Where can I buy a GBA flashcart that is for like 2-4 rom/fan games?

[ItsProbablyNOTMe]

Preferably not one of those with an SD card or huge storage of games (but if that's all there is then I'll try it maybe.

Preferrably some or for GBA, GBC and gb all possible on one cart

 

[Kwyjor]

Preferrably some or for GBA, GBC and gb all possible on one cart

That's not really possible. GBA and GB/GBC carts operate at entirely different voltages. At best, you can get a GBA cartridge that runs GB and GBC games using the Goomba emulator – which is fine, really, and practically indistinguishable from what you would get with an actual GB and GBC flashcart.

Anyway, it is possible to re-flash some pirate GBA carts in a DS Lite using https://github.com/nflsilva/nds-gbabf , though I'm not clear as to exactly how you would identify a suitable pirate GBA cart or even if it would be substantially cheaper.

And really, unless you can get something like that for cheap, there's really no reason not to go with a proper cart with an SD card slot.

 

[ItsProbablyNOTMe]

I had to delete the quote/reply you did because GBA temp had an on-screen error/pop-up about url links and spam (there's a link in your reply).

I am not wanting to download an emulator and so much and too much information about roms and emulators, instead, what is a proper cart for gba games with SD card?

I just want to play the cart in my gba sp

 

[Nikokaro]

Many would recommend, not without bias, the EZ-Flash Omega, but personally, if you allow me, I would suggest a Supercard Micro SD ( 2 gb micro SD). It all depends on what titles you are interested in. I have owned it now for 5 years and I am satisfied with it: for example all FEUniverse (Fire Emblem) hacks and all the Doom (PrBoom) wads ported to GBA (that you find on this site) work perfectly and flawlessly as also all gba titles fantranslated into english.

The only annoyance is that you have to patch roms with its pc software. But in case of problems with some title I could help you fix it (with fast-restart, prefetch patcher or other tricks).
In addition to normal saves it is possible to use save-states, cheat codes, software resets etc.

Regarding where to buy it, in Europe you can find it on eBay, Amazon and Aliexpress.

Opinion drawn from personal experience; no useless controversy, thank you.

 

[FAST6191]

I would generally suggest anything but the GBA slot supercards unless you already know they work with the games and hacks you care about -- them, their clones and some of the very first carts are the only things to suffer slowdowns beyond what was present in the original game (may or may not trouble a given game, and what is there needs extra patching which may trouble hacks). Or if you prefer they have not been made since about 2009 at the latest and there is a reason you can still find them despite GBA flash carts getting kind of rare at one point before EZFlash came back and everdrive appeared on the GBA scene.


Anyway yeah multiROM GBA cart is harder to do with cheapo flash carts or hoping you get a repro that is programmable -- unlike some older systems and some optical drive based systems it is a non trivial task to stack multiple GBA games together for something not built to handle it*. Easier to get a proper flash cart and many of those will be available for less than even some of the middling desirable games.

*this would also mean the EZ 3 in 1 outside of a very specific beta kernel for the EZ5 which is the choice of some wanting a cheap means of playing GBA games if they have a DS/DS lite and DS flash cart to handle it.

 

[Kwyjor]

I have an EZ-Flash IV, myself. It's ancient, but still generally works fine. (The worst thing about it is that it is the only device I've ever owned that uses "mini" SD cards, which is something completely different from micro SD.)

 

[RAHelllord]

Personally I would definitely recommend proper flash carts with SD card in it, mostly because the other kind isn't really produced any more and compatibility is spotty, or if you do get the proper made ones you will pay nearly as much as what the more fancy EZ-Flash or Everdrives would cost.

For example, insideGadgets makes really good ones:

- GB, 4MB, 128kb FRAM Flash, supports a few mappers:
https://shop.insidegadgets.com/product/gameboy-4mb-128kb-fram-flash-cart-low-power/ - $43

- GBA, 32MB, FRAM Save:
https://shop.insidegadgets.com/product/gameboy-4mb-128kb-fram-flash-cart-low-power/ - $35

To actually flash the games you will also need a flasher:
https://shop.insidegadgets.com/product/gbxcart-rw/ - $30

All prices without shipping or import fees (they are made and ship from Australia).
BennVenn also makes similar things, and prices are similar as well.

Downsides to those things: Compatibility is nowhere near as good as either any of the EverDrives or EZ-Flash carts, you have to keep track of more things (flasher + carts), you can only have one game on it unless you modify the roms.
Advantages over ED / EZ-Flash: Much better battery life, true plug and play once they're flashed, no menus or similar to deal with.

For romhacks in particular I would recommend either a cheap EverDrive (GB X3 for GameBoy, GBA doesn't have a "cheap" one) or the EZ-Flash Jr and Omega. Their much better compatibility and ability to handle all types of save formats means you can easily get them to work even if the programmer did something funky with their hacks, and you can just update the romhacks by plugging the SD card into your computer and dragging the files over.
If you have to pick one over the other, I would suggest going with an EverDrive GBA Mini or EZ-Flash Omega DE, and between the two whichever is either cheaper for you in particular or has the features you care about more. The ED GBA Mini takes a bit less power to run than the Omega DE and thus will allow your battery to last longer, if that's relevant to you.

The Goomba Emulator is also preinstalled on both the ED GBA Mini and the EZ Omega DE, the GB/C games are all drag and drop for those two as well and you don't have to worry about anything. Only downside is some games sound weird and compatibility with GBC games is spotty, for example Link's Awakening the water fall sound is atrocious via Goomba Color and Pokemon Crystal just will not work correctly at all. The ED GB or EZ-Flash Jr will not have those issues at all.

EDIT: I am using some of the insideGadgets flash carts, and particularly the flasher to backup my saves on real carts, but I would only recommend them if you know for a fact they are a good fit for your needs. Support is above and beyond any other company I've dealt with before so I can highly recommend them, but again only if you know for a fact the products do what you want them to. If you have questions Alex, the owner, has an open Discord server and he and other people there are very helpful when it comes to questions about the products or if you've found a new a problem.

 

[metroid maniac]

This really depends on the ROMs you want. Like has been pointed out, a supercard or a reproduction cart might be suitable in specific narrow cases but you need to check what the ROMs are in advance.

 

[Hanafuda]

I have an EZ-Flash IV, myself. It's ancient, but still generally works fine. (The worst thing about it is that it is the only device I've ever owned that uses "mini" SD cards, which is something completely different from micro SD.)

i'm still using the EZ IV too. Mine's also a mini-sd, I've got a microsd in it with adapter. But yeah, load times are annoying on bigger games, but ... it works.

 

[ItsProbablyNOTMe]

What is flashing a game and how do i flash a game? I've not done this myself before

Post automatically merged: Dec 18, 2022

Preferably not one of those with an SD card or huge storage of games (but if that's all there is then I'll try it maybe.

Preferrably some or for GBA, GBC and gb all possible on one cart

Thanks for replying.

If it is possible, can everyone post an image of the cart they're referring to? There's many different versions of an item and sometimes a different one for a different system/console/handheld and I am not always certain which one is "that one" someone is mentioning in a reply/post

Are there any that do what is needed easily without using/me having to use an SD card?

 

[Kwyjor]

What is flashing a game and how do i flash a game?

"Flashing" a chip just means writing new data to it. In the case of the aforementioned pirate carts, you would flash them by using the program I linked to. Period.

An "EZ-Flash" cartridge, despite the name, doesn't really have anything to do with flashing. It just contains its own chips that it can flash using software on the cartridge directly rather than requiring another program running on a DS Lite. This is all completely hidden from the end user – you pretty much just put your ROM files on the SD card, insert the SD card into the cartridge, and then select your file from a menu.

If it is possible, can everyone post an image of the cart they're referring to? There's many different versions of an item and sometimes a different one for a different system/console/handheld and I am not always certain which one is "that one" someone is mentioning in a reply/post

What do you mean..? If you want a cartridge for GBA games, then obviously you're going to want a GBA flash cart.

Are there any that do what is needed easily without using/me having to use an SD card?

The answer to that question has already been supplied. Is there something specific that you do not understand? Because there's no point in repeating what has already been written.

What exactly do you have against SD cards, anyway? They're cheap.

 

[hxjudge]

Many would recommend, not without bias, the EZ-Flash Omega, but personally, if you allow me, I would suggest a Supercard Micro SD ( 2 gb micro SD). It all depends on what titles you are interested in. I have owned it now for 5 years and I am satisfied with it: for example all FEUniverse (Fire Emblem) hacks and all the Doom (PrBoom) wads ported to GBA (that you find on this site) work perfectly and flawlessly as also all gba titles fantranslated into english.

The only annoyance is that you have to patch roms with its pc software. But in case of problems with some title I could help you fix it (with fast-restart, prefetch patcher or other tricks).
In addition to normal saves it is possible to use save-states, cheat codes, software resets etc.

Regarding where to buy it, in Europe you can find it on eBay, Amazon and Aliexpress.

Opinion drawn from personal experience; no useless controversy, thank you.

Hey can you point me in the direction of all these prboom wads for GBA, thx

 

[Nikokaro]

Hey can you point me in the direction of all these prboom wads for GBA, thx

https://gbatemp.net/threads/gba-doom-wad-conversions-open-for-suggestions.586037/