Determining Action Replay Plus version (Vampire Saviour compatibility etc.)

[Drenholm]

Hi,

Although I don't, and may never, have any of the games that are affected by the "problem" with the older version of the Action Replay cart (which is fixable by a mod, I know), I'd be curious to see which camp (old or new) my cartridge falls into.

Is there any way of telling without having to test the affected games?

Thanks.

 

[antime]

Write a program that prints the cartridge ID value on screen. If it reports a 1MB cart but you're certain it's a 4MB one then it's faulty. The program could also test the amount of RAM in the cart by writing and reading back data.

 

[Drenholm]

Thanks for the suggestion, but I wish I knew how to write a program . . . =( Maybe later!

Well, the page does say "[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]1M/4M expansion RAM (supports all 4M RAM games)", so is this a good indication that it is the revised model? As I said, I'm not really too worried at this point; I'm just curious.

http://search.ebay.com/250076906864

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[ExCyber]

Well, the page does say "[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]1M/4M expansion RAM (supports all 4M RAM games)", so is this a good indication that it is the revised model?[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Not really, but as far as I know the old ones have gotten progressively rarer over the years.

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[Drenholm]

Thanks. So you think I will probably have a newer one? As I said, I may never play the affected games; I just get paranoid about stuff like this. =D

 

[cgfm2]

There's nothing really wrong with the old ones AFAIK; the 4-in-1 has 4MB of RAM but early versions returned the 1MB ID, the newer version returned the 4MB ID.

Some RAM carts are sold with a switch so you can pick which one. This is important because some 1MB games will not run with a 4MB cart. The 4-in-1 does not have this.

The modification that NCS listed was to fix the old type models to always have the 4MB ID.

Regardless of which one that you have, you'd probably want to add a switch to pick which ID is available. Or do what I did and buy two, with one modded for 1MB mode and the other left in 4MB mode.

 

[Drenholm]

Thanks for the info. Here is the word from the seller themselves:

[FONT=Arial, Verdana]These are latest version and include all 4M game support (checked), haven't updated the listings but also latest version no longer has the PC link port pictured on the packaging, as it is obsolete (with the ISA PC link cards no longer around).

I find the statement about the removal of the port interesting, as I did not know that the cart was being developed that late (although my knowledge about the ISA>PCI migration is almost none).

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[gameofyou1]

Yes, I have noticed this also, that certain retailers are selling new ARP cartridges that do NOT have the 25-pin data port. I have asked NCSX about this and their response was:

"yes we confirm the batch of AR4M that we stock have the port connector on top. The versions that do not have the port are likely clone cartridges from unauthorized manufacturers in China. All of the versions of the AR4M that were manufactured by EMS have the port on top."

So, contact the seller before buying a new cart, to make sure it has the data port (if you need to use it).

Thanks for the info. Here is the word from the seller themselves:

I find the statement about the removal of the port interesting, as I did not know that the cart was being developed that late (although my knowledge about the ISA>PCI migration is almost none).

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[Drenholm]

Hm, maybe I got pwned by a spoof item . . . Will wait 'til my much-awaited Street Fighter Alpha 2 and its 4MB RAM requirement arrives to check if this cartridge actually fully works!

I suppose I'll try and eventually pick up a proper, ported cartridge, for posterity if nothing else. Thanks for your reply and interesting info.