Nice investigation. I bought a 7,99$ R4-SDHC (non-i) last month, I needed it for a DS Lite and I figured out it was enough for me since I didn't need the functions of the RTS chip anyway. After reading this, turns out It was a fine choice. RetroGameFan's YSMenu works great for me.
Just wondering: should I get my hands on a 3DS in the future, could I backup my card's kernel, flash it with the R4i-B9S kernel file (as it can be done on the Gold Pro and RTS Lite) to use its CFW-enabling function, then flash my own kernel backup back? Or, is its chipset too old for that?