Hacking GBALdr?

[Trel]

I noticed an ini that when I read it mentioned GBALdr, after googling that, I found that is has the capabilities to dump games. Does the one on the R4 do that, if so how can I use it to do that?

 

[Destructobot]

GBALdr can dump GBA games. You just hold R when it is starting up to start the dumper.

It always dumps 32MB plus another 512KB file. Make sure you have enough free space on your card first, or Bad Things may happen.


Edit: Yes, it works on the R4.

 

[OSW]

it can dump gba games, and it always does it to 32 megabytes, so they should be trimmed to appropriate size afterwards.

should work on R4 fine.

DS games cant be dumped to R4.

edit: Destructobot got there first

 

[Trel]

Nothing happens special if I hold R, the game just starts up as normal.
(I've tried, R, L and L+R)

And I know I can't dump DS games with the R4 (easily at least), so I use the M3 for that.

 

[cory1492]

Are you using 0.1 final or a different release?

 

[Trel]

Well I was using the one built into the R4, but I just tried that and the only thing that one says is that it can't find the 3 in 1 thing.
Do I need to do somethign special to use that one?

 

[Destructobot]

GBALdr is not built into the R4, it's a completely seperate program.

 

[Scytheandsickle]

Is the 512kb file the save file?

 

[Trel]

Ok, so it's not built in.
(I must have tried to use it in the past and didn't remove the ini afterwards)

Either way: When I try to use the .nds that was linked here, it just complains about not finding an EZFlash 3in1.

@Vereux0, I don't have a save file yet. I'm trying to dump the rom.


EDIT: I also tried manually DLDI patching just to be sure.

 

[Destructobot]

Either way: When I try to use the .nds that was linked here, it just complains about not finding an EZFlash 3in1.
You're probably not holding R soon enough. You have to start holding it before the program starts. I just tested it, and it does work.

I didn't manually patch the file, and I didn't bother with the .ini file. I just copied 'gbaldr_0.1.nds' to the memory card, ran it, and started holding R while the R4 was still loading it.

Is the 512kb file the save file?

The 512KB file is a dump of the 3-in-1's SRAM. If you are dumping a GBA game instead of the 3-in-1, that file will just contain garbage data.

The dumping feature was originally added to verify that GBALdr was writing data to the 3-in-1 correctly. It's just a happy coincidence that it also works for dumping GBA games.

 

[Scytheandsickle]

So it doesn't dump the GBA save file?

 

[Destructobot]

It dumps the SRAM contents from the 3-in-1. That's where the 3-in-1 keeps the save data.

It will not dump save data from a commercial GBA cart, only from the 3-in-1.

 

[cory1492]

It will dump SRAM data from a commercial cart, up to 64K (everything else is just going to be garbage, so FLASH or EEPROM save chips will not dump since SRAM is the only method supported).

 

[Destructobot]

Nope, I just tried it (again) with my copy of Metroid Fusion, and it just gave me 512KB of 0xFF.

 

[cory1492]

Odd, worked when I tried it (though these carts have been sitting so long they are of wrather dubious reliability). You sure your card isn't like a couple of mine, where the battery is so old that it actually does have NULL data on it now?

 

[Destructobot]

Odd, worked when I tried it (though these carts have been sitting so long they are of wrather dubious reliability). You sure your card isn't like a couple of mine, where the battery is so old that it actually does have NULL data on it now?

It still has all of it's save data intact. I checked that before I even checked the SRAM dump.

Edit: What game did you try it with?