Hacking Phat DS and homebrew

haliway

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Hi everybody,

I´m new here and I just got a Phat DS with loopy capture card and charging mod.
I have tried to understand what has been said in this forum regarding the best flashcarts for slot 1 and slot 2 but the answers were kind of complex and confused me a bit to be honest so i will try to ask specific questions here :

1) What is the best flashcart for slot 1 for a Phat DS ? And why ? (any way to play GB/GBC and SNES as well ?)

2) What is the best flashcart for slot 2 for a Phat DS ? And why ? (I want to be able to do some pokemon transfers, have a rumble pak and memory expansion pak to play with browser).

3) Can GBA games run on slot 1 (no emulation) natively without having to buy a slot 2 GBA flashcart ?

4) What are the advantages of using slot 2 over slot 1 for GBA games ?

5) I read that EZ-Flash Vi is the latest EZ-Flash version but i can only find EZ-Flash IV (no V nor Vi) on their official website, why ? A rebranding / renaming ?

6) It seems like EZ-Flash 3 in 1 is one of the few ones adding RAM, rumble and GBA support to most of the flashcarts. Is there any external sign to find out what version a reseller is selling (The article "How to tell which version of the 3in1 you have" does only display and talk about the internals). Is it possible to use a DS Lite version on a Phat DS (cutting edges or something like that) because the latest one has 64Mb instead 32Mb. Is this 3in1 compatible with DSTWO and DSTWO+ ?

7) What do you think of DSTWO+ and where is it possible to find one ? Better than DSTWO ?

8) Any way to play DSi games via a flashcart ?

9) What is the best DS devkit to develop some homebrews ? Is there any other method than flaschcarts to run these specific programs on my Phat DS ?

10) Any flashcart website with a lot of choices to recommend for purchases ? (possibly in Sweden or France as i live in these countries but other locations are fine too)

11) Any way to use a controller (via bluetooth or other protocol) to play my games on my Phat DS ?

12) Final question, what is the best linker to play DS games on my NEW 3DS XL ? (Sky3DS does not read DS games if i remember).

Hope this list of questions is not too long to answer but that would help me a lot to start with.
 
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FAST6191

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1) Money no object and power no concern. DSTwo, DSTwo+ or their 4 in 1 thing. You might still be able to find one but they got harder to find a while back.

Alternatives
Whatever R4 officially supports Wood and does not have a timebomb. Don't know what that is right now.
Possibly the acekard 2i , though they are not the best hardware quality.

EZ5i maybe. They stopped updating shortly after the big DSi/3ds flash cart killer update (it would be a while before the 3ds was fully hacked and could disable the protections that way) which meant a handful of later releases would not work on stock firmwares. There was some talk of open sourcing things like they did with some other stuff of theirs but no movement yet. You can probably also use the anti piracy patches people use for compatibility layers to make things work (it mainly being stuff like pokemon conquest and black 2/white 2 that people seem to care about, most other things released after that also working fine as the EZ5i had some pretty nice countermeasures).
In terms of features this is probably one of the few things to compete with the DSTwo family (though obviously no onboard emulation boost) -- it has pretty decent (for what they are) savestates and in game text reader. That said most of the others will do cheats, soft reset and load which is all most want.

GB/GBC is emulated well enough on anything.
SNES natively is more tricky. You can get some stuff done and the DSTwo and other enhanced carts with their onboard stuff do better, though far short of something like the PSP. Generally if the game had an acceptable PCE/TG16, megadrive/genesis or GBA port (including with ROM hacks to enhance them and sort issues, of which there are many issues and fixes) then do that instead.

2) 4 main choices you will be reasonably able to find.
EZ4. Was the main choice until everdrive and EZFlash came back with modern designs. Lacks some of the niceties of those titles but will play just about everything as it would have happened on hardware. http://gbatemp.net/threads/buying-a-gba-flash-cart-in-2013.341203/page-18#post-4756995 being the main tricky titles (note this is not a list for the supercard stuff I mentioned elsewhere, though some might still be troubled).
There are many iterations now, just don't get an EZ4 lite compact.
EZ 3 in 1.
EZFlash Omega.
Everdrive GBA stuff.

Definitely don't get a supercard GBA slot cart or a clone thereof. I have not seen a firecard clone in some years now but they might still be out there but when they say 128Mbit (or 256 in the really rare cases) they mean that size -- if you are not used to Mbit then divide by 8, so 128Mbit if 16 megabytes and GBA games go up to 32 (list of said 32 meg games in the link above, though some hackers use the extra space as well).

Older EZ4 models might do for RAM for homebrew but if you really want rumble and memory then it is probably going to be the 3 in 1 you seek. Good lucking finding a GBA size version (repro makers, people wanting a real cart for their ROM hack and apparently some electronics types that noted it used a chip they really liked and was hard to find otherwise rinsing the market of them years ago, to say nothing of everybody mostly wanting DSlite stuff back then).

For pokemon transfers I would sooner rip a save and use an emulator, or recreate it with one of the save editors.

3) and 4) The DS Slot is too slow to run them natively so anything has to be emulated, which the DS lacks memory and speed for. The GBA slot runs things in GBA mode natively so if you have a vaguely usable cart (which is to say just about everything that was not a supercard or clone thereof) then if it fits then it runs.
For the DS slot stuff then consider it a proof of concept rather than something you will want to use if it is just the native DS emulators.
If it is on the supercard dstwo family, ismm or iplayer then the onboard emulation they provide (all said carts have fancy CPUs on to do their own thing) mean you can do most of the library pretty happily. Some of the really annoying to emulate stuff like Golden Sun might trouble things but they are few enough in number you can probably get away with it.

5)The EZVi is not the EZ6 but the DSi compatible version of the EZ5, and last iteration of the EZ5 family to continue being supported (the originals, NYE and plus versions dropping off at various points). https://hackmii.com/2010/02/lawsuit-coming-in-3-2-1/ if you want info on what the DSi workaround was.
The EZ4 was originally a cart aimed at running DS ROMs (it took a while for DS slot protocol and encryption to be cracked) but inherited much of the GBA compatibility of the EZ3 (of which it was essentially a version of, but without RTC, with DS mode and with a mini/micro SD slot depending upon the version rather than NAND. Also lacked some of the nicer features of the EZ3 like compression and savestates).

6) Yes you can cut edges and attach a pull tab, make a new 3d printed case for it or cannibalise an old game (I am duty bound to use barbie horse adventures as an example in such discussions as a joke but all GBA games are more or less the same unless they have extra hardware).
64 vs 32 is not going to do much for you as nothing outside of the EZ5 line (and even then some hard to come by betas kernels for it) supports the extra NOR space. Not to mention most things only need the RAM.
Many flash carts added native support for the 3 in 1 (EZFlash released the code for it) but if not then there is DS homebrew to support it. Most people would probably use Rudolph's exploader program.

7) For your purposes then not really -- it mainly being a package to add support for the 3ds. There might be a store out there somewhere with some but you are somewhat late to this party so good luck on that one.

8) Not on a DS, no (there is substantially more hardware for the DSi than there is on the stock DS). I don't know what ended up going for flash carts and the DSi in the end (for the most part it was only Team Cyclops that did anything other than make a DS flash cart that booted on a DSi and even then support and functionality was iffy). Today most people doing things with the DSi either do it on a 3ds or with a hacked DSi firmware (which itself can be a bit trickier to get sorted, though I have not kept up with the very latest developments there).

9) Devkitpro (specifically the devkitarm part of it) https://devkitpro.org/ is what most would use for low level programming. Quite a few people had some fun and made good stuff with lua but they were far more limited than what you could do with that.
Supercard DSTwo does have some more capabilities if you want to develop for that, though be warned it is rather hard coding (most people ignoring the DS side of things and just taking inputs and feeding back video and outputs).
Other than that pretty much anything you can boot into DS mode with will have a DLDI patch/support built into it. DLDI (or perhaps more technically libfat) is was what used to access the SD card in the end and make sense of the dozens of flash carts and new ones coming on the market.
Some people making cheats quite liked some of the action replay PC debugging and then supercard dstwo/ismm real time memory viewers/editors. However today we have very nice emulators so minimal need for that one.

10) Don't know what French flash cart sellers have survived the various purges, bans, paypal/credit card wranglings and whatever else, and they were never particularly numerous to begin with (not to mention most technically being in the French speaking parts of Belgium if memory serves). Sweden then has https://www.shop01media.com/index.php?route=common/home , though their stock is pretty slim pickings these days. They are a good site though and have long been seen to go out of their way to make things work.

11) Nothing easy I can point at and say this. There was never the equivalent of a GB player, super game boy or even transfer pak for the DS or anything compatible with it.
It would be easy enough to solder on things to the DS like people use to make turbo controllers, PC controller adapters and whatever else if you really wanted. For the pokemon typing game we also saw a hack to use a network pipe to mimic its keyboard option. I don't know what, if anything, DSserial provided and it would again take game level hacks, and I would sooner use the GBA slot of that sort of thing (see what guitar hero did, though more advanced for this).

Short version you are going to need to open up the DS, find the debug points for the controller (or something akin to it) and solder wires to them. From there you can do any of the old game controller to USB adapter type, turbo controller, split controller, disabled person controller, hacks to get buttons presses from one of those to register on the DS. The easier way would be to wire directly to it, the harder would be have some kind of interface (an arduino or teensy type programmable chip being more than capable of this sort of thing) and plug in a normal controller and adapt accordingly.

12) Most people these days looking at playing DS games on the 3ds family are not using a flash cart as much as the DS compatibility layers for them (see the long threads we have on anti piracy patch databases for use with them) and running them from SD cards. Even then you can run older versions of the DS layer that don't have as much flash cart detection to use the older stuff, or possibly even drop it entirely but I have not looked into that. Most modern R4 clones, Acekard 2i, or any of the DStwo family will do here.

I held back a bit there for some things but hopefully enough is there to answer what you needed. You might also like this thread https://gbatemp.net/threads/current-favored-kit-for-ds-dslite.537988/ as many of the same questions were asked and some we went into a bit more depth for.
 

haliway

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Really awesome. Really thank you for your answers. I would like some clarifications about your explanation so let me replu to some of your answers.

1) What are EZFlash Redux, Reborn and Omega compared to 3in1 ? Are they compatible with DSTWO products like EZFlash 3in1 ?
Why does the official site not display version V, version V Plus and version Vi as part of their product line ?
EZFlash V, V Plus and Vi are slot 1 flashcarts right ? Are they better than the Redux (i dont see if Redux play DS games as well, i guess yes) ? And compared to DSTWO products ?

8) So it is possible to hack the DSi directly to play games. And Cyclops is the only flashcart to run on a DSi console. But you said that Ez Flash Vi was for DSi or i missed something (or you meant that it is possible to do GBA stuff but no DS stuff apart from iffy Cyclops one)

12) Not sure to understand "see the long threads we have on anti piracy patch databases for use with them". Are you saying that DS games played on 3DS have to be patched in order to be played ?

FInally another question, what is the goal of a Neon Advance ? Get the feeling of a DS Lite in a GBA kind of form factor ?
 
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FAST6191

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Reborn? I don't know what that might be, though hopefully the following will figure it out. I suspect it is one of the new batches or tweaked versions.

Originally there were 4 models of EZ4
The original GBA size miniSD EZ4
The EZ4 lite
The EZ4 lite compact. These have minimal GBA abilities and were made so people wanting DS ROMs could have a cheap way to do it (the NOR and PSRAM cost a lot of money back then)
The EZ4 lite deluxe. Where the lite and original feature 256Mbit of NOR and 128Mbit PSRAM these feature 384Mbit (256+128) of NOR and 256 of PSRAM.

Everything with lite in the name was sized for the DS lite and used microSD, the latter two being shaped like DS lite dust covers where the former sticks out maybe a mm or two and does not have the little tab on the side.

Around the time of that 2013 thread I linked with all the trouble ROMs the GBA size EZ4 was the last standalone thing on the market of any merit and getting hard to find, as were miniSD. The lite line other than the compact having long since stopped being made and being really hard to find -- as you might imagine the lite deluxe was considered among the best carts around. The M3, G6 and some of the older EZFlash being the main other carts people would look for.

The EZTeam came back with a new batch of EZ4 a few years ago at this point, some with microSD instead of the now really hard to find miniSD, and then made another they called the reform.
They also released updates so now the old carts would be able to use SDHC memory (the SD spec only goes up to 2 gigs officially and was getting very hard to find). Said update (actually a few just before it) did however stop any DS mode support (though nobody really used it outside of some DS game dumping homebrew, and for that I would suggest you hack your 3ds and use that to dump DS games if you think you want such functionality).

The 3 in 1, officially EZ5 3 in 1 expansion pack, was originally made as an expansion pack for the EZ5 to allow it play GBA games. As mentioned though they released the source code so other flash carts and homebrew could make use of it.
These were also a bit cheaper than the EZ4 so a lot of people got them.

The Omega is an entirely separate flash cart to all the others. Made in something of a response to everdrive trying their hand at a GBA cart it aims to be a GBA flash cart made with all the bells and whistles that modern electronics affords so minimal load times, real time clock is back, savestates available, no need for save patching (though that was also added to the EZ4 carts in an update around the same time as the SDHC support and new batches, and was usually handled by DS carts and homebrew for the 3 in 1).

8) That lawsuit coming in 3 2 1 link covers the tech side of things.
Anyway. New versions of consoles often have a habit of blocking old hacks. We never saw any GB/GBC flash carts blocked by the GBA, not anything when the GBA SP came along, nothing on the GB player, nothing on the GB micro, nor anything when the DS came along* and again nothing when the lite came along. The DSi however blocked all flash carts before it and saw flash cart makers have to issue new versions to cope with it.
The DSi is also technically a more powerful console than the DS with extra abilities, even if we ultimately saw very little that made any use that anybody cares about with it (some DSiware is probably about it).
To that end all the new flash carts carried on running in DS mode even on the DSi and thus could not access any new DSi features. The exception being team cyclops and some hard to do hacks.
Nintendo then would release firmware updates to the DSi that made hacks harder, and also blocked flash carts that had worked around the block (the 3ds was also a thing at this point and doing the same). Eventually Nintendo released a pretty big update that managed to knock out all the flash carts presently available. Supercard's DSTwo being the only thing to get around it where everybody else went to new hardware (or stopped doing anything). The R4i gold dual hypercore party rainbow edition stuff coming after that block.
However a few years back we saw some new hacks get made and people take up some interest in it all.
https://gbatemp.net/threads/dsi-hacking-everything-you-need-to-know-about-it-and-more.540158/

*the passme method was blocked by later DS firmwares but then we got the passme 2. No need to worry about that though. The very first GBA flash cart will work in the very last DS lite, and the very first DS slot flash cart will also work in the very last lite released.

12) If you are using the compatibility layers instead of a flash cart then some do, most flash carts however have it all built into it all. It is all pretty easy to do though. https://gbatemp.net/threads/ap-patch-preservation.477536/

13) https://www.joebleeps.com/neon-advance I guess is what you are referring to.
The DS/DS lite technically play GBA games, have some nicer screens than most of the GBA models before them (AGS 101 and third party replacements probably being the only things likely to compete there). About the only thing you don't have with a DS is the ability to use a link cable -- the link cable led to some good stuff but at the same time solo play on the GBA also has enough to probably keep you going for years to come.
The DS and DS lite hinges are also prone to failure. To that end some people took to removing the top screen (and putting a resistor across the relevant points to make it still think a screen was there as it checks) and just using the results to play GBA games, such a thing got labelled a GBA macro by some in the community.
That looks like an enhanced version of that concept but with speakers in there (the speakers being in the top screen in the DS family) and a fancy light pipe to make it look pretty.
Personally I would rather fix the console and have it all but to each their own.
 

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haliway

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Wow man you are bible. Lovely to get answers like that. I guess i will have a lot to read my god...

I actually managed to find 2 EZ-Flash V Plus including 3in1 bundles here in Sweden for 30 euros (to use with my DS Lite) + 2 EZ-Flash Omega for 40 euros (for my future modded GBA). I want 2 in case one dies. Hope they are brand new sealed in their respective box (ordered from an online store) and hope that´s actually not a scam.
I will then try to find some DSTWO Plus and one 3in1 GBA size (it will be very hard to find one so 2 is an impossible mission i guess).
These ones will be for my Phat DS which has a loopy capture card and a charging mod + audio filter.

Hope it was good choices :)
 
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FAST6191

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EZ5 plus... not sure what I would want to do with that but bundle wise I guess that is reasonable, and you can probably augment it with the patch programs/AP databases. The EZ5i split off from it and got updates for a while longer where this languished somewhat. It might also be lacking some of the really nice features the EZ5i eventually ended up with

There were several editions of EZ5 (original and new year edition aka nye, the EZ5 plus then being the thing made when SDHC appeared as I think just about every flash cart company released a new cart for that one).
After that was the EZ5i.

Also be aware you may have to replace batteries on things -- if they have sat in boxes since they were made then chances are even if they were the rechargeable versions the batteries have since died. I don't think they will have leaked and caused even more fun but there is that possibility.

Latest kernel for the EZ5 plus line
https://gbatemp.net/download/ez5-kernel.23783/
So that would be January 2011 the last update happened.
Text list of DS releases by date
https://web.archive.org/web/20180920175520/http://www.abgx.net/nds_releases_date.txt
Make of that what you will then. The DS being king of the castle was largely over by this point (the 3ds was but a month or two away at this point and everybody expected that to be another GBA or DS... how disappointing history is).
We did not really see any kind of final burst on the DS as devs that really knew the hardware and were given no supervision to make games -- go look at the late stage GBA and GBC games after their respective consoles had successors to see what devs were doing there (or indeed just about any other console prior to them). Some of things they got the hardware to do was really impressive and not having much supervision they often actually made games worth playing (I usually get people to compare Pirates of the Caribbean Dead Man's chest on the GBA and DS as an example here. Never going to be one of those hidden gems but the GBA version is pretty solid where the DS is forgettable at best) rather than bland rubbish that corporate often demanded.

Do note on the link above that most of the later pussycat dumps were pointless redumps* and only serve to cause ROM hackers annoyance, and eximus and ABSTRAKT were mostly doing European versions of games and v1.1 editions. That said if you are doing the whole French thing there might be something there.

*the old rudolph dumpers I mentioned before assumed an area of the header was blank, mainly as it was. With the DSi extra security new games gained a bit of signing data in that location rather than having to have the DSi update firmware for every new game. No flash cart, ROM hacker, emulator author or the like will ever care about this extra bit of data -- the only thing anybody might ever see is if Nintendo release some kind of ds mini like we saw for the NES and SNES and they decide to check that data and frankly meh and it will likely be hacked in a few minutes anyway.
 

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I tried to find the EZ-Flash Vi but i could not manage to find any... I guess for this price i can still manage to update it with custom updates etc.
15 euros is not even half the price of any 3in1 possible to find so...
I don´t really count on this one anyway (if i find a Vi 805 i will buy it). For DS i will most likely rely on my future DSTWO Plus.

And what is the best linker on OLD 3DS / NEW 3DS ? nobody seems to come to an agreement about this question...
 
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Hi everybody,

I´m new here and I just got a Phat DS with loopy capture card and charging mod.
I have tried to understand what has been said in this forum regarding the best flashcarts for slot 1 and slot 2 but the answers were kind of complex and confused me a bit to be honest so i will try to ask specific questions here :

1) What is the best flashcart for slot 1 for a Phat DS ? And why ? (any way to play GB/GBC and SNES as well ?)

2) What is the best flashcart for slot 2 for a Phat DS ? And why ? (I want to be able to do some pokemon transfers, have a rumble pak and memory expansion pak to play with browser).

3) Can GBA games run on slot 1 (no emulation) natively without having to buy a slot 2 GBA flashcart ?

4) What are the advantages of using slot 2 over slot 1 for GBA games ?

5) I read that EZ-Flash Vi is the latest EZ-Flash version but i can only find EZ-Flash IV (no V nor Vi) on their official website, why ? A rebranding / renaming ?

6) It seems like EZ-Flash 3 in 1 is one of the few ones adding RAM, rumble and GBA support to most of the flashcarts. Is there any external sign to find out what version a reseller is selling (The article "How to tell which version of the 3in1 you have" does only display and talk about the internals). Is it possible to use a DS Lite version on a Phat DS (cutting edges or something like that) because the latest one has 64Mb instead 32Mb. Is this 3in1 compatible with DSTWO and DSTWO+ ?

7) What do you think of DSTWO+ and where is it possible to find one ? Better than DSTWO ?

8) Any way to play DSi games via a flashcart ?

9) What is the best DS devkit to develop some homebrews ? Is there any other method than flaschcarts to run these specific programs on my Phat DS ?

10) Any flashcart website with a lot of choices to recommend for purchases ? (possibly in Sweden or France as i live in these countries but other locations are fine too)

11) Any way to use a controller (via bluetooth or other protocol) to play my games on my Phat DS ?

12) Final question, what is the best linker to play DS games on my NEW 3DS XL ? (Sky3DS does not read DS games if i remember).

Hope this list of questions is not too long to answer but that would help me a lot to start with.
1) Get an r4i. Make SURE that it's from r4i-sdhc.com (with the hyphen) or says that on it.
2) I don't know. Just use Twilight Menu ++ with a DS flashcart.
3) Yes, but only if the kernel (the menu/operating system) on the flashcart is Twilight Menu ++. You COULD use GBAemu4ds, but it sucks so much it's not worth it.
4) None. Just... use GBArunner2 from Twilight Menu ++. It's bundled in.
5) IDK. Don't bother with EZ-Flash.
6) As I said, don't bother with EZ-Flash.
7) I don't, because I don't bother. Just go for an r4i. I got one for ten bucks and it served me well until I realized I could just hack my 3DS.
8) Yes. Once again, Twilight Menu ++.
9) IDK, and no. The DS doesn't have memory storage!
10) No. Flashcarts by nature are the kind of things you only find from sketchy websites or eBay, so just go for eBay.
11) Sadly no. (I wish too- Mario 64 DS is just better with a controller.)
12) Use the same r4i you'd get for the DS.
 

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1) Get an r4i. Make SURE that it's from r4i-sdhc.com (with the hyphen) or says that on it.
2) I don't know. Just use Twilight Menu ++ with a DS flashcart.
3) Yes, but only if the kernel (the menu/operating system) on the flashcart is Twilight Menu ++. You COULD use GBAemu4ds, but it sucks so much it's not worth it.
4) None. Just... use GBArunner2 from Twilight Menu ++. It's bundled in.
5) IDK. Don't bother with EZ-Flash.
6) As I said, don't bother with EZ-Flash.
7) I don't, because I don't bother. Just go for an r4i. I got one for ten bucks and it served me well until I realized I could just hack my 3DS.
8) Yes. Once again, Twilight Menu ++.
9) IDK, and no. The DS doesn't have memory storage!
10) No. Flashcarts by nature are the kind of things you only find from sketchy websites or eBay, so just go for eBay.
11) Sadly no. (I wish too- Mario 64 DS is just better with a controller.)
12) Use the same r4i you'd get for the DS.

No time bomb on these ones ? My concern with r4* is that it is impossible to know what is what. It is a real mess and with so many clones... What are the good and the bad ones ? R4i is the good deal according to you ? is it r4isdhc website ?
I hate that type of flashcarts bringing so much confusion... that´s why i prefer to have different carts (EZ-Flash for GBA, DSTWO for DS and something else on 3DS if needed) because i don´t want timebomb and crap stuff with such brands. I heard so many bad things with r4*...
 
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No time bomb on these ones ? My concern with r4* is that it is impossible to know what is what. It is a real mess and with so many clones... What are the good and the bad ones ? R4i is the good deal according to you ? is it r4isdhc website ?
I hate that type of flashcarts bringing so much confusion... that´s why i prefer to have different carts (EZ-Flash for GBA, DSTWO for DS and something else on 3DS if needed) because i don´t want timebomb and crap stuff with such brands. I heard so many bad things with r4*...
There are tons of clones, but make sure yours is from r4i-sdhc.com. WITH THE HYPHEN. Mine isn't (it's a r4isdhc.com clone card) but the timebomb is disabled if you put YSMenu or Twilight Menu ++ on it.
Tl;dr: put Twilight Menu on it and you'll be fine.
 

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Sorry I thought it was a statement.

Best one money no object and power no concern.

DSTwo/DSTwo+ . As mentioned though hard to find, expensive when you do (was at the time as well) and gobbles a bit more power than a stock cart.

The DSTwo is best mainly because of the extra fancy homebrew options it has and features that nothing else really possesses or possesses as well.

Most people however only want the games to run, ROM hacks to run, cheats and maybe soft reset (never got it myself but the DSlite does have a dodgy switch).
This can be accomplished by just about anything that runs on the 3ds.

I would love there to be a nice suggestion to just say here, $30 and it will do what you want. However we do not have that, maybe one of the flash cart teams can give us something there but with the market being what it is then eh.

The original R4 (itself something of an OEM of an M3 cart) was a reasonable cart for the time. I did not care for its patching approach when others were doing savelists that continued working for years after the last update to that but eh and it took off somewhat. Obviously today it will not work on the DSi or 3ds and is limited to 2 gigs of storage (the SDHC stuff would come later)
For whatever reason R4 then became a byword for flash cart on the DS (similar to how people use jailbreak to mean hack despite no apple products being involved) and we got an explosion of fly by night (even by mod chip/flash cart world standards) companies making their own, even some of the big ones gave it a go.
Some of them were better than others though. I did not pay attention to see what we are suggesting these days though (if the others above have them then I am not going to doubt it). I would prefer such a thing to not have a timebomb and use the wood kernel (itself something of a similar kernel to the stuff the acekard family had by virtue of having the same coders and using much of the same codebase; while the hardware of the acekard might have been lacking it was a good kernel that got made that most others looked to so as to see quick fixes and solid features -- its cheat engine was among the most solid there was).
If you can navigate the waters and get a well made R4 named thing with a proper kernel then you will have something that plays every game essentially as it would be at retail, with cheats, and ROM hacks if you want them. As we are not particularly getting new games for the DS at this point in time then no worries about new games not being compatible.

Everything else (be it EZ5i, m3i, ak2i) might do well if you can find one for not a lot, or you find it on the street but I don't know that I would go looking for one.

If it is on a 3DS then you can hack the 3ds and while it might take a patch or two then you can run DS games directly from the SD these days.
 

FAST6191

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I have not kept up with R4 named things to know what it what as far as individual carts or the websites claiming to support them these days.

I know there are some good ones out there, though not what ones they might be or where you might find one. I tended not to go on the sites themselves to buy them and instead try to find them on established sellers, and today it is possibly even worse as it has been a few years so I don't know who is squatting on what these days.
 

Plasmaster09

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I´m just asking if i can buy stuff on this site @Plasmaster09 @FAST6191. Is it a scam or legit website ? It is actually not to buy R4 specifics
I mean you probably can
If it is a scam (I don't know) then it's only like ten bucks anyway
You should probably just get one off eBay and make sure the card says r4i-sdhc.com on it
 

Technicmaster0

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No. As I said, the legit one is r4i-sdhc.com and all the others are clones.
R4i-sdhc.com has a timebomb, too. They are the same as r4isdhc.com, just more expensive.
The real deal are supercard dstwo (plus) or r4i gold 3ds plus (r4ids.cn). You can trust the stuff that fast said, he knows stuff.
 
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haliway

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R4i-sdhc.com has a timebomb, too. They are the same as r4isdhc.com, just more expensive.
The real deal are supercard dstwo (plus) or r4i gold 3ds plus (r4ids.cn). You can trust the stuff that fast said, he knows stuff.


Thank you. Yes but i have other things to buy and i would like to know if r43ds.org is a scam store or not as I found what i was looking after on this site ?
 

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