Hacking 3 in 1 Expansion " not found "

[K2Valor]

It worked for a while, now I get this error:

GAME PAK ERROR : PLEASE TURN POWER OFF

edit -- woops, nvm. just forgot to write it to NOR

 

[K2Valor]

ok, new error im getting. the game writes to the NOR fine, but once it gets to SRAM it stops and has red text of the last game i played below it where it saws " writing sram "

 

[tjt486]

k2valor, I had that earlier. Have you changed the structure of your microSD card lately? I had renamed my GBA folder from "gb" to "gba".

Essentially, gbaloader was trying to dump the .sav file from my previous rom into the GB folder, which no longer existed. It didn't want to discard this information, so it wont overwrite it. I fixed it by creating an empty gb folder, and it dumped the .sav into there, after which I deleted it.

Also, apparently the "nes classic series" games are not compatible. I get game pak error with all of them.

 

[K2Valor]

haha wierd because it actually messed up when i was trying to play Donkey Kong Classic ( just watched The King of Kong

)

So I [think] I put it back to the defaults I had it at and I am trying to do the SRAM now.... and it works!

dude you are a lifesaver thanks

 

[K2Valor]

Ok, heres my problem. I had 3 games in my GBA folder.

Super Mario.gba
Kirby.gba
GTA.gba


So, I flash Super Mario.gba to the NOR, and then to SRAM
It creates Super Mario.sav

Then, after I'm done with Super Mario, I start Kirby. When I flash Kirby the NOR and then SRAM, it OVERWRITES Super Mario.sav with a new Super Mario.sav

Then I go to play GTA, and when I flash it to NOR then SRAM, it creates Kirby.sav


What am I doing wrong?

 

[Destructobot]

That's how it's supposed to work. GBA games cannot write saves to the slot 1 cart themselves (they can only access the 3-in-1's SRAM), so GBALdr automatically writes the save for the current game to it's save file (creating the file if necessary) when you write a new game to NOR.

 

[K2Valor]

That's how it's supposed to work. GBA games cannot write saves to the slot 1 cart themselves (they can only access the 3-in-1's SRAM), so GBALdr automatically writes the save for the current game to it's save file (creating the file if necessary) when you write a new game to NOR.

So is there any chance of my saves being deleted, or should I just not worry about the saves and just play the games?

 

[K2Valor]

woops, double post sorry

 

[Destructobot]

So is there any chance of my saves being deleted, or should I just not worry about the saves and just play the games?

Just be sure you write the current SRAM save to it's save file before backing the save files up onto your computer. Aside from that, GBALdr's automatic save handling should be fine.

 

[cory1492]

mhm, that was one of the things I had mentioned in the readme IIRC - I haven't added the code to create non-existant but specified directories (like if you rename one in between.) I'll have to convince myself to have a sit-down with it and try to un-complicate things somewhat.

BTW: Thanks for checking >16MiB out, but unfortunately I think just booting is not enough (games are like RAM, more often than not what you will see when you boot it is loaded right from the beginning of the memory space.) The 16MiB+ things should work out fine, but what would be really good is if you were able to burn a full sized/32MiB rom and use the built in dumper (which was intended for this purpose chiefly) to grab a dump of it and verify with a compare that it indeed burned and dumped properly.

 

[tjt486]

I did a dump/compare with a md5 utility and the checksums matched up on the 32MB file.

 

[cory1492]

I did a dump/compare with a md5 utility and the checksums matched up on the 32MB file.

thanks for the double check tjt486, I just wanted to be 100% certain

 

[tjt486]

Not a problem, Im glad to be in a position to help with the new hardware.

By the way, did the data I posted on your blog (the text off of the chips) do anything for you?

 

[stentor]

I was all set to use Rudolph's tool on my new EZflash before I got this error...

I'm now using GBAldr with an R4 and I have a bunch of problems with that as well, mainly with saving. Starting LTTP gives me a "save file corrupt" message, and I can't create a new file. Advance Wars lets me save, and the data still appears when I soft reset, but once I turn the power off it's gone.

Also, does this tool only support very slowly writing to the card? I know with Rudolph's tool it's possible to play files more quickly off the R4 itself, as well as adjusting settings for the rumble and expansion pack. Am I missing something or do I just have to hope for an update to Rudolph's if I want to use the card's full functionality?

 

[tjt486]

Did you apply a save patch to your roms?

 

[pinkdeath]

kay, so cory's works with GBA roms, but has there been any progress on getting rumble or the ram expansion working? I really want to use rumble but rudolph's tool is the only thing I know to use and it says mine isn't found

 

[Deleted User]

I got my 3in1 today and used this programme. I've patched my rom (Minish Cap) and placed in a "GBA" folder. It erases and then writes NOR. What do I do then? I think it's created a save file too.

 

[Mailyfesux]

Now you can boot the game pretty much.

I have an issue too. Whenever I try to write a new game into the pack, it starts saving SRAM, but then the bar doesnt move. i think its because I deleted the save file on the Microsd. Is there any way to fix this?

 

[Demostrike]

Is there a way to load to psram with this program? I can't find a way to do so.

Thanks

 

[cory1492]

No there is no way to use PSRAM with this version. Rudolph jumped on the bandwagon part way through my development cycle and facing the hijack I basically abandoned it (and now it appears Rudolph may do the same thing now that Yasu is making a homebrew cart menu replacement.)

My initial motivation for starting work on GBALdr was because EZ team asked me to, when Rudolphs tool came out they went through the trouble of hand patching it to english but would answer none of my questions regarding adding unicode support to apps to support their chinese users (I don't know any other language besides english so I've never had to explore displaying anything else until then, ignoring that request and then going and hand patching someone else's app was pretty much like spit in the eye.)

As I said back then, an alternate to gbaldr with little english support can be found on Rudolph's blog, good luck with it.

It wouldn't be hard to hex edit rudolphs app (it needs adjustmet to appoximately 12 bytes) to have the appropriate ID's to enable use of everything except writing NOR past 16MiB. If one had the source, it would take only a matter of minutes to update even if (like myself) one had no way of testing directly. Again, good luck with that as well, without the card to try it on I'm not into doing support for hex edits.

0x227E2218 (in file it is 0x18227E22) needs to be changed to 0x227E2202 (in file 0x02227E22) - it occurs in 2 places
right before those there is also
0x00002218 (0x18220000) by itself, which needs to be changed to one of (and I'm not sure which, the code EZ released checks for any of the three which is why I'd rather not edit it myself) 0x2202 (0x02220000),0x2220 (0x20220000), 0x2215(0x15220000) - if there are any others I can't be arsed into finding them.
- offset 0x7AC
- offset 0x18AC (questionable, may not need to do anything with this one but 0x18227E22 is definitely there)
----
As to SRAM issues with gbaldr, if you just make a blank text file in the right place renamed to the right name, it will take care of filling it for you. An alternate is to just pick any SRAM file and force it to load to SRAM. Any other freezes not related to file missing in the past were caused by hardware issues like a failing battery, or occasionally having file names in unicode (another language that isn't just ascii characters.)