Hacking the skins on my firecard wont work!

[jocelyn77]

ok, im pretty sure i did everything correctly to make my fire card skin. it is 256x192 pixels, its a BMP file, and i changed the names to c_file.bmp and desktop.bmp. is there anything im missing? i have firmware v1.45 (it came with my fire card, and i think its the latest, not sure), just letting you know. this isny a HUGE deal, but could someone please help me?

 

[madonion]

Dont expect anyone to help you here mate, I asked the same question but nobody took the time out to reply.
Make sure you have the global.ini file in the root of the DSYSTEM folder. Hope you manage to sort it out!

 

[jocelyn77]

awwh

but i have the global.ini file on mine, but is still doesnt work

i made a really cute skin too!

 

[Apache Thunder]

Could be your firmware. I would recommend using this firmware:

http://www.qi168.net/forum/index.php?topic=108.0

That is what I'm using and the custom skin I'm using runs fine with that.

Don't worry, even though you have a "Fire Card", and this is "Ultra-NCard" firmware, they are fully compatible with each other. Your F-Card should upgrade to this firmware with no problem. Email/PM me if you need help with the firmware upgrade.

Also, don't forget to backup your games and saves. This includes the system.sdb and lastsave.sdb files in your DSYSTEM folder. The system.sdb contains the actual save game data, the .SAV files that go in the same folder as the games merely tell the N-Card what the save type is and such. (but back those up anyway!)

The reason you have to back them up is that you have to format the fire card after the upgrade.

 

[jocelyn77]

ill try it.

 

[jocelyn77]

hey apache, i updated my firmware to the one you suggested, but the skins still wont work

but i think i really like this firmware better! it puts it in abc order, and it seems to load faster

thanks for suggesting it! the only thing that bugs me is the backgroud > any other tips?

 

[Apache Thunder]

Contact me via email (its also my MSN Identity, you should beable to find it in my profile).

I'll try and help you out there. Perhaps you can send me your skin so that I can get it working for you and then send you the working DSYSTEM folder. Also, the new firmware defaults to the 3D interface (which I don't really like and prevents skins from working I think). For you skins to work you must disable the 3D interface. To do this find the DISPTYPE setting and set it to 0. It should read like this (and might be at bottom of the file).

[MENUINFO]
;Display mode, 3D=1, 2D=0
DISPTYPE=0

See if that gets the skins to work. If not send your skin to me via email, and I will apply them to my N-Card and then send you the fixed version.

 

[jocelyn77]

i dont really understand what you said, so im just gonna send you my skins. ill upload them on photobucket then send you the links.

 

[Apache Thunder]

lol no problem. I have sent you the fixed DSYSTEM folder. It only contains desktop.bmp, c_file.bmp, wait.bmp and global.ini files, so you should beable to just overwrite the folder on yours with mine and all other files should remain untouched.

I did the fixes on global.ini file for you. I have also included a wait.bmp file since this firmware will make use of it. I made it myself. Hope you like it!

 

[paul1991]

There is alot of wrongness in this thread.
It matters not which firmware you have(As long as its 1.23o or above) nor is the menu is 2d or 3d. You probably have a DSSYstem folder with hidden bmp files. Delete it and download apaches. Try that on you card and let us know.

Also, with 1.44, you lose many features. Namely, you lose download play support.
To alphabatize roms on 1.45 do this:
Open up your ncard on your PC.
Right click in some empty space in the file.
Click Arrange icons by... then click "Show In groups
Go back to the same menu and click "Name"

Viola! Alphabet on any firmware!

 

[jocelyn77]

yay! i used apache's DSYSTEM folder thingy and i got the skins to work!!!! and i dont think i had any "hidden bmp files". not that i know of at least. thanks apache and paul for helping! but one more question: how do i change the text color to black or white or dark green or something? because i can read the text fine on the top screen, but not on the bottom screen.

and btw, i sent you another e-mail apache.

EDIT: i changed my firmware back to the regular v1.45 firmware, because of what paul said about the losing the download play support. but the skins and the global files still work on it!


EDIT (again): how can i change the highlight color on the touch screen. like you know how when you scroll up and down on the touch screen and the games are highlited a certain color? i wanna change that color on my fire card. i know i have to change something in the GLOBAL.ini file, but what to i change. thanks fer helping!

 

[paul1991]

I know what you are talking about. I can not help you now, but I will let you know tomorrow.
All I can say now is that it IS possible.

 

[Porkdish]

The chances are the bitmaps for the custom skin where not saved in the correct format.

Keeping old dsystem folders around is never a good idea, they often conflict with later updates. Better to let the xmenu.dat file autogenerate a new dsystem folder and put the correct saved bitmaps in there.

Using older firmware is of course, your prerogative but it is the major cause of errors with newly released roms and the first thing anyone will suggest you do is update.

The newest firmwares do NOT default to the 3D menu, they removed it entirely due to it being a memory hog and rather clunky. Only the 2D menu is possible.

The text colour can be changed via the settings under [msg color] in the global ini. There are three entries, one for red, one for green and one for blue. They are additive and range from 0 to 31. All three set to 31 results in white text, all set to 0 results in black. The text colour is the same for BOTH screens, you cannot have different text colous for the top screen and the bottom.

You CANNOT change the highlight colour, at least not via the global.ini. It is a hard coded 'invert highlight. Anything in your desktop.bmp that falls under the menu area will be inverted as a highlight (thus my preference for grey which is easier to manage).

Changing the scroll bar colour is also difficult and often unresponsive to entries in the global.ini you can make it nearly transparent but not completely, solid colours are possible but usually look terrible.

You can make the bars that appear at top and bottom of the lower screen by default, transparent.

You cannot turn off the firmware version number that appears at top right and it will ALWAYS be snot green coloured.

It is in general a terrible menu to skin and will remain so forever...

 

[jocelyn77]

thanks for your reply porkdish

it answered a lot of my questions. but how do i change the text color to grey? would it be like 16, 16, 16? or something along those lines.

EDIT: and btw, the skins WERE in the correct format. apache said that it was something to do with my global file. but anyways, it works now

 

[Porkdish]

Yes, Think of it like light, all colours add together to make white. 16, 16, 16 is approx 50% grey.

18,16,16 would be slightly warmer (more red). 31,0,31 is bright purple, etc...

Newer firmwares make their own global.ini along with the dsystem folder. Updating to a reputable, up to date firmware is advisable to keeping old system files between updates.

 

[jocelyn77]

ok thanks!