NDS Slot-1 Clean ROM no-patch Tester

zatelli · Jan 20, 2007

NDS Slot-1 Clean ROM no-patch Tester

on the fly patching? Find out.

An application developped by programmer openchip has been floating around lately. It supposedly helps you find out whether your slot-1 flashkit truly supports clean roms or at the contrary patches the clean rom on the fly without you noticing. We have tested this application on various flashcards using formatted microSD & latest loader for every flashkit we tested & the results aren't encouraging:

SC DS: Clean ROM no-patch play:NO
DS-X : Clean ROM no-patch play:NO
EZ- V: Clean ROM no-patch play:NO
X9 TF: Clean ROM no-patch play:NO
Acekard: Clean ROM no-patch play:NO
R4: Clean ROM no-patch play:NO
M3 DS Simply: Clean ROM no-patch play:NO

openchip said:
If this tool reports that Clean ROM no-patch play is not supported, then the NDS Slot-1 device cant really directly play any NDS ROM's. The ROM's can not access the Card using their own native access routines, those some sort of ROM or firmware patching is taking place before the ROM's are actually started.

Give this little application a shot & discuss your results.

Homepage

Clean ROM no-patch Tester ver 1.0

shadowboy · Jan 20, 2007

Well... Its just supercard, right? Hopefully g6 simply and the other ones are clean, otherwise I may keep slot 2.

tjas · Jan 20, 2007

I think only the slot 1 solutions with internal memory such as the ds-x will have 100% clean roms... everything with memory cards wil have patched roms...

H8TR · Jan 20, 2007

M3 DS Simply and R4 got a No. So they don't work with all roms. Just most of them.

QUOTE(tjas @ Jan 19 2007 said:
I think only the slot 1 solutions with internal memory such as the ds-x will have 100% clean roms... everything with memory cards wil have patched roms...

I don't think that is true. I believe that this program test the chip, processor or whatever is in the flash cart. Not the flash memory or NAND solid state memory. Clean or not, as long as the rom works, via drag and drop like in the R4DS and M3DSS, I don't really care what this program says.

Dirtie · Jan 20, 2007

This reveals a lot - it's something I've wanted to know since the first slot-1 carts were released, now I have my answer.

It seems DS carts still aren't quite up there when compared with GBA ones

(in this respect)

peepoop · Jan 20, 2007

QUOTE(H8TR @ Jan 19 2007 said:
Clean or not, as long as the rom works, via drag and drop like in the R4DS and M3DSS, I don't really care what this program says.

Totally. If I can just drag and drop a clean rom onto my slot 1 card, that's clean enough for me. If the flashcart wants to do its own internal patching behind the scenes to make it work, who really cares? As long as I don't have to patch it, cool.

fischju_original · Jan 20, 2007

the problem is the nature of patching; because this is true, slot-1s will have less compatibility with future games without needing an update

111111111 · Jan 20, 2007

I think the point is, that if a cart does on-the-fly patching it requires constant updates whenever a game comes out that works differently (and we all know that nintendo do this quite often).

If the company that makes your flashcart suddenly stops supporting their hardware then you no longer have a cart you can just drag/drop with - but one that you manually have to patch every game you play.

atm, otf-patching seems to be the only/best solution.

Little · Jan 20, 2007

Well, I'm guessing the point here is that as long as they games have some form of external influence on them, they will never have full compatibility and never run at full speed etc. If a slot-1 cart truly 100% runs without patching, then full compatibility is achieved as its just like having the real cart. In theory, if you're running completely clean roms with no patching, you'd never need a firm ware update etc.

Katalyst · Jan 20, 2007

Guess this explains how R4 was able to implement soft-reset without the need of patching a rom.

Destructobot · Jan 20, 2007

Without solid information about how this tester works, the test is pointless. If just transforming the memory addresses makes the tester say the rom is being patched, then only genuine carts will ever pass the test.

Until the author of this tool explains how he prevents false positives the results should be ignored.

adgloride · Jan 20, 2007

The slot 1 cards will have to patch on the fly so you can read from the MicroSD card. It looks like we'll all have to rely on constant firmware updates though

zone97 · Jan 20, 2007

Guys... we should all be thankfull that we have the level of compatability and playablity that we have.. as it stands as a whole we have about 98% perfection. Thats good enough for me, Im not overly greedy.

rice151 · Jan 20, 2007

So, the above mentioned flashkits report NO Clean-Roms, which would make sense as none of them have perfect DS Download Play compatibility...

Destructobot · Jan 20, 2007

The idea that patching breaks download play doesn't make any sense. The DSX has the best download play and it patches on the fly.

Normmatt · Jan 20, 2007

You can never have a flashcart that uses MicroSD cards that runs CLEAN ROMS without patching, unless a flashcart company builds a flashcart exactly like the official development cart every slot1 cart that claims to run CLEAN ROMS will require patching

Costello · Jan 20, 2007

QUOTE(Dirtie @ Jan 20 2007 said:
This reveals a lot - it's something I've wanted to know since the first slot-1 carts were released, now I have my answer.

It seems DS carts still aren't quite up there when compared with GBA ones

(in this respect)

I disagree. The DS is different hardware, it is protected! Roms need to be patched in order to work. The GBA wasn't protected like that.
You can't really compare anyway, the systems are too different.

And yeah I wouldn't take these results seriously until we know what this program actually does.
As far as we know, this app could just be a program that says "Clean ROM no-patch play: NO".
We at least need to find one for which the program says "YES" ... maybe emulators?

Normmatt · Jan 20, 2007

It says YES in no$gba but completely crashes DeSmuME

corbs132 · Jan 20, 2007

how are the load times on these cards compared to patching cards?

Dirtie · Jan 20, 2007

QUOTE(Normmatt @ Jan 20 2007 said:
It says YES in no$gba but completely crashes DeSmuME

Perhaps it says YES partly because it runs encrypted roms (I would think).

You have a point about the protection Costello, which brings me to the point that we're not exactly running the "cleanest" dumps - the encryption check (or whatever you call it) is simply being bypassed/emulated/whatever by the carts themselves, just the same as the nopass devices do. This is a necessity seeing as the dumps everyone is using have a decrypted secure area (part of the reason why the earlier passmes - before the decryption routine was figured out - required an original game). I have no idea if this has any bearing on the results of this little app though, I'm just guessing. More information on the inner workings of this little piece of homebrew would indeed be welcome

As soon as roms with encrypted secure areas can be run (if this is possible) without on-the-fly patching, then we'll be up to the level of GBA flash carts. Yes I am aware it is an unfair comparison from a technical standpoint, but that doesn't make it untrue

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