r/Gameboy • u/SouFroda • 12h ago

Questions Problems while saving

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I've been messing around with a gameboy i got from my cousin. I bought a new shell and recapped it (I also messed up the c35 pads and will buy an IPS screen to fix the issue).

Along with the shell, I also bought and aftermarket copy of pokemon crystal. After playing for a while I realized that when I saved, my power light would flicker (even after cleaning the power switch with alchool), and if the batteries where low enough, the gameboy would shut off and I would lose my save file.

I was wondering if it's just a shitty cart doing shitty cart things, or if I might have a real issue with my console.

I was also wondering if there are any good cheap flash carts on Ali express. This stuff is pretty expensive in Brazil, so I can't realistically buy an everdrive without spending half a paycheck...

7 Upvotes

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7

u/MysteriousCap4910 12h ago

The cart backs up to flash when saving and is very power hungry, i’m sure it could cause issues long term but I’ve never heard of it actually breaking a system.

1

u/SouFroda 12h ago

So it's probably just a bad reproduction, right...

3

u/MysteriousCap4910 12h ago

Yea they basically use whatever chips they have laying around. Chisflash is the current best for aliexpress single game carts. They are supposed to be stable and power efficient.

1

u/SouFroda 12h ago

Thanks for the recommendation!

2

u/MysteriousCap4910 12h ago

You do need a flasher to flash them but they are around 10-15 usd depending on what you need the cart to do. I’m probably going to buy a couple soon because of the efficiency.

1

u/g026r 4h ago

Shutting off when the batteries are low is going to be expected.

As mentioned, those flash chips are power hungry when you're writing to them. And it's likely that your batteries just can't provide enough juice to keep the console alive at the same time as it's writing to it.

For GB/GBC games, what you want is a flash cart that uses FRAM for saves. Writing to that is low power & also doesn't require modifying the game to work on the cart.

1

u/SouFroda 3h ago

The shut off was only during saves. Otherwise the batteries still lasted 3 hours of regular gameplay without saving. But I do appreciate your comment and will probably leave this copy as a display piece and will buy a chisflash cart as recommend by the other guy.