Hacking Why is the R4 disliked so much?

[sgwiiboy]

Ok R4 was the card to have when the slot ones first got big. They bailed out on their customers or rather were forced to stop production and support. This left alot of folks very very unhappy.
The fact is tho the original R4s are supported on the same firmware of the new R4li/M3. This means they do get updates now.

The part that makes everyone not like the R4 is that there are cheaper better cards now. With newer features. Thoose being RTS, ingame txt, slow motion, alternate save paths, Cheat files you dont have to pick apart to make work, easy to use skins, battery saver modes.

All of that adds up to a better experiance with your card. Wich is why when someone says I'm gonna gat a R4, everyone says no don't. We say don't because we want the user to be happy and enjoy their purchase. Users that are happy with their cards are less likely to clutter the forums with gripe threads about R4 won't load XXXX game or why did I buy an R4.

All of us here would rather help somone who is happy with their purchase and trying to learn than try to calm someone down from a rant before they will even listen.
In the end it all comes down to get a good card that you will happy with. That already has all the features you want. Without haveing to use custom firmware and patches on tons of games to make them work and a support team that don't just poof away one day outta the blue.
This is why the R4 is disliked in my mind. Hope it helps.

Thanks dude, great reply. I must admit I like the idea of RTS and will probably look at a card with it in the future. It would have come in handy while I was playing Suikoden and there was no possibilty of saving for long periods.

 

[jesterscourt]

1. It is old.
2. It is discontinued.
3. It was so easy to use/acquire that a bunch of noobs got it and nearly spoiled the scene for everyone else.
4. It is the Kleenex of flashcarts. Most people outside of communities like this think flashcart = R4.

 

[DanTheManMS]

You need to understand that the R4 clones are all lumped together. You got one of the better ones, good for you, but for the most part, lots of clones have zero updates after a while before the company moves on and makes another clone.

As I've stated in the past, there is nothing severely WRONG with the R4, it is just that there are better deals out there. Good R4 clones cost as much as an AceKard, while the cheaper ones aren't worth the $5 pricetag they have.

Again, if you are happy about the R4, that's good. But I try and convince people out of it just to avoid a barrage of dumb questions. See, if I recommend a certain clone, chances are there are 2 others with the same name. R4i SDHC is good, there are a ton of them out there with that name, and they will buy the wrong one or ask, what about the R4i Upgrade or whatever. There are so many clones that it is just easier to deal with it by avoiding all of them. Honestly, even the good clones aren't spectacular, so we aren't missing much.

This is basically what I was going to say. Because there are so many fakes and clones out there, it's difficult (if not impossible) to keep track of which ones are good and which ones are unsupported crap. Rather than spending hours learning the differences and then figuring out how to best explain them to people who ask, it's a hundred times easier just to say "avoid anything with the R4 name." Is this unfair to the good R4 clones out there? Of course it is. But it helps avoid issues before they begin, and lessens the sheer amount of knowledge I have to have in order to provide solid up-to-date advice.

For this reason I will be recommending against the new R4 RTS made by the M3 Team. Sure the M3 Team is reliable, and this is bound to be a solid cart, but I am against anything that helps revive the R4 name, which at the moment stands for nothing but confusion and shoddy products.

 

[Advi]

He makes a good point; a game with lower compatibility than other flashcarts will still more than likely play all of the games most people who use them do.

Of course, it's the extra features that trips people up. Homebrew rarely works on R4's, Slot-2 compatibility is only with YSmenu, all of the current R4 flashcarts for sale are clones, and still some stuff like RTS and RTG are popular turn-ons.

 

[Midna]

Ok R4 was the card to have when the slot ones first got big. They bailed out on their customers or rather were forced to stop production and support. This left alot of folks very, very unhappy.
The fact is tho the original R4s are supported on the same firmware as the new R4li/M3. This means they do get updates now.

The part that makes everyone not like the R4 is that there are cheaper, better cards now. With newer features. Thoose being RTS, ingame txt, slow motion, alternate save paths, Cheat files you dont have to pick apart to make work, easy to use skins, battery saver modes.

All of that adds up to a better experiance with your card. Wich is why when someone says I'm gonna gat a R4, everyone says no don't. We say don't because we want the user to be happy and enjoy their purchase. Users that are happy with their cards are less likely to clutter the forums with gripe threads about R4 won't load XXXX game or why did I buy an R4.

All of us here would rather help someone who is happy with their purchase and trying to learn than try to calm someone down from a rant before they will even listen.
In the end it all comes down to get a good card that you will be happy with. That already has all the features you want. Without haveing to use custom firmware and patches on tons of games to make them work and a support team that don't just poof away one day outta the blue.
This is why the R4 is disliked in my mind. Hope it helps.

I was about to post, but then I read this and found it summed up all the stuff I was going to say.

Just let me su up why I dislike the r4.

I won't go into the faults of the R4. For what it was made for, it performs reasonably well. It runs most games and homebrew, and gets the occasional updates from it's clone developers. But there are a couple problems.

It is even more expensive then superior karts like the Acekard. This makes it a bad choice as a purchase. That's why people will tell you you made a bad choice if you bought it. You could have gotten a better deal on something nicer.

The other reason is what it doesn't have. Look at the CycloDS. It has RTS, an in game text reader reader, full built in support for all the EX-Flash 3-in-1 features, full Wii compatibility, custom save paths, multiple saves, you can adjust the brightness from in game, an onboard firmware chip that makes it so that you don't need the firmware on the chip, a unique battery saver... the list goes on. Why would an educated user choose the R4 when you could get a card with all these sweet features? That's not to say the R4 is a horrible card. It does what it's supposed to. Run ROMs. But there are so many extra things you could do for a few dollars more, and a few extra things you could do for cheaper.

Yeah. That's my 2 cents.

 

[sgwiiboy]

Thanks to all for the really good replies and great info.

In all honesty, while I did do a fair bit of research I bought the R4 based on the fact that a friend had suggested this site based on his own experience www.r4cards.co.uk. The price was fair for the package I thought and most importantly it actually turned up and it worked. I think however, from doing a bit more reading into this, I am lucky I got one of the better R4 clones and things could have been very different.

I am now thinking I will give my daughter the DS and the R4 and I will buy myself another DS and plump for either a Cyclo or M3 but can't quite make my mind up. I realise the Cyclo is better but I really like the look of the M3 software.

 

[Midna]

The M3 really isn't bad. It has support for several firmwares with various advantages. They're really not too bad. It's a quality cart. But it just can't stand up to the Cyclo either. Personally, I (prefer the air) would go for the Cyclo. For the potential hundreds of dollars you save on pirating your games, an extra 20-30 dollars really shouldn't have any bearing on your purchase.

The CycloDS is a lot more convenient. But in the end if all you want to do is play the ROMs, do whatever you want.



On a completely unrelated note, I just HATE when people accept R4 as a synonym for flash cart. Some people at by school even call their TTDS' "R4s." Blarg.

 

[dalekdan10]

i use R4 there is nothing wrong with it, I only had a problem once where it deleted everything and i was gutted!!!

 

[Midna]

i use R4 there is nothing wrong with it, I only had a problem once where it deleted everything and i was gutted!!!

...

Usually a Dalek would be smarter than this.

 

[Deleted_171835]

Most people dislike people with the R4 becuase they are prejudiced. Most of the "noobs" in the homebrew world use the R4 as it is the most commonly known card. But that then creates a stereotype for all R4 users. Heck, half the people (members that come and leave) leave comments like "Doesn't work on r4" or "HELP. NO R4PATCH".

 

[granville]

1- R4 is extremely outdated and no longer supported by the official R4 team

2- due to this outdated nature, idiots join this forum for the single purposes of creating threads/comments bugging everyone about why their new rom doesn't work, and F5'ing the site to death (literally) in search for answers. Due to this, the site went down for many hours at a time just last week. And their questions are completely unnecessary and inappropriate due to the fact that their answers have been answered by the other 500 posts in the thread. Many of these people never post on the site again, their questions about R4 being their single post.

3- it's stupid when people suggest buying an r4 for NEW flashcard purchases, when it's clearly one of the worst cards you can buy nowadays. The best card is cheaper than it is and just has the best features available. Why would you recommend a more expensive one that doesn't work properly and gets no support over a cheaper one that gets the latest support and works with pretty much everything?

 

[azure0wind]

i think it's because there are SO MANY CLONES out there, so people start don't like R4 , anyway R4 is a great Flashkart

 

[Kittymat]

The R4 was great and that is the problem, all these other teams jump on the bandwagon and call their new card the

"R4 super dooper much better than the last one really official"

These are the current R4 cards
R4 DS (r4ds.com)
R4i RTS (r4rts.cn)
R4 i.l.s (r4li.com)
R4 SDHC (ndslr4.com / r4sdhc.com)
R4 SDHC (r4new.com)
R4 New (r4new.com)
R4-II (r4iids.com)
R4-III (r4dsl.net / r4iiinew.com / r4iii.com)
R4 Upgrade (r4dslnet / r4iiinew.com / r4iii.com)
R4-III (r4-dsl.net)
R4 Upgrade (r4-dsl.net)
R4 III SDHC (r4iiisdhc.com)
R4 Advance (r4ds-a.com / r4i-advance.com)
R4i Advance (r4ds-a.com / r4i-advance.com)
R4 Deluxe (r4deluxe.com)
R4i Deluxe (r4deluxe.com)
R4-New (r4-new.com)
R4 Plus (r4.ndsl.cc)
R4 Plus (r4plus.net)
R4 Pro (r4dspro.com)
R4 Team (r4team.com)
R4 Top (r4top.com)
R4-v (r4-v.com)
R4i-v (r4-v.com)
R4x (r4xds.com)
Gold R4i (r4ids.com)
Hyper-R4i (hyper4i.com)
Super R4i (super4i.com)
R4 Ultra (r4ultra.com)
R4i Ultra (r4ultra.com)
R4i (r4i.cn)
R4i II (r4i-sdhc.com.hk)
R4i Neo (r4neo.com)
R4i Pro Upgrade (r4ipro.com)
R4i-sdhc (r4i-sdhc.com)
R4 SDHC (r4-pro.com)
R4i Gold (r4-pro.com)
R4i Upgrade (ndsr4i.com)
R4i Pocket (r4ipocket.com)


So which one do you have

Ah the R4 gold - this one - Gold R4i(r4ids.com) OR this one - R4i Gold(r4-pro.com)

And there lies the problem, 100's of noobs conned into buying one every day and then trying to set them up not knowing what they really have.

So the R4 is not hated, just exploited!

 

[Langin]

guys thats an very big list... I had that r4 new clone... just so stupid bying that thing now I have an acekard2i and its an real one!
first I did started as all those why doent cheats work n00b with ezflash v but now I am happy with my account here!

 

[Dark^'^Knigh]

Most people dislike people with the R4 becuase they are prejudiced. Most of the "noobs" in the homebrew world use the R4 as it is the most commonly known card. But that then creates a stereotype for all R4 users. Heck, half the people (members that come and leave) leave comments like "Doesn't work on r4" or "HELP. NO R4PATCH".

OP 24 July 09 - effectively answered by 26 July 09.
Curious as to why short 'discussion' threads like this get dragged up for absolutely no apparent reason

 

[Splych]

- Outdated. Stopped updating...

- A lotta clones out there. It messed up people who got fake R4s. Causing their DS's to brick/break...

 

[Langin]

Ive searched for an new flashcard and the 50 frist sites I saw where from r4 clones!