well i might as well add my 2 pence worth into all this, for all the good it'll do!
i've got a black SP (european version, model number ags-001) and 256 cart + f2a linker (purchased very recently), and every version of the linker software SAYS it writes the cart ok (apart from some crashing every now and again which is fixed by turning the gba off then on again). The trouble I have is that when I verify the write via the software, it always says there are errors. Sometimes the cart boots and the game either crashes or has choppy sound / gfx, and other times the cart wont boot at all. But always verification errors.
I've tried winXP and win98, printer port set to EPP, ECP, and ECP + EPP, all software versions (i think) and none of it makes any difference. The only strange thing to note is that according to the linker manual if my port is in EPP mode the speed settings should work, but no matter wot mode my port is in it never seems to make any difference speed-wise.
I might pop into work later to try out the kit on various PCs to see if that makes any difference (by i dont hold out much hope).
Since we're all a bunch of complainers, has anyone out there with a european SP (indicated by the label C/AGS-EUR on the back) had 100% success flashing to their cart? And i'm not talking about the software just saying it wrote OK, cos mine does that. Wot i mean is also verifying the cart successfully then playing the game for a while with absolutely no problem. And repeating this process consistently. If such a person exists, please give us details - software version, pc set-up, etc....
Here's hoping for a fix....