Hacking Supercard DS One SDHC problems

Supercool330

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I bought a Supercard DS One SDHC several months ago and used it primarily for Homebrew stuff. We took a car trip to my relatives for new years, and I decided to load a bunch of my DS games onto my SD card so I didn't have to keep track of all the games. My problem is that games freeze up all the time. For example, Yoshi's Island DS freezes whenever I go through a door, Final Fantasy IV freezes whenever I win a battle, and Custom Robo Arena freezes whenever I start a battle. I'm using a Sandisc 8gb class 6 (40x) micro sdhc card. I ran the self test and it didn't find any problems. There was 1 day during the trip where it didn't freeze at all, but now it is freezing again. It has no problems doing homebrew stuff, but I figure it must be a bad Supercard. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
 

aphirst

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What stands out to me is the MicroSD card. It's the same as mine.
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The problems you're having seem to point very clearly to Random Access Time. The Sandisk cards have fast transfer times, but relatively slow seek times. And the freezing is caused by slow seeks.
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But it's something which is *easily* fixed. Just reformat the MicroSD with the "Panasonic SD Formatter", almost invariably the first result on Google is what you're looking for.
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That tool formats the MicroSD in a way which is actually compliant to the SD standards (the standard Windows format just thinks the SD is a Hard Drive, and as such the filesystem isn't optimised).
 

Supercool330

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Damn, I really thought you were on to something there. I formatted it using the Panasonic SD Formatter (http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/sd/download/sd_formatter.html), set to Full(Erase OFF) and no format size adjustment, but I still had the same problems. If it tells you anything, the auto speed test thing recommended 22 both before and after reformatting. Anyways, thanks for the help, and any other suggestions would be great.
 

aphirst

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Ah, right. You're really supposed to do a full format with erase on, and enable size adjustment. Those are the settings which actually fix what I think the problem is
wink.gif
 

granville

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You did the FULL self test at bootup and didn't receive any PSRAM errors? You're having similar problems to me, but the test showed that I did have the error. If you have another microSD card, try using it to pinpoint whether it's the Supercard or the microSD.
 

Supercool330

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I'm still having the same issues. I ran the full self test and it didn't say there was anything wrong with the PSRAM (which from others description is what it sounded like the problem was). Unfortunately I don't have another micro sd card to test, but I think I will grab one tomorrow if I can't figure this out (I really want to know if my supercard is busted). How do I use the DSTT menu, I can't find the triple loader thing anywhere? Anyway, thanks again for all the help guys.

P.S. Sorry I posted this in the wrong section, wasn't quite sure where it should go.
 

Supercool330

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Using the ttds menu fixed the problem, which again makes me think there is something wrong with the PSRAM of my supercard. I saw the guide for fixing PSRAM problems on the SC forums, but will that work if the self test isn't reporting any errors? Also, what exactly is the PSRAM used for in the supercard, do I lose anything by using the ttds menu that I could be getting if I was using a properly functioning supercard?
 

granville

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Supercool330 said:
Using the ttds menu fixed the problem, which again makes me think there is something wrong with the PSRAM of my supercard. I saw the guide for fixing PSRAM problems on the SC forums, but will that work if the self test isn't reporting any errors? Also, what exactly is the PSRAM used for in the supercard, do I lose anything by using the ttds menu that I could be getting if I was using a properly functioning supercard?
PSRAM is apparently used for storing save files temporarily until you get back to the main DS-One menu. I say this because 1- the menu says "processing save file" after I play a game and go to the menu, and 2- because when I short out the battery to fix this, it seems to empty the temporary save out of the battery.

As far as using the DSTT menu goes, I like it a fair bit better. The thing is faster and the cheat engine is better. The only thing the Supercard menu has going for it are the real-time save and real-time cheat systems. Meaning the DSTT menu cannot save anywhere during a game or cheat anytime during the game. I'm willing to think the PSRAM might have something to do with these functions. Not sure though.

The DSTT menu doesn't use PSRAM at all. It just writes the save file directly to the microSD card and doesn't bother to store it temporarily. That's why it will run games even when your PSRAM is faulty.

And in regards to fixing the PSRAM error, there are a few techniques:

1- short out the battery. You open up the card and connect two small metal points with something like a flathead screwdriver or other metal object. You can find specific instructions on SCdev or the Supercard forums. This clears the battery's memory and resets it to the factory setting. The downside with this technique is that for me it only fixes the card for about 24 hours and then the PSRAM problems return.
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2- you can open the card and put a piece of index card paper between the exposed label and the card's circuit board. I've also heard that using aluminum foil works too, but It didn't for me.

The way I got mine to function is by doing BOTH steps 1 and 2. I first shorted out the battery, and then put a piece of index card paper in the card. I've gotten the error very rarely and now haven't had the error in months. But I still use the DSTT menu anyways since I now like it better. Plus opening the card up all the time is a hassle. I stripped the screwhole too, so now my card is held together pretty weakly.
 

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