Hardware Best GBA flashcart that works on the GBA?

[Link5084]

If so, is there one that supports microSD? How else would you put games into one?

 

[Toni Plutonij]

Yeah....if you're looking for the best one, it would probably be M3 Perfect with GBA casing....It uses microSD cards (nonSDHC), which means up to 2 GB in size....

Also, good choice would be http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.11179, check it out.....it's a cheep good choice..

You should know that all better carts GBA are either sold out, or hard to find!!

 

[Urza]

EZF4 would be my recommendation for a good, cheap slot-2 flashcart.

You'll need an adapter though, as it uses MiniSD cards, not MicroSD.

 

[Maikel Steneker]

Yeah....if you're looking for the best one, it would probably be M3 Perfect with GBA casing....It uses microSD cards (nonSDHC), which means up to 2 GB in size....

Btw, SDHC works with the integrated version of Moonshell, just not with games or homebrew. Nothing important or relevant, but whatever

 

[Toni Plutonij]

Really?!?! I didn't know that, I was always under impression that it's a hardware limitation, isn't it'?!

 

[Veho]

Another vote for EZF4. Cheap but great.

 

[Minox]

I would also vote for EZ Flash IV. It's cheap and has almost perfect compability.

 

[heyyouguys]

A gba cart that has built in memory Elink 512meg works very well http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.10369

you may also want to look at the EFA linker
http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.10369

I have the elink and also a xrom512(which you cannot find anymore). The thing is the elink saves just like a real gba cart.

The issue you may want to look at when buying a gba cart is compatibility (which should not be an issue anymore) and gamesaves, how it saves em.

 

[cracker]

A gba cart that has built in memory Elink 512meg works very well http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.10369

you may also want to look at the EFA linker
http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.10369

I have the elink and also a xrom512(which you cannot find anymore). The thing is the elink saves just like a real gba cart.

The issue you may want to look at when buying a gba cart is compatibility (which should not be an issue anymore) and gamesaves, how it saves em.

I would avoid any of these types of carts -- ones that rely solely on NOR memory. The reason why is that they take a very long time to write in comparison to other types of memory, have a very limited amount of space, require using crappy (out of date) tools that might not be able to handle a lot of games (especially those that were released after those types of carts were all but made extinct by removable media flash carts), and require using a special piece of hardware to flash the games that needs to be hooked up to the computer (and even sometimes goes from PC->GBA which is REALLY slow).

The only cart that uses a special piece of hardware to flash that I would recommend is the EZ Flash 3. I still have mine and it still works beautifully for GBA.

But they are nearly impossible to find nowadays -- at least for a price I would be willing to pay. So I would recommend the m3 Perfect carts. All of the versions should operate more or less equally as long as the media you use is decent so it is just a matter of how bulky of a cart you would be satisfied with. If you don't want anything hanging out of the slot then a microSD version of the m3 (m3 Lite with GBA shell) is the only way to go. If you are ok with a slight bit of protrusion then I highly recommend the miniSD version (I got one of these too). If you are possibly going to be using it for DS stuff in the future then this is definitely the best.

But if you do want to go for a cheap solution for just GBA that is pretty good then the EZ4 is about the only way to go.

 

[Link5084]

EZ4 works with the DSL right? Is it better than the EZ Flash 3 in 1's GBA compatibility?

 

[how_do_i_do_that]

The EZ4 series is also been retired, so once everyone is out thats it.

Thier list of products not in production anymore.
http://www.ezflash.cn/products2.htm

 

[Gore]

EZF4 would be my recommendation for a good, cheap slot-2 flashcart.

You'll need an adapter though, as it uses MiniSD cards, not MicroSD.

I agree with this. My adapter got jammed in there so it pretty much uses microSD, which is good.
Maybe it's just me, but I think the EZ4 messes up when there's too many files in a folder, so I'm going to be splitting up my games folder shortly.

 

[cracker]

EZ4 works with the DSL right? Is it better than the EZ Flash 3 in 1's GBA compatibility?

Yes it works in any DS. It has the same compatibility for GBA games as the 3 in 1 since they are very similar in design and use the same patching system. The GBA side of things works pretty well. I think they worked the bugs out that were causing problems with a few games. Like I said before, if you only want GBA and you want a cheap cart then it will work fine. But if you plan on maybe using it for DS then it's not a good solution since there is an evergrowing list of problems with games (even as far back as Pokemon Dash!).

 

[Link5084]

Does the EZ4 work with Gamecube connectivity?

 

[cracker]

Apparently the GC games that support GBA linking (some? all?) send code that is executed by the game on the GBA. The EZ4 only has SRAM for game saves and it patches different types of saves to use it instead of the chip they normally save onto. When the code gets executed by the GBA and the game uses something other than SRAM for saving (like for Pokemon they all use Flash) it will either fail to read the save data or worse -- trash the save and make you lose ___ hours of your life getting back to where you had been. So the code sent to the GBA from the GC would actually need to be patched into the GC game's image which probably hasn't been done and would require means of playing a backup on GC which not everyone has. But this isn't a problem that is exclusive to the EZ4. It happens with any cart that uses SRAM for saves (which means about all of them -- the G6 is the only cart that I know of that has real Flash and EEPROM saving). So this shouldn't be a deciding factor since none of them (but the G6 and any other scarce cart that has real saving) will work right unless they use code built into the GBA game for accessing the save data.

 

[anubiss]

I vote for EZF4

 

[Link5084]

Okay, and what about games like Boktai and Warioware Twisted? They still need to be patched right?

 

[cracker]

Yes. Any special hardware games need patching to 'work around' the special hardware. Get the patches here.

 

[Rockym]

Yes. Any special hardware games need patching to 'work around' the special hardware. Get the patches here.

Unfortunately, there is no patch for Pokemon Emerald there. I have an EZ4 and was pretty happy with it until I tried to play Emerald and got clock errors. Tried to find a patch and got really frustrated so I ended up buying an M3 Perfect because it has a built-in RTC. So far, it is working pretty well and I can use it in my GBA as well for connectivity to GC and other GBA games.