[WIP] SuperChis —— Open source GBA TF Flashcart

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So tried 2 diiferent lots of patches, and copying to flash. Didn't work either way :(
mine works fine 🤔🤔
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Post in thread 'SuperChis Prime: How I Fixed the SuperCard SD's Flaws on a Budget' https://gbatemp.net/threads/superch...rd-sds-flaws-on-a-budget.678808/post-10846534
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So tried 2 diiferent lots of patches, and copying to flash. Didn't work either way :(
1-patch the game.
2- write it to nor flash
 
Last edited by sam2895,
We plan to launch non-budget flashcart in the second half of 2026, and it is still in the very early design stage.

We'll have RTC, Rumble, Gravity, Gyro, Solar...


Just wondering if theres any updates on this new flashcart?
 
Just wondering if theres any updates on this new flashcart?
About a week ago he implied he would be restarting development of the cart from scratch.
chis.png
 
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This is a really interesting direction. I’ve been using a ChisFlash cartridge as one of the reference cartridges while testing CanoFlash, a wireless cartridge flasher for original GBA hardware, and having an open design available has been extremely useful.

The larger NOR Flash planned for SuperChis sounds especially interesting. Being able to run problematic games from NOR without relying on waitstate patches could address one of the main compatibility limitations of SuperCard-derived designs.

Do you expect SuperChis to retain a programming interface similar to the current ChisFlash boards, or will it require a completely different flashing protocol? I’d be very interested in testing CanoFlash compatibility once the hardware is ready.

Great work to both of you, and thank you for keeping the project open source!
 
This is a really interesting direction. I’ve been using a ChisFlash cartridge as one of the reference cartridges while testing CanoFlash, a wireless cartridge flasher for original GBA hardware, and having an open design available has been extremely useful.

The larger NOR Flash planned for SuperChis sounds especially interesting. Being able to run problematic games from NOR without relying on waitstate patches could address one of the main compatibility limitations of SuperCard-derived designs.

Do you expect SuperChis to retain a programming interface similar to the current ChisFlash boards, or will it require a completely different flashing protocol? I’d be very interested in testing CanoFlash compatibility once the hardware is ready.

Great work to both of you, and thank you for keeping the project open source!
The SuperChis Prime cart has been available for a while, you can buy it from Chis Family Store on AliExpress. Sounds like there will be later versions with additional features like rumble, but the Prime cart works great playing games from micro SD. I have a feeling you can access the NOR storage from an external flasher like you'd use for ChisFlash, but in general use you use SuperChis's own menu to load games from the micro SD.
 
The SuperChis Prime cart has been available for a while, you can buy it from Chis Family Store on AliExpress. Sounds like there will be later versions with additional features like rumble, but the Prime cart works great playing games from micro SD. I have a feeling you can access the NOR storage from an external flasher like you'd use for ChisFlash, but in general use you use SuperChis's own menu to load games from the micro SD.
Thanks, that clears up the distinction. I was thinking about the SuperChis from the external-programmer side, but I understand that its normal workflow is to use SuperFW and load or write games from the cart's own microSD menu.

From the CanoFlash side, access to the internal NOR through the regular GBA cartridge bus would be the interesting part. However, I wouldn't assume that it behaves like the simpler S29GL256-based cartridges I currently support, especially with the CPLD and memory-mapping layer in between.

I may get an official SuperChis Prime and inspect its JEDEC IDs, banking and write protocol as a separate compatibility experiment.

Have you actually seen its NOR read or written with an external flasher, or was that just a possibility? If you know of any technical notes about the external access or memory mapping, I would be interested in reading them.
 
Thanks, that clears up the distinction. I was thinking about the SuperChis from the external-programmer side, but I understand that its normal workflow is to use SuperFW and load or write games from the cart's own microSD menu.

From the CanoFlash side, access to the internal NOR through the regular GBA cartridge bus would be the interesting part. However, I wouldn't assume that it behaves like the simpler S29GL256-based cartridges I currently support, especially with the CPLD and memory-mapping layer in between.

I may get an official SuperChis Prime and inspect its JEDEC IDs, banking and write protocol as a separate compatibility experiment.

Have you actually seen its NOR read or written with an external flasher, or was that just a possibility? If you know of any technical notes about the external access or memory mapping, I would be interested in reading them.
I may have been wrong about accessing the NOR with an external flasher. I just tested my SuperChis in my GBFlash, and it did detect it as a flash cartridge, but it detected the size as 32MB whereas I believe the NOR flash is 128MB, and when I tried dumping it, it dumped the SuperFW firmware, not the contents of the NOR.

So may be a no-go, sorry, but you could see if the firmware source code could help, or speak to ChisBread when he's available.
 

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