Hacking Does the price of a flashcart really matter?

[golden]

Hey guys, me again, and I made this thread to ask a simple question about your opinion and explain my idea.

So my question is:

Does the price of a particular flash cart really matter to you? As, do you take into account how much you are going to pay and consider cheaper carts having an advantage because they are cheaper?

I wanted to say what I believed first. First of all, I would say that the price doesn't matter a single bit since when you put on the games, from a real game buyers point of view just two to three DS games cover the price of the cart. So if you pretend that you weren't a pirate and you actually bought the games then about 2 games cover the price of the cycloDS. So really, do you take the price into account a lot even though no matter what cart you buy you are going to save hundreds on games?

 

[Bitbyte]

To me, price doesn't really matter, unless it's like the cost of over 5 retail games, then it's a bit expensive. Back in the days, GBA flashcarts used to run for 155 euro (remember paying that for my EZ-Flash II Powerstar) so the flashcarts for NDS are really cheap, even cheaper than the cost for 1 retail game over here.

 

[golden]

Ya, I remember the GBA flashcarts. Man, looking at Jandaman and seeing how freaking expensive they were made me not buy them. But the DS carts are extremely cheap. From the DSTT at $26USD all the way to the DS-X at $110USD. All around the price of 0-4 retail games. Of course, no one really buys the DSX anymore so it is really G6 and Acekard RPG that hold the top expensive spots.

 

[Salamantis]

I don't think it should. The flash card always ends up paying itself later on, because example already 3 retail carts cost more then the CycloDS. I don't mean if a card it overpriced (I'm not going to pay over 150$ for a cart, you know).

 

[golden]

Not at all to me (well, I mean not OVERpriced). It always ends up paying for itself.

My thoughts exactly. No matter how much it is $20-$100, it will always pay for itself well and over.

 

[Maikel Steneker]

Yes, price is actually very important to me.

I'm not talking about a few bucks here (I will pay those to get the M3 Real instead of the M3 Simply), but I won't get an G6 Real because it's too expensive.

Sure, you'll first cart is definately worth the cash, but when you want more of them for their unique features (like me) price is important. You won't think about the AceKard R.P.G. being worth its price because it plays clean roms and has cheat support, but because it has a MiniUSB port, dual storage, an open source firmware and so on.

 

[golden]

That is also true. In a collectors point of view, maybe the price does matter for unique features after they have another cart for playing games.

 

[cutterjohn]

Price is also VERY important to me as well. The $55 for the Cyclo DS Evolution was the MAX that I was willing to pay for a slot-1 flash cart. I'm just glad that I ordered one before divineo & mod-chip decided to start gouging on the price($80 and $65 respectively).

You'll NEVER catch me buying a gimmicky card that costs more as usually they do so because of onboard memory which I find to be a waste as the onboard memory WILL eventually wear out and it's not really replaceable for most people. If there was one like Acekard that had BOTH onboard memory and a uSD slot AND if it were reasonably priced, I MIGHT buy one, but no such card exists at the present.

Actually price being a consideration goes into every single thing that I buy. I look at price, and the expected value of what I'm buying, and if they don't align well I won't buy. e.g. PS3 I'll NEVER buy one of these $500+ toy to play games with, as to me a console is worth max $250-300 and the games had better NOT be any more expensive than a typical PC game when new $40-50. Of course Sony also has the negative of being arrogant SOBs just before the PS3 launch as a further disincentive to their new toy, and a history of low production quality of Sony products that I've bought before. I don't like the XBOX360 any better even though it is lower hw price, but inflated game prices which are better on the PC anyways where they're moddable since almost all the XBOX games are just consolejacked PC games...

 

[myuusmeow]

IMO it does-I was lucky enough to get my dad to trust Echostore because it had the Yahoo! logo on it!

 

[DarkAura]

As long as it has the features I like, I don't really mind the price, as long as it's not super overpriced.

 

[golden]

WEll I know that price is a huge factor for many of my friends, and I can understand why. Nowadays pretty much every cart can play every game, it wasn't like the old GBA days where one cart can play this set of games and that one can play the other set. The DS carts can all play all games, why not opt for the slightly cheaper one?

Good point but some look cooler than others and when you know all of them will pay for themselves then people will naturally want the cooler looking cart like Ninjapass X9.

 

[kellyan95]

Price = why the SC CF did so well

 

[iritegood]

Price is important to me as well.
However - I remember back then I really wanted a GBA cart. But it cost way to much for a little kid...
I'm glad DS carts are so affordable these days.

 

[Eyedunno]

I don't use flashcarts for pirated ROMs. I use them for homebrew, multimedia, and backups of stuff I legitimately own (so I don't have to take five carts with me when there's only a slight chance I'm going to want to play certain things). So yes, it makes a difference to me.

Unfortunately, this has ended up costing me more on some things. I didn't buy the M3 Perfect microSD (with GBA adapter) for my GB Micro because it's expensive. I figured my only alternative was the Supercard Mini, so I got that, thinking the compatibility issues wouldn't affect the stuff I wanted it for, and besides, I was getting the very newest build of the Supercard Mini, so there couldn't be any problems, right? Well, there were no compatibility issues, but there are still massive slowdown problems. At this point I discovered the EZIV. So I got that.

Now, I'm happy with the EZIV, but for the price of the SuperCard plus the EZIV, I could easily have gotten the even better M3 Perfect microSD.

Live and learn.

 

[golden]

I don't use flashcarts for pirated ROMs. I use them for homebrew, multimedia, and backups of stuff I legitimately own (so I don't have to take five carts with me when there's only a slight chance I'm going to want to play certain things). So yes, it makes a difference to me.

Unfortunately, this has ended up costing me more on some things. I didn't buy the M3 Perfect microSD (with GBA adapter) for my GB Micro because it's expensive. I figured my only alternative was the Supercard Mini, so I got that, thinking the compatibility issues wouldn't affect the stuff I wanted it for, and besides, I was getting the very newest build of the Supercard Mini, so there couldn't be any problems, right? Well, there were no compatibility issues, but there are still massive slowdown problems. At this point I discovered the EZIV. So I got that.

Now, I'm happy with the EZIV, but for the price of the SuperCard plus the EZIV, I could easily have gotten the even better M3 Perfect microSD.

 Live and learn.

That stinks. I applaud you for not going the pirates route but that exact incident is the reason why I personally try not to consider pricing when it comes to GBA stand alone carts as they are meant to be pricey with RAM and everything so make sure you get the best.

 

[Jaejae]

For me, price matters to some degree, but the cart would have to have some shit hot features for me to pay more for it than the competing cart.
For example (although not $100) I bought an Acekard RPG over the Cyclo because it boasts features that the Cyclo _cannot_ match.
Sure, the Cyclo has great support, slow motion, and better cheat support, but with firmware updates, so could every other cart.
But you cant stick a mini USB port and 1GB of NAND in a cart with a firmware update.

 

[golden]

For me, price matters to some degree, but the cart would have to have some shit hot features for me to pay more for it than the competing cart.
For example (although not $100) I bought an Acekard RPG over the Cyclo because it boasts features that the Cyclo _cannot_ match.
Sure, the Cyclo has great support, slow motion, and better cheat support, but with firmware updates, so could every other cart.
But you cant stick a mini USB port and 1GB of NAND in a cart with a firmware update.

Nice. That's exactly why I got my RPG too! And the awesome shell!

 

[redact]

f*** yeah corse it does im a jobless 15yr old

 

[golden]

f*** yeah corse it does im a jobless 15yr old

lol Well any flash cart is better than buying the games themselves money wise speaking of course. Except the DSX.

 

[redact]

f*** yeah corse it does im a jobless 15yr old

lol Well any flash cart is better than buying the games themselves money wise speaking of course. Except the DSX.

lol it's always funny when people bag the dsx and to think we used to think it was the answer to our slot 2 problems