Hacking EZ IV help?

[noobish hat]

Hi, I just got an EZ IV card. I roms would not run at all. It would load them, then just a white screen after the GBA logo. Then I got the "battery dry or first in" warning. So I replaced the battery using the tape method, and then the roms were working. However, I still get "battery dry or first in" warning, and if I switch off the GBA and switch it on again, all the in-game saves disappear.

I don't understand it. I assume it might be because the battery connection is not good enough, but it doesn't make sense because a. surely the roms would not work, like originally, and b. aren't the saves stored to the SD card? If the system is working fine when I save my games, shouldn't the saves go straight to the SD card and be waiting for me when I restart, regardless of the battery?

As I say, I used the tape method which is not perfect, but I also had to resolder the tabs which snapped off when I was removing the original battery. This is all I can think of as a reason for it not saving. I am using the client to transfer roms over.

Any ideas?

Cheers!

 

[noobish hat]

Urgh, I finally found the section of the forum where EZ IV stuff belongs. Could a mod move this? Thanks.

Anyway, a turn of events.

I found out that the EZ IV only writes saves to the SD card after a reset. Normally this is when the system is switched off and back on again. Of course with dead or poorly connected battery, the save is lost when this happens. However! I read that a soft reset to the UI, which is patched in by the EZ client, will do the same thing. After wasting a lot of time because there is more than one soft reset key combination (or maybe somebody just posted the wrong combination), I managed to soft reset. I turned the system off. I turned it back on. "Press L to skip saving" it said. Excellent, everything is going well, I thought. Then I loaded up the game and... still no ****ing save!

I'm getting angry now.

 

[Count Duckula]

Are you copying the save files over to the miniSD (in the 'saver' directory) along with the patched ROMs? The card can sometimes have problems creating the actual save file, but can update it fine if it already exists.

What game? Some games, eg the mario advance series, need to be named in 8.3 format (8 or less character file name, 3 character extension) in order for them to save.

When you connect the miniSD to your PC and look in the 'saver' directory, is the save file name the same as the ROM, or is it corrupt in some way (eg a fullstop in the middle of the name)?

If the save file name is corrupt then try renaming the ROM and .sav to 8.3 format and try again. It may be a good idea to copy the .sav that the ez-client creates over to the miniSD card again just in case, ensuring it is named the same as the ROM (apart from it's file extension).

 

[noobish hat]

Thanks man! It was Astro Boy Omega Factor. I literally just sorted it out by renaming the roms and was coming on here to post. I found your advice elsewhere on the forum, regarding renaming. I wasn't sure it was going to work because in the UI, the file names are still the full game titles. It finally retained the save though I wish I could sort the battery out but I've had a enough faffing around for now.