Hacking EZ-Flash IV Questions.

[zero1221]

1. What does it mean when a game comes up with a white screen? Is it the same as with games that show a black screen? That I have to load it to NOR with firmware 1.720 because of the soft-reset thing? I know I could just try it, but wanted to see if anyone knew if it was dangerous to do so.

2. I know that the final firmware messes up some games because it soft resets into them. I've found Super Mario Advance 2 & 3 suffer this problem.
Are there any gba games that don't work unless on 1.720? Is there anywhere I can get a past firmware? Is it safe to downgrade the firmware?

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[how_do_i_do_that]

1. It is either patched wrong or you patched it with another program and the EZ-Client is trying to overwrite the patch which causes the blank screen.

2. Reverting to an older firmware doesn't affect the cart, unless otherwise noted in the update log.

http://ezflash.sosuke.com/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=793

 

[zero1221]

1. It is either patched wrong or you patched it with another program and the EZ-Client is trying to overwrite the patch which causes the blank screen.

2. Reverting to an older firmware doesn't affect the cart, unless otherwise noted in the update log.

http://ezflash.sosuke.com/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=793

Ok, white screen means patched wrong. Thanks!

 

[kuwanger]

@zero1221: I believe you can press L+A (it might be R+A) to start a game to revert to the hard-reset behavior in the normal 1.720 firmware. Or, you can use the 1.720 reset firmware which will default to the hard-reset behavior. That's really the only way to be sure if the white screen behavior is the result of bad patching or the issue with hard-reset. how_do_i_do_that's link has a link to the firmware under the "Reset before running (sorts frameskip issue):" line. FYI, the "sorts frameskip issue" is about an issue NDS owners were having with choppiness when playing GBA games; presumably a hard-reset fixed their problems as well).

 

[zero1221]

@zero1221: I believe you can press L+A (it might be R+A) to start a game to revert to the hard-reset behavior in the normal 1.720 firmware. Or, you can use the 1.720 reset firmware which will default to the hard-reset behavior. That's really the only way to be sure if the white screen behavior is the result of bad patching or the issue with hard-reset. how_do_i_do_that's link has a link to the firmware under the "Reset before running (sorts frameskip issue):" line. FYI, the "sorts frameskip issue" is about an issue NDS owners were having with choppiness when playing GBA games; presumably a hard-reset fixed their problems as well).

I tried L+A and R+A and it didn't work for Super Mario Advance 3. Loaded it to the NOR and it worked perfectly. Super Mario Advance 2 though is working now
even when I don't press L or R before pressing A. Strange, but I can live with it. Not like I didn't play yoshi's island to death when I was a kid anyway.
Also, the game I was talking about must of been a bad dump because I found another and it's working great.

Edit: Came back and tried that other firmware, works great.
It fixed all my problems playing on my GBA and I was wrong, white screen can mean the same as a black screen.
I even tried playing the game that I thought was bad and it worked.