ROM Trimming

[Kalisiin]

OK, this is gonna definitely sound way noob, and I probably am, compared to most here, but...I keep hearing this phrase about ROM Trimming.

1. WHAT is ROM Trimming exactly?

2. WHY would someone trim a ROM?

3. WHEN would someone determine it was a good idea/necessary, to trim a ROM

4. HOW does one trim a Rom?

5. WHAT effects can/does ROM Trimming actually have?

Please forgive, but I don't understand the term...and Wikipedia was no help.

 

[anaxs]

1. rom trimming is when u make a rom smaller when it contains unnessisary componants
it gets rid of them to make the file smaller for your convenience

2. if u run out of room in your memory card but most people dont do it

3. When you are running out of room in your memory

4.you have to get a rom trimmer and it does the work for you
it takes out all the unessesary componants and un needed things from in the rom

5. basically it makes the rom smaller

 

[Satangel]

2. To save space on your microSD. That way you can have more DS/GBA games on your microSD.

3. It's always a good idea, except for playing rom hacks. Rom hacks usually need a clean, untrimmed rom to work.
But for the rest, you save loads of space and the game still works perfectly.

4. I use NDSTokyoTrim. Google it. It's superfast and works very good.

5. No bad effects, the game works just like an untrimmed rom.

I really recommend you to try it, there are disadvantages and you can save loads of space with it!

 

[Zerousen]

1. its basically getting rid of extra data on a rom so the rom is smaller and you can fit more roms in your SD.
2. So they could have more roms on their SD card.
3. When they run out of room in their SD card.
4. I use the R4 rom trimmer for all of my roms.you can get it here. it tells you how at that page.
5.some rom trimmers may over trim a rom and cause its download play to break and download play will not be able to work. though i havent tried it out yet, people say that NDSTokyo Trim,another rom trimmer,does not over trim roms.you can search it on google on how to use it.

Well I Hope I helped you quite a bit x3.

 

[Depravo]

The memory chip in commercial cart are always of a finite size: 8mb, 16mb, 32mb, 64mb etc. So if a game contained, for instance, 25mb of data it would have to be put on a 32mb memory chip. The cart would actually contain 7mb of blank data. Are you following this?

Now, when a ROM is dumped the ENTIRE memory chip is copied, even the blank part. What a ROM trimmer does is identify the 'blank' part of a ROM and delete it leaving only game data.

It's always worth doing as sometimes games can contain quite a LOT of blank data. When I first discovered ROM trimming I trimmed all the games on my full 2gb SD card. After trimming I could fit 7 more games on the card.

 

[anaxs]

@kalisiin:
now you have 3 good explanations of everything u need to know about rom trimming
u learned something new today

 

[Zerousen]

@kalisiin:
now you have 3 good explanations of everything u need to know about rom trimming
u learned something new today

Yes, indeed, you have learned something new today,and may help you in the future x3

 

[Kalisiin]

Thanks for the straight answers, and for not treating me like an idiot for not knowing.

Next question...would trimming a ROM ever cause a ROM that currently does not work....to work?

Because there are a few ROMS I can't get them to work...and I'd like them to.

 

[Satangel]

Thanks for the straight answers, and for not treating me like an idiot for not knowing.

Next question...would trimming a ROM ever cause a ROM that currently does not work....to work?

Because there are a few ROMS I can't get them to work...and I'd like them to.

Nope, never heard of a case like that.
It's probably because your flashcard can't run the game properly.
Which flashcard do you have?

 

[TrolleyDave]

What trimmer are you using?

 

[Kalisiin]

Currently, I'm using a Supercard SD, and I'm not using a ROM Trimmer.

I didn't want to get or use one until I knew what it actually did.

There's just a few games on which it gets hung up, and either I get whitescreen, and nothing else...or effed up graphics and a weird sound, and no way to move forward. It's only on a few games...the vast majority of them all work just fine.

Just was wondering if there was anything I could do to make the others work when they currently will not.