MK5 GIGA cart 8G version Review
Supplier - IC2005 - Neoflash
A few weeks ago i recieved the new MK5 Giga Cart 8G version from Neoflash to review, my apologies but im very late with it, with all the news i post and judging comps and running websites it leaves little time to get moving on reviews.
Now ive said this before but its always best to state it again, i am no tech head when it comes to Flash Carts, im not a developer im just a normal fan who wants to know that the flash cart works, saves work, i can play Homebrew and Emulators, i can play my own backups of games i own and that the process is easy to do and understand.
First off heres a look at the flash cart
http://nintendo-ds.dcemu.co.uk/mk5_giga-05.jpg
The GBA size cart is your linker and sits in the slot 2 GBA port, you will need to have a Mini USB Lead, you do not get one of them in the pack so if you havent already got one, then youll need one. the other cart is your Flash Cartridge which stores your files, think of it as an hard drive for your Nintendo DS.
Ok heres the specs as printed on the official site/shop:
* Support clean rom,not need any patch,just need drag and drop
* Huge memory space,from 8Gbit upto 64Gbit
* USB 2.0 high-speed data transfer
* USB disk function, compatible with any operation system
* Build in the last moonshell V1.5 and upgradable
* Support homebrew
* Build in SMS multi save function,and auto save
* Menu upgradable,just need drag and drop the new core to MK5
* Multi rom support,media play support
* MK5 turbo engin, 100% full game running speed ,without any delay
* Build in passme function,can boot almost GBA flash cart perfectly
Getting the ball rolling
Before i start this works on all revisions of DS/DS Lite to stop those questions later. First off i put the Slot 1 Flash Cart into the DS and turned it on. The flashcart displayed a screen like this:
http://nintendo-ds.dcemu.co.uk/mk5_giga-01.jpg
Now thankfully there was already several homebrew roms on there DS Organise being the main one that will interest you, think of it as a personal organiser for the DS and thats a fair description of it. Theres also a few games too a great little Tetris type game.
The screen that greets you is full of 3d icons of each game/app on your DS Flash Cart. Personally i dont think the 3D icons work great but its probably just my taste.
Roms for Homebrew and Back Ups of your own Commercial games are in .nds format so no horrid file conversion that plagues some cards, i remember the messing about with my first supercard, it was damn annoying having to convert files.
Sticking extra files on the cart was very easy, with both carts in the DS, firstly turn on and youll notice some text with USB mentioned. Then close the lid into standby mode and insert the USB Mini Cable into the GBA/Slot 2 cart and the other end into a USB port on your PC. If you have a USB 2.0 port then thats all the better.
When the cable was inserted right away it flashed up with another drive in windows, no messing around whatsoever. I grabbed a few roms both Homebrew and Commercial (Copies of my own games) and they transferred over to the DS very fast. The only downer with the cart is that GBA Games/Homebrew is not playable on this flash cart. (you will need a seperate GBA Flash Cart).
Anyway once the files are on your cart, disconnect from the PC and turn off your DS and take out the Slot2/linker. Now reboot with just the flash cart (ie the normal DS looking cart).
You will then see a screen with 3d icons on the bottom, a neat touch is that you can scroll trhough your files with your stylus, starting the games/apps is as easy as tapping the icon of choice. Before i forget one tep on each icon brings up information on the top screen of size and save info etc.
Roms loaded very fast and because its a clean boot ie no converting compatability should be extremely high.
Conclusion
An extremely easy to use Flash Cart that will please Homebrew Users new and old. No converting means simple downloading of NDS files and transfer to flash cart. You dont get instructions but to be fair its quite simple to use for beginners, trust me if i can use it then you can :D. The memory of the cart isnt upgradeable but to be fair theirs plenty of storage for most users so not really a problem. Another great thing is that compatability is excellent for both homebrew and your backups. You do lose GBA compatability but every slot 1 cart does.
Finally the price is a treat at US$49.00 from IC2005
For the price one of if not the best flash cart for DS at this time. Well done Neoflash.
