really recommended, most of them have a habit of being kinda scammy, they'll send different cards or nothing at all and such and there is no buyer protection.

The current recommendations are either simply use TWiLight Menu++ (or forwarders) to play straight from your 3DS SD, no flashcard needed, or to get an Ace3DS+ clone from either AliExpress or eBay. See the r/flashcarts quick start guide for more info on that.

TWiLight's generally best as it's free and doesn't require any additional hardware, but flashcards do still have slightly better compatibility so it can sometimes be worth getting one.

 

[master801]

R4i Gold 3DS Plus is the best out of all of those cards, but you're unlikely to find one.

R4i SDHC Gold Pro is basically the same as the R4i SDHC RTS Lite and R4i SDHC Dual-Core (the r4isdhc.com variant, not to be confused with r4isdhc.co.cn). The default kernel for these cards are rigged with a "time bomb" that will not allow the kernel to boot anymore beyond a certain date. This can be bypassed by using the YSMenu kernel instead of the default one. You will however, lose RTS (basically, an in-game menu) functionality.

R4i 3DS RTS works basically the same as the other clone R4 carts with a built-in time bomb. Not completely sure if the default kernel has RTS functionality or not.

R4i 3DS B9S is pretty much the exact same cart as R4i 3DS RTS, but with ntrboothax flashed onto it. You can even reflash the original (R4i 3DS RTS) firmware back onto it, if it has already been dumped by someone else. By default, these CANNOT be used for playing games. Only for ntrboothax.

tl;dr Buy the R4i Gold 3DS Plus if you can. If not, get one of the other hundreds of current clone carts. They all pretty much work the same and you're gonna be using YSMenu on half of them, anyway.

If you're really picky and want to use Wood R4 (the menu), then get a r4sdhc.co.cn cart. These don't have time bombs and you get Wood R4.

 

[N7Kopper]

TWiLight's generally best as it's free and doesn't require any additional hardware, but flashcards do still have slightly better compatibility so it can sometimes be worth getting one.

Not better. Different. If you want to play DSi exclusive or enhanced games, bootstrap runs those - flashcarts don't. Aside from some rare experimental ones, flashcarts are nitro (DS) only. Also no infrared.

That said, I use both nds-bootstrap and my flashcart for SoulSilver. One to connect to the Pokéwalker (by using White 2, sadly not the built-in IR) and one for Battle Revolution.

 

[Pk11]

Not better. Different. If you want to play DSi exclusive or enhanced games, bootstrap runs those - flashcarts don't. Aside from some rare experimental ones, flashcarts are nitro (DS) only. Also no infrared.

That said, I use both nds-bootstrap and my flashcart for SoulSilver. One to connect to the Pokéwalker (by using White 2, sadly not the built-in IR) and one for Battle Revolution.

I would still say it's the overall better choice as it has nearly the same compatibility as flashcards for NTR games, compatibility with DSi Mode and DSiWare, and (most importantly) is free. Flashcards do still have a use at times and are sometimes better than TWiLight (mainly old homebrew and a couple NTR games), but personally I wouldn't say it's inaccurate to call TWiLight the overall better option nowadays.

 

[assassinz]

You can get a new M3 Simply on ebay. It can use Wood R4 and is made by the original R4 team afaik.

 

[master801]

You can get a new M3 Simply on ebay. It can use Wood R4 and is made by the original R4 team afaik.

You forgot to mention how the R4 can only use 2GB micro sd cards... or that it can only be used with CFW on the 3DS.