flash cart/copier question

[Soviet Conscript]

ok i currently have a few import games and am thinking about aquireing a few more unfortuniatly i don't speak any japanese so i would like to play a translated patched rom of my games and i also don't want to go through the hassle of replaceing batteries for saveing. i also would like to play these games on the origional hardware as opposed to an emulator (pc or xbox or whatever). i'm mostly intrested in doing this for snes and genesis games. would these let me do it?

Doctor SF7 (64M) for NTSC SFC for snes
and
MD-PRO 64M flash Card plus kit for Genesis/MegaDrive for genisis

thanks

[shadowkn55]

I know for sure that the Game Doctor SF7 will let you play translated games. You can also backup your save file to floppy with it also.

[madman77]

Yea, both of those products will allow you to do that. The SF7 is a great little unit.

[norkusa]

Is the SF7 anything like thie SFIII? I had a SFIII once but couldn't use it because it wouldn't play .SMC format roms. They had to be converted to SFIII format with an ancient command line app that I had no idea how to use, so I ended up selling it.

[shadowkn55]

The sf7 is an upgraded version of the sf3. Stay away from the sf3 unless you plan on collecting them. The sf7 will still need the roms converted to its own format using ucon64.

[madman77]

The easiest thing to do is use the parallel port, you can send .SMC files directly and ucon will convert the files as they are sent.

[Jorpho]

Is the SF7 anything like thie SFIII? I had a SFIII once but couldn't use it because it wouldn't play .SMC format roms. They had to be converted to SFIII format with an ancient command line app that I had no idea how to use, so I ended up selling it.

http://ucon64.sourceforge.net , natch.

[Soviet Conscript]

ok so now i have both

Doctor SF7 (64M) for NTSC SFC for snes
and
MD-PRO 64M flash Card plus kit for Genesis/MegaDrive for genisis

but i have a few questions. the SF7 needs a power supply. its rated for a
9v DC and 850 Ma now the power supply i have for it converts ac to 9v dc but its 800 Ma. i have no idea what the Ma thing is after the voltage number you get. is being 50 off a big deal and should i get anouther adaptor thats is rated 9v dc and 850 Ma or higher?

question 2. my flash cart. the cart itself works fine. there were some games on it and it plays perfect in my genisis. thing is i can't get it talking to any of my computers to flash diffrent games or remove games. i bought the M/F USB power adaptor for it. i have the dream writer (genisis) program for it that is downloadable from Tototek and i set my parallel port for EPP mode in my BIOS settings. thing is i couldn't find a 25bn M - 25bn M parallel cable anywhere. not target not walmart not office max not radio shack. i'm hoping they have them at compusa thing is the closest one is a bit of a drive from me. i've been useing a 25bn M - 25bn F with an adaptor in the F end to make it M.

so my question is do you guys think the cable is my problem and i should get a stright 25bn M - 25bn M (hopefully if they have one at compusa) or is there a step i'm missing in getting my comp to to EPP mode with the parallel port? like i said i set the port to EPP in my startup BIOS but maybe theres anouther step?

any help would be appricated. thanks

[shadowkn55]

mA stands for milliamps. The gd7 has a pretty generous tolerances of mA it can take. Your power supply should work just fine.

[Soviet Conscript]

mA stands for milliamps. The gd7 has a pretty generous tolerances of mA it can take. Your power supply should work just fine.

thanks for the info Shadow

can anyone help with question 2?

[rbudrick]

It is absolutely necessary to have a straight thru- 25 pin to 25 pin M-M cable.

-Rob

[Sweater Fish Deluxe]

I don't see any reason why a male to female cable with an adpter on the female end wouldn't work. His problem is probably actually that his parallel cable doesn't carry all the pins. Most parallel cables that I see only pass specific pins, just the ones used by printers, most likely, since that's what 95% of parallel cables used to be for. With backup units, though, you need to have more pins connected than you need for a printer, so it's crucial that you get a parallel cable that carries all 25 lines.

You might check thrift stores, I see parallel cables there pretty frequently. Of course, at a thrift store you can't be absolutely sure that you're getting a proper parallel cable with all 25 lines connected, but just look for the very fattest cable you can find (more than a cm thick) and it'll probably be the right one.

I used to use nothing but a female-to-female extension adapter with my Neo Geo Pocket flash linker and that was very handy and I also think I got faster writes with it. That setup may not work with the Genesis cart, though.


...word is bondage...

[Soviet Conscript]

well, heres the cable i ordered

http://www.compusa.com/redir?cab=50050732

hopefully it will work

[rbudrick]

I don't see any reason why a male to female cable with an adpter on the female end wouldn't work.

Right, I didn't mean to indicate that wouldn't work. I only meant the end result had to be M-M and straight thru. On some cables, a couple pins are crossed, and that's no good for copiers.

-Rob

[Soviet Conscript]

well, i'm starting to get annoyed

i just got a switchbox cable DB25 m / DB25 male. 25 conductor, straight-through and still nothing

i'm starting to think its the acual unit and not the parallel cable. i set the comp to EPP in BIOS and the port is correct but it just will not detect. i know the cart is ok so i'm pretty much at a loss

either the transfer unit thing is busted or its still the cable. or i'm just doing something totally wrong.

as long as its hooked up MD flash diagnostic should detect it right? cause i'm just getting cart not found.

anyways thanks for the help guys.

[Sweater Fish Deluxe]

You may also need t set the I/O address. If there's a setting for it in the program, check to make sure that it matches your actual hardware's setting for the LPT port (you should be able to find it under Windows hardware config if it's not in your BIOS). If there's no setting in the program that you can find, then make sure your LPT port is set at 0378 as that's the most commonly used, I think.

If that doesn't work, then yes, there's a good chance the writer is defective.

Oh, are you sure you're using a powered USB port to power the writer? USB hubs and the USB ports on the front of a computer are generally not powered.


...word is bondage...

[Soviet Conscript]

yhea, looks like the writer is defective

i've tried 2 diffrent usb cables on all my computers usb ports inculdeing a second computer. you can set the I/O address in my BOIS and i confirmed it was on EPP 378, i even tried changing the address just to see but still nothing. i made sure the address was also the same in the software but like i said, nothing. and i'm fairly sure this is the correct parallel cable as well.

know anywhere i can get a writer cheap? the flash card itself seems to work fine and i'm assumeing the bulk of the cost is with the card.