Hacking Acekard 2i doesn't load ROMs

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Psyko12

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Hi

I am aware that there are similar topics present, but as I have searched for the past 24h without result, including countless tries on getting it working.


Yesterday, my DS Lite randomly stopped loading ROMs. My sister came to me, complaining how her DS no longer wanted to load Super Mario Bros.
I deleted the save file and told her to replay the game. It now booted and got to the menu, but if it was working, I don't know.
A while later I decided to play some Mario Kart. But nope! After selecting "Single Player" the screens faded to black, like usual, but they instead remained black and the background music went on repeat.

I backed up the save file to my computer and deleted it from the memory card. The game would still not boot properly. It would still hang at the same place.
I got desperate. I backed up the save files and formatted the memory card. Thus deleting the AKAIO 1.7.1 loader from the memory stick.
Now I tried the same version of AKAIO. No luck.
I tried the original AK2 loader as well, but that got the DS to whitewash after selecting the game.


As of this moment of me writing this post, I have tried the following:
• Formatting the memory stick and reinstalling the loader using the tutorial in this forum.
• Tried using the regular AK2 loader, as well as reinstalling the AKAIO one.
• Tried launching the games with the old save files, tried doing it without the old save files.
• Tried re-generating the save files using the AK2 loader instead

And so forth


Background info:
After I first received the Acekard 2i I installed an old version of the loader, from July 2009.
This is the loader that generated most of the save files.
I later on upgraded to the most recent AK2 loader, 4.23. Shortly after this I was adviced to swap over to AKAIO as Mario winter olympic games wouldn't work on AK2 loader.


The most weird part is that the memory stick contains four games.
Horse Life, Mario Kart, Super Mario Bros and Mario at the winter olympic games
None of the mario games work, but the Horse Life game which had its save data generated on the AKAIO loader still works.



On a side note, when I tried the official AKAIO installation tutorial, I did format with the program provided and I did copy the ak2loader.nds from /__aio/loaders/ to /__aio/ak2loader



Thanks in advance. I've honestly been thinking about this problem for 24h on and off, and I've spent more than six hours trying to find a solution online.
//Psyko
 
Psyko12 said:
Hi

I am aware that there are similar topics present, but as I have searched for the past 24h without result, including countless tries on getting it working.


Yesterday, my DS Lite randomly stopped loading ROMs. My sister came to me, complaining how her DS no longer wanted to load Super Mario Bros.
I deleted the save file and told her to replay the game. It now booted and got to the menu, but if it was working, I don't know.
A while later I decided to play some Mario Kart. But nope! After selecting "Single Player" the screens faded to black, like usual, but they instead remained black and the background music went on repeat.

I backed up the save file to my computer and deleted it from the memory card. The game would still not boot properly. It would still hang at the same place.
I got desperate. I backed up the save files and formatted the memory card. Thus deleting the AKAIO 1.7.1 loader from the memory stick.
Now I tried the same version of AKAIO. No luck.
I tried the original AK2 loader as well, but that got the DS to whitewash after selecting the game.


As of this moment of me writing this post, I have tried the following:
• Formatting the memory stick and reinstalling the loader using the tutorial in this forum.
• Tried using the regular AK2 loader, as well as reinstalling the AKAIO one.
• Tried launching the games with the old save files, tried doing it without the old save files.
• Tried re-generating the save files using the AK2 loader instead

And so forth


Background info:
After I first received the Acekard 2i I installed an old version of the loader, from July 2009.
This is the loader that generated most of the save files.
I later on upgraded to the most recent AK2 loader, 4.23. Shortly after this I was adviced to swap over to AKAIO as Mario winter olympic games wouldn't work on AK2 loader.


The most weird part is that the memory stick contains four games.
Horse Life, Mario Kart, Super Mario Bros and Mario at the winter olympic games
None of the mario games work, but the Horse Life game which had its save data generated on the AKAIO loader still works.



On a side note, when I tried the official AKAIO installation tutorial, I did format with the program provided and I did copy the ak2loader.nds from /__aio/loaders/ to /__aio/ak2loader



Thanks in advance. I've honestly been thinking about this problem for 24h on and off, and I've spent more than six hours trying to find a solution online.
//Psyko

maybe a clone what hardware do you have?
 
I got a legit Acekard2i. There is no window or anything on it. (I peeled the sticker half way through.)
The middle is a little bulky though, but as I said, no window.

Anyhow, What loader should I go on with trying? currently I just dumped the contents from the AKAIO 1.7.1 package.
 
did you try using a different micro sd?
oh and you can get previous versions of AKAIO here if you want to try them
 
I tried AKAIO 1.7 and 1.5.1.

When I tried AKAIO 1.7, it got to the menu but a few seconds later the screens went black, and I didn't touch any buttons and I didn't touch the screen.
After that, Mario Kart would not work. The screen would just whitewash.

Same thing with AKAIO 1.5.1. After I try to launch MarioKart it whitewashes both screens and gets stuck there.

On my memory stick, I have:

__aio (folder)
ak2loader.nds
ROMS (folder) (only mariokart.nds in ROMS folder)


Also, I do not have any other SD cards. Is this the problem?
 
Psyko12 said:
On my memory stick, I have:

__aio (folder)
ak2loader.nds
ROMS (folder) (only mariokart.nds in ROMS folder)


Also, I do not have any other SD cards. Is this the problem?

you're supposed to have the following files at the root of your microSD card:
_aio folder
akmenu4.nds
your .nds (rom) files with their corresponding .sav files - obviously you put it in a folder
any homebrews

you seem to have misplaced your akmenu4.nds and have somehow put the ak2loader.nds outside the _aio/loaders folder
 
Okay something is very very wrong here for sure.

I'd rather have you start off fresh than fix your problems.

1) Back up your saves and games

2) Download & install the SD Formatter. Format your MicroSD with it. Set it to FULL Erase ON and Format Size Adjustment OFF.

3) Download AKAIO 1.7.1 fresh. Extract & copy the "__aio" folder & "akmenu4.nds" to the root of the SD card.

4) Go here and download the updated loaders. Extract the file and copy the ak2loader.nds to SD:\__aio\loaders, overwriting the existing file.

5) Create a "Games" folder and place you games & saves in there. Make sure your save files have the extension *.sav in lowercase.

And for the record, if you'd like to use the Official FW's loader, then you place its akmenu4.nds into SD:\__aio\ak2loader. Then highlight a game and open its properties by tapping Y twice. Set the loader to be AK2loader.
 
First of all, I misspoke. The ak2loader.nds was never at root. I typed down the wrong filename
frown.gif


As for Hakoda: thank you. I tried SDformatter. When it was done it said this:
QUOTE said:
Drive Format Complete !
FULL FORMAT
("Flash Erase" operation has been canceled because this device didn't support it.)

Volume Information
- File System : FAT
- Total Space = 1.83GB (1,966,800,896 Bytes)
- Cluster Size = 32768 Bytes


Nonetheless, I followed your guide down to every single darn detail. Yet the game freezes. I've also tried with another copy of the game and let the loader create a fresh save file.

Yet, it FREEZES!

This is driving me nuts. The process of trying the games to see if it works is like talking to a rock. Whatever I say to it, whatever I do to it, it remains the same!



Thank you for your replies nonetheless. I really do appreciate it
smile.gif


Any other suggestions?


Edit: I've just noticed that after Mario Kart froze, the save data seems to get corrupted. Now that I try to launch mario Kart again, the screens whitewashes.
 
Do this for a couple of the ROMs you are having issues with:

Download hashtab from http://beeblebrox.org/ and install. In Windows Explorer right click on the ROM file and select Properties, goto the File Hashes tab, once generated right click on CRC32 and select Copy. Then paste the value into your post along with the ROm name and region.
 
tk_saturn said:
Do this for a couple of the ROMs you are having issues with:

Download hashtab from http://beeblebrox.org/ and install. In Windows Explorer right click on the ROM file and select Properties, goto the File Hashes tab, once generated right click on CRC32 and select Copy. Then paste the value into your post along with the ROm name and region.

Mario Kart DS
Supposedly clean, though trimmed.
CRC32 Hash:
6E4CEDA1

I believe the region is Europe, as you hear mario say "Yaahoo" instead of "here we got (US version)"
 

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