UPDATE EDIT October 19, 2020
@yaum stated there was a misunderstanding in his later below post #12. He never bought or paid for anything from digitopz.com.
I'm leaving what I originally wrote here for those to see how this conversation played out.
To Digitopz, I'm sorry for jumping the gun in accusing your business of foul play. It doesn't help that in this shrinking DS flashcart market, bad word of mouth can quickly tarnish reputation and hurt income.
I, @TurdPooCharger, have added your Ace3DS Plus link back to my signature recommendation list.
Never got any answer from Digitopz, but I got a flashcart in a bundle. It's an R4 Upgrade revolution for DS... It's not listed in the compatibility list for NTRBOOT, does anyone knows if I could use it nevertheless?
Kind of sad... I was hoping that somehow I would be lucky for this one
Hey, I'm sorry you got ripped off. You paid for a Ace3DS Plus, and digitopz instead sent you a different product. That's bait and switch. Since digitopz has given you the silent treatment, this can be interpreted that they knew what they did was an underhanded tactic and hoped that you as the buyer would say nothing and accept the given product.
There are several 'R4 Upgrade Revolution for DS', and all of them are some of the earliest flashcart models. None of these are ntrboot compatible.
You're not alone in what just happened to you.
- Digitopz and their related sister websites (digi*) were the main sellers of the Ace3DS Plus and Ace3DS X. [
wayback capture]
-
http://www.ace3ds.com/ace-3ds-where-to-buy.html returns a '404 Not found' error as of late.
This year has seen several flashcart retailers close shop.
It seems the few that are still in business are selling what dwindling stocks they have left, and they can't seem to resupply their inventory. I think what caused (
www.r4ids.cn) to stop making
R4 Gold 3DS Plus also occurred to (
www.ace3ds.com /
Ace3DS Plus).
Xuvation said:
Well, I would be careful most sites should be out of stock or close to out of stock. I used to sell these r4 gold plus cards on ebay, sold hundreds, but I can't even restock. I started having quality control issues with them this year, like 5-20% of the cards were defective when I tested them on multiple shipments even though I told them about the number of defects, along with them sending crappier usb readers. When I accumulated 20+ defectives I was getting ready to exchange by shipping defects back, but that's when they went out of production so I got screwed. The person I buy from keeps saying the factory had chip / manufacturing issues, I'm still waiting for them to go back into production but it's been months so they might be gone for good. I'll keep inquiring on the availability though. Maybe they'll get another factory one day , I'm not sure who runs the site if its the factory or if the factory manufacturers on behalf of the company. But they showed signs of going downhill this year, wholesale price increased by 30% and then quality control plummeted for a couple months, and then they finally stopped manufacturing, at least I can't get any more.
Xuvation said:
Yea, I recently inquired again for gold plus cards like a week ago, and they pushed it back even further now there saying at the end of this year. I have doubts though, they keep pushing the date back, telling me they would start production again in a month, then 3 months, now it's at the end of this year or early next year.
I'm stuck selling the cheaper cards now, well at least they last longer in terms of durability, updating the firmware is pretty annoying but since the latest kernel files work on my leftover 2017 r4isdhc card I have, the timebomb cards should last for a while as long as you update the kernel every 3-4 years or set your console time back. Well, time to look for a new source of income. The r4 equivalent of Gba cartridges aren't even worth the hassle, extra low-profit margin. I'll probably stop selling in like 8-12 months. If the cheaper cards increase in price again might even stop sooner.
The reasons I started recommending the Ace3DS Plus sold by digitopz were,
- (1) nds-card.com stop selling the R4i Gold 3DS Plus.
- (2) Ace3DS Plus is ntrboot compatible, cheap, and uses WOOD kernel.
- (3) All my readings about digitopz suggested it was a reliable retailer.
Digitopz should
n't have declared this item as out of stock if they didn't have any at hand, not pull that substitution bad will shit on you. I've now taken that flashcart off my signature's recommendation links.
@yaum, I don't think digitopz will come clean refunding you your money, shipping a replacement/actual Ace3DS Plus, or renegotiating a compromise (partial refund) since they've kept quiet up to this point. Even then, a single bad deal like this can quickly burn down that trust bridge between buyers ⇄ seller.
I don't know if my words has much weight but on your next or last e-mail reply to digitopz, link this post to them. They should think very carefully how they want to conduct business going forward even with the pandemic and economic slowdown. A hanky pranky deal here and there might net them some $$$ to eat today, but what about tomorrow when others keep in mind to avoid them?
***
Again, my sincere apologies that my recommendation resulted this. That leaves back to square one in finding another flashcart that's ntrboot compatible. There's the R4iSDHC series found at nds-card.com or aliexpress.
If you still intend to settle on a flashcart without time bomb, the Ace3DS Plus can be found in a different package form.
