Hacking I got a flash cart I know nothing about

[Cactuar]

I bought a flash cart from a guy on craigslist yesterday and I haven't tried it yet because I don't have a gba yet. It's label says XG Flash 128, it came with the linker and usb cable only, no driver/software disc to speak of.

Does anyone know about these and how they compare to the other gba flash carts?

 

[FAST6191]

Sounds like it is only 16 megs, I will be surprised if it works on anything newer than XP and I would also be surprised if the battery still works.

However you are a lucky bastard. There are no small number of people around here that would have snapped that up and if you are going to tell us you got this for $20 or so then someone will probably swear. It is a vintage GBA flash cart, NOR style rather than RAM and NAND. Compatibility is more or less whatever it will fit though I do not believe there is RTC on that model so you will still have to patch the pokemon clock. For an added bonus though you should now have one of the best methods of dumping GBA ROM images and saves (though I am not sure what happened as far as EEPROM saves).

Software (hopefully)
http://www.rbenda.de/wbb2/thread.php?threadid=410
You will probably want to flank any software you can get with GBATA and flash advance toolkit
http://www.no-intro.org/tools.htm
http://www.gameboy-advance.net/rom_tools/flash_advance_toolkit.htm

http://www.gameboy-advance.net/flash_linker/gba_xg-flash.htm has some more.

Edit. Just to clarify it is not likely to replace an EZ4 or something any time soon but it is nice. You can probably use it quite well for faking GBA slot carts to unlock things for the DS (though saves might be an issue) and maybe even something with a gamecube and GC linkup cable.

 

[Cactuar]

FAST6191 so the 128 in the name isn't representative of the storage space, it may only be a 16MB capacity if I'm understanding correctly? Also the guy claimed he was able to use it with Windows XP and 7. He said for my Windows 8.1 I may need to install VMWare. He didn't know anything about where to get the software anymore so thank you for the links. I will say though that I like how the cart's size is very close to a real gba cart and it seems to be pretty sturdy. I hope I can play Mother 3 on it but I know that's pretty much one of the biggest ROMs ever.

I used to own an EZF4 and I sold it and my AGS-101 about a year ago So know that the GBA bug has bitten me once again I need to get my 4 or 5th GBA. I think I want to get the non SP style this time though.

 

[FAST6191]

Sorry I meant to say, GBA flash carts are measured in megabits so 128 megabits/8 = 16 megabytes. Mother 3 is very much 32 megabytes so that is out, however there does seem to be some disagreement as to the size XG cards could come in but I am betting on it being 16 megabytes.

If it worked on 7 then chances are it was 7's backwards compatibility mode. However yeah a VMware/virtualbox install should do for this and if you can get it small enough to transport around (and XP installs can get very small compared to modern USB drives) it might be a better idea.

 

[Cactuar]

Very cool. and thanks for clarifying the capacity. I haven't ever used VMWare or virtualbox but I've got a couple thumbdrives that would love to have an XP install. Well so maybe I don't get to finish my Mother 3 save file yet but that's ok I think I can still have fun with it.

FAST6191 I tested it and it still saves!

 

[Lemmy Koopa]

Hah, now I remember why I got an SD Flash cart. I forgot they read in megabits, I was just thinking how 256 MegaBYTES didn't seem to bad on one card I had and yet it filled up so much space already, now I remember why.

I think I do remember hearing about this flash cart, it's definitely an older GBA flash cart. I think most of the old ones work fine, it's the newer ones with SD cards that had problems because they had slow down problems (Supercard) unless you got a decent one (M3).

Perhaps you can find someone who had it on here too with drivers, or maybe google the drivers?

 

[FAST6191]

For the record it was only the supercard and its clones that had slowdowns past the first attempts at GBA carts, everything else was "if it fits it will run", give or take solar/tilt/real time clock and the occasional AP patch/save patch if your client software failed to be updated, all of which amount to run this small patch and go and the same for every cart that was not a supercard or its clone.

 

[thaddius]

Perhaps you can find someone who had it on here too with drivers, or maybe google the drivers?

I uploaded them to Filetrip a while ago here.

The XG Flash was my first cart. Not the greatest, but it does the job.

EDIT: Whoops! The above is just the latest software, not the drivers. I'd suggest using that along side the drivers which can be found here.

 

[Lemmy Koopa]

I uploaded them to Filetrip a while ago here.

The XG Flash was my first cart. Not the greatest, but it does the job.

Awesome! I know what you mean. I kind of wish I kept my EFA Linker just as a backup cart cause my M3 is in really bad shape. It needs a new case and the SD reader is so messed up to the point I just stuck an Micro SD reader in it to avoid ruining it more.

 

[Darkipod]

Awesome! I know what you mean. I kind of wish I kept my EFA Linker just as a backup cart cause my M3 is in really bad shape. It needs a new case and the SD reader is so messed up to the point I just stuck an Micro SD reader in it to avoid ruining it more.

You should just sell it to me, or work out a trade, I have quite a few carts now...

 

[Lemmy Koopa]

You should just sell it to me, or work out a trade, I have quite a few carts now...

Unless you're trading me a better shape M3, nope. I'm not downgrading from my M3.

If you were to have it, basically you'd probably need a new case (or repair the current one somehow) And to fix the SD card socket to stop reading so badly because one of the prongs broke off and I put a replacement one on that's still a bit skiddish.

 

[Darkipod]

Yeah because trading a good M3 for a broken M3 would be optimal? hahaha <3