Hacking Can play GBA but no NDS...

[chibimaria]

(Warning, another newbie that doesn't know what she is doing.... be gentle

)

Okay, just got M3 Lite and Passcard 3 today.
Downloaded the latest game manager from the site and flashed it in GBA mode and everything went well as far as I could tell.

So I put New Super Mario Bros DS on the card. I start up the DS Lite and select Passcard3 (thats how you play .nds games, right?). It goes to the splash screen and then it goes to the black warning screen and it just stops on that screen. I left it for a while and no change....

I don't think its the M3 because I put a GBA game (Mario Kart) on my microsd card (which is a Sandisk 512mb btw) and that works fine.

I saw some people suggesting something about cleaning the contacts and realigning the passcard... if you think thats the problem can someone tell me what post to look at for more info?

I hope its nothing serious

If anyone could help me I'd immensely appreciate it.

I know you guys get a lot of people like me but I couldn't find any other posts that had the same problem as me.

edit: I just thought to mention this too. I did try to play a regular NDS cart (Kirby Canvas Curse) after this to make sure there was nothing wrong with the slot and it played fine.

 

[tama_mog]

definitely sounds like the passcard, unfortunately the best thing people can tell you is just to fiddle with the casing to get a tighter contact with the connectors in slot1..I've heard people inserting and ejecting a couple times then it magically works, I've heard people putting a piece of cardboard along with the passcard to ensure a flusher fit, I've heard people pressing on the casing to tighten down the pcboard......bottom line is it has to make good contact with your slot1 connectors....the idea of the passcard being defective is not out of the question either since you can actually see the passcard3 in the DS bios.

 

[chibimaria]

Okay, I'll give that a shot. Thanks for the advice!!!

In the meantime I guess I'll have to check and see what realhotstuff.com's return policy is.

 

[tama_mog]

90 days no questions asked. Real good service, you'll be taken care of.

 

[chibimaria]

Sounds good. I tried cleaning the contacts, sticking in an index card to make it tighter, and pushing down on it and none of it worked. So yeah, I guess I'll have to take them up on that return policy.

Last question: should I bother getting another passcard 3 (seeing that a lot of people are having trouble with it) or should I look into another solution instead?

Thanks for everything

 

[enoughrope]

I don't know if it's related but I had the same problem with G6. I could play GBA but couldn't get to NDS. It turns out that there was a bug in Passcard 3 that would cause the software to stuck at startup. So I had to update the G6 version(or downgrade it). I have updated(also downgraded) G6 and it works fine now.

 

[chibimaria]

do you know if its possible or if its even a good idea whether or not to do this with the m3?

lol this stuff is giving me headache

 

[enoughrope]

Actually I wouldn't be so quick on returning it. It's probably the same Passcard 3 bug that's causing the problem. Just get the update for the M3 and update it.

 

[chibimaria]

v29, right? Yeah I did that already. I'm pretty sure it went through okay. I did the sd version and I did it through gba mode.

The only thing I wasn't sure about was that I put a game on the it before I flashed the firmware. I didn't think this would make a difference and I didn't see anywhere that this would be a problem.

Should I try emptying the card and reflashing it?

 

[enoughrope]

Well I have no experience with M3 so I don't know. We should wait for someone who has experience with M3. Maybe this problem has been discussed before, you can try searching it on the forum.

 

[chibimaria]

Okay, thanks for all the help anyway.

And a new development to add to the passcard 3 drama:

When I was trying to figure out what was wrong with the card I noticed that the contacts were different from my NDS games... namely, there was a hole.

I don't know if all passcards have them... but if they don't then this could be whats wrong with mine.... I took a picture and its below...

I don't have another passcard to compare it with so this could be normal... I don't know.

 

[matt1freek]

mine doesnt have a hole like that..

 

[GexX2]

No hole here either. Seems to be a defective passcard :\

 

[chibimaria]

well that probably explains it then. this mystery is solved.

thanks everyone for your help!!!

 

[enoughrope]

I don't think it would even get to the splash screen if there were any defects. But who knows.

Edit: Well it looks like this has been resolved as defective. Good luck.

 

[alvina]

My passcard3 has a small hole in the same position as mentioned by chibimaria.
I had the problem where my passcard3 would not be detected by my ds, unless i push down on it slightly while its booting up.
if u look really closely, there is a date on the pcboard. i noticed that a friend of mine's passcard3 has a later date than mine and does NOT have the little hole.
fortunately, we traded passcards and mine works fine on his ds, while his works fine on mine.
still.. it might be the manufacture date of the passcard3 that causes the problem or that has a small hole in the pcboard which causes the problem.
... who knows...

 

[chibimaria]

Hm.... I really don't know anymore. I did try pushing down on it but that didn't work for me... but it might be one of those things you have to get just right... I contacted realhotstuff and they told me to send back anyway...

but my new problem is now I can't play gba games.... before I tested Mario Kart real quick just to make sure the M3 was working.... and now I'm getting white screen of death.

This is getting really frustrating....

Before this I had a 512MB Flash Xtreme Card for my GBA and I thought that was bad (sometimes the software and the savefiles would drive me nuts)... That was a walk in the park compared to the problems I've been having with this stuff.

Yikes!

But seriously, thanks everybody, I'd be even more screwed without you all.
chibimaria

edit: okay, so after reading alvina's post I decided to try the passcard3 again... and I pressed down on it a little differently and this m3 loaded up... but the icons were screwed up and the games wouldn't load up... so now I'm thinking its a combination of passcard having to be pushed down a little and there also be something wrong with the m3lite. yeah... this has been fun.

 

[chibimaria]

edit:

yeah, I'm probably going to wind up sending it all back. I downgraded to v28 it seemed to be going well and then white screen of death on both the ds and gba end... yikes....

I'll edit this post with new developments as they happen.

chibimaria

edit 2 & solution:

wow, I never thought I'd have so much trouble with something straight out of the box. Anyway I did a combination of things, I'm not sure which one was key so I'll just post them all.

1. Moved m3 from black cart case to white cart case
2. put down double sided tape to prevent wiggling (It was wiggling barely a milimeter but decided to play it safe)
Tested and no good still got white screens for gba and it froze during the loading for nds games
3. downgraded from v29 to v28. (still used the v29 game manager which might have not been the best idea)
Tested and same thing
4. upgraded from v28 to v29.
Now it works! I tested Megaman battle network, Mario Kart ds, and big brain academy. All worked fine and the saves worked too.
For gba I just tested Yoshi's Island real quick... the sound was cracking a bit. I'm okay with that because I have my old gba flash cart for gba games. I got this for ds games anyway.

Thanks everyone and lets hope it stays working *knocks on wood*
Maria