EZ Flash/Save Management System

From Bibliotheca Anonoma

SMS (Savegame Management System) is the name given to the feature that the loaders of the EZFlash carts provide that enable you to back up (and restore) your savegame to the carts rom memory be it the NOR of the EZ1/2's or the NAND of the EZ3 all while in the GBA / GBA SP / Gameboy Micro / GBPlayer / DS.

It is available for all EZFlash products in both the GBA and DS loaders

To enable it in EZClient under the system config menu (or whatever menu you use to tell it to use the loader tell it/to alternate between DS or GBA if you have a translated version of EZClient). Make sure to format the memory section you are using for SMS in the appropriate tab (Savefile system setting by default), this is also the tab used to burn and read savefiles with EZClient.

EZ3 and EZ4 users SMS or its close equivalent is part of the way the loaders work so you should not have to do anything.

As stated above it allows you to have your savegames be stored on your carts rom memory as opposed to the battery backed SRAM. This enables you to do a few things:

  • Save a game as a backup all without the use of a PC and linker.
  • Save a game and explore a different path (a choice of characters/skills in an RPG for instance) and restore later if you do not like what you see.
  • Use in conjunction with softreset to reset a game back the loader and then save the game if you have a bad battery and do not want/cannot replace it.

EZ1/2 and SMS[edit]

SMS is available to you when you are in the loader for your cart and is used by certain combinations of keys to load, restore and delete. Press L while in the loader to get a screen with all the required button combinations for it.

 L + A = Restore save from SMS section
 L + B = Save to SMS section
 Select = Delete save in SMS
 Start = Check status of save in SMS ( useless )
 * All require time to take action (a couple of seconds usually).

*SMS is NOT flawless (does not keep track of memories , especial when you delete save SMS from pc ) so you do run a risk of losing your savegames when using it: Mr Driller 2 on GBA for instance does not work with it, on the whole it works fine though.

EZ3 and SMS[edit]

When starting EZPDA after playing a game there will be a save file in the RAM, a message will pop up and write the save file to NAND section, if you would rather not write the save to the NAND press L to stop/prevent the save backup process. Additionally the current save in RAM may be saved to any position *.s01-*.s99 by entering the EZ-disk manager section or the save folder and pressing L + R at the same time then scroll with the controll pad to the position you wish and press A. In this way you can have up to 100 saves for each ROM! (or until NAND is full). To start your ROM with a particular save simply go to the EZ-disk manager and into save folder scroll to the save you want and press A. The save will be loaded into RAM. Then you just start the ROM as normal, and it will be playing that file. But a word of caution, it WILL NOT save over the save you picked by itself! It will try to save over the original .sav file! If you press L during startup, however, and then go to the folder that contains the .sxx (where xx is the number) file is, you can save over it by giving the new save the same filename.