ROM Hack GBA backup cart saves

[SFXlakito]

Okay, I don't exactly know where to ask this but here goes: I have a ton of GBA games (over 20) and I want to back up the saves on them to use with the roms on my EZ4. So what all do I need? First of all, do I need a flash linker (to connect my GBA games to the computer)? I can get one from Jandaman for about $15 shipped, so it's not that expensive. Would I need to dump the whole rom onto the computer? Also, I heard from someone that you CANNNOT back-up GBA saves that use EEPROM, is that true? Because I'm guessing a lot of them do.

I just want to know these things before I place an order with Jandaman. Thanks ahead of time.

 

[FAST6191]

No you can read the save directly off of the cart (dumping does not take long anyhow).
The person that said about the EEPROM is correct, there is no way to transfer them on to your PC either as far as I am aware.

 

[SFXlakito]

Hmm.. so do you think it would be worth it to try and back up some of my saves? Or do most of the games use EEPROM, to the point where it would be almost useless to dump them (since I can just get the rom off the internet)? Here are most of the games I own: http://img432.imageshack.us/img432/3465/cimg0191tv2.jpg

 

[Bridgy84]

One way to check is use GOnline under the releases tab right here on good ol GBAtemp!!! If you look at the info on all the games, it list it's saver type near the bottom. Thats the fastest way i can think of. Hope it helps.

 

[FAST6191]

As a rule of thumb EEPROM (small, cheap and used for high scores), SRAM (More expensive, battery backed and used for simple RPG's), Flash (Expensive, large space and no need for a battery, used in complex RPGs and where a lot of data may need to be saved)
I used offline list: http://offlinelist.free.fr/ for these, apologies for the crappy format but it was done quickly:
WarioLand4 SRAM
LOTR: The Return of the king EEPROM
MArio Golf SRAM
Astroy Boy EEPROM
AW2 Flash
AW1 Flash
M&L superstar EEPROM
Kingdom hearts SRAM
SMW EEPROM
Ecks vs sever None
S.M.W3 Flash
Harvest moon Sram
Sonic Advance 3 Flash
Metroid Fusion SRAM
MK super circuit Flash
Car Battler Joe EEPROM
Golden sun Flash
Metroid ZM SRAM
Mech Platoon EEPROM

 

[patters]

If you have a flash linker you can use a shareware tool called Flashmanager to read and write all types of save, including EEPROM:
http://tinyurl.com/qzv5n
It supports many flashcart linkers.

Download the most recent English version here:
http://mootan.hg.to/download/FM300EB15.exe

One quirk though is that it reverses every 8 bytes of the files it exports meaning that you can't use them with emulators until you've converted them and vice versa. I wrote a Perl script to do this though. Install Perl on your system from http://www.activestate.com/Products/ActivePerl/

Then save this in notepad as 8bflip.pl. Run it from the command prompt.

CODE#!/usr/bin/perl

if (!$ARGV[0]) {
Âprint "Usage: 8bflip.pl gamesave.sav\n";
Âprint "produces the output file gamesave-flipped.sav\n";
Âexit;
}
$infile = $ARGV[0];
$outfile = $ARGV[0];
$outfile =~ s/\..*$/-flipped\.sav/;

$buffer = "";

open(INFILE, "$outfile") or die "cannot open output file";
binmode(OUTFILE);

while (read INFILE, $buffer, 8) {
Â$buffer = reverse $buffer;
Âprint OUTFILE "$buffer";
}
Â
close(INFILE);
close OUTFILE;