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[mxmike]

Hey everybody, I am sad to admit but I am a total noob! when it comes to the DS and it's hardware.  But, I am a long time C++ application and game programmer and I am really serious about developing for the DS.  So I guess I have some really dumb questions.   What is the deal with PassMe?  Why do we need a card that ports other cards?  Why isn't there a dock that connects to your PC where you can write directly to standard DS cards? (sorry not used to the terminology yet.) I would just write over games that I don't like.  And if there is a such a dock (that perhaps no one has due to price or whatever) is it possible to read the cards and see whats on them, or is there a special encryption?  How are the cards formatted? I guess that's all I need right now.  I know it's a lot.  Please send me links to docs and stuff.

[sneef]

when you say "standard DS cards" do you mean retail game cards?  if so, they are not programmable.  ROM only.   There is a DS card-sized flash-based backup device being developed called Ultra flashpass, but it has yet to be shipped.  And it seems to be simply a nopass with its own onboard flash (NOR or NAND, not sure)..  It has a "dock" like you mentioned.

As far as reading the cards to see what's on them, you can do that on the DS hardware itself, running a homebrew app from the GBA slot, checking or dumping the data on the DS card.  

yes,there is encryption on the cards.

The whole point of the Passme is that the DS comes with the hardware to read GBA carts, and there are already lots of existing GBA flash-based carts, so the easiest way to get your own data (homebrew or backup) to be read by the DS in DS Mode is to somehow pass the code requests from the DS slot to the GBA slot, and read from the above-mentioned GBA flash cart.  Hence, the passme.

sorry no links.. i just woke up.. hope this sort of answers the surface level of your questions.. i'll try to be more helpful later. heh..

[mxmike]

thanks that answers a lot!

[mxmike]

Assuming of course that you haven't flashed your firmare.  Do you have to mimic the encryption for the hardware to even pick up your software?  I want to write code that will be native to the DS system so that users wont need to change anything on their ds system, if it's even possible.  Do official Nintendo developers use special developing software to create the games for the DS?   I hope my questions aren't too vauge.  Like I mentioned I am really new to the DS lingo and the whole process of writing code to and running code on GBA carts... etc..

[mxmike]

I saw a web page that claims to be selling the card with dock set that you mentioned but the site seems a little ify if you know what I mean. Here is a link

http://minionlinestore.com/

The poor descriptions, images and paypal payment section makes me question the ligitimacy of the site.  And there seems to be no mention that it is not avaliable as of yet.

There seems to be so many products and lots of different claims of capabilities.  What do the Nintendo developers use to write to the cards for testing?

[sneef]

from what i understand, early nintendo development kits were like modified GBA hardware.. i'm not really sure what they use now... but as far as the ultra flashpass thing, that link you found is the actual main "supplier".. they have been around on ioffer.com as well.  a sizeable group of people have all ordered and paid for their sets, and nobody has received them yet.. but they aren't a total scam site.  They do really ship items people pay for.  I just think there was too much wishful thinking on their part, in regards to the release date of the flashpass.

anyway, i'm not really sure how the RSA encryption is implemented on DS games.. probably some people on gbadev.org might be able to point you in the right direction with that..

[fattybumbum]

I have ordered the flash pass and hope to get it next week. MiniOnline are reputable so far I have ordered and recieved from them before. I will rite a review when I get it.