flash cart doesn't work

[JruASAP]

hello, I need some help.
I ordered a flash cart from www.ic2005.com the first week of june and exchanged it because it didn't work.  I was able to get ROMs onto the cart (I tested them with other emulators and they worked just fine) but they either wouldn't load up at all, or loaded up and were extremely glitchy and crash/freeze.  Every game also tended to freeze at the same point every time (ie. blazing lasers lets you play a bit of the level, then freezes, but bomberman '93 freezes as soon as you try to start a match)  So I received my second cart and it has the exact same problem, ROMs may or may not load up, and if they do they don't work.  I am very tired of dealing with ic2005 because the guy swears up and down that he tested both carts (the one I sent back and the one he sent to me) and claims that they work and I'm doing something wrong.  I actually asked him for a refund several times and he hasn't answered me.  So if you guys could help me to get the cart working it would really help.

I have a United States Turbografx-16 (with the CD attachment if that makes a difference)

I have tried using both the beta OS X program, the old program included on the CD, and the new program that was just released.  I have tried formatting the card (low level and standard) with the new program, I have a converter to play Japanese PC-Engine games on the USA system and have tried formatting the cart as a PC-Engine cart and playing it through the converter which didn't work, it had the same problem.  I have tried japanese roms, USA roms, PAL European ROMS, but none seem to work.  I am convinced that the guy at ic2005 is lying to me and that this cart is defective (for all I know he sent me back the same cart I tried to exchange, after all, it has the exact same problem), but I figured it was worth a shot asking you guys for help.

I tried to be as detailed as possible in this post, but if you need to know anything else please ask.

Thanks for anyone who tries to help me!

[Conle]

Well sounds like the cart is defective , and since you said that they sent back the same cart its most likely the case.
Did you tell them to actually do a quick playthrough of a few games and not just load them to the game intro screen for example/?

[Dr.neo]

i just check this case with ic2005 sales team,here is the answer:
[1] your send back the first cart is can run, they copy full japanese games to it ,and test every games on japan version PC-E, all working fine.
[2] then they pick up on new pc-e flash cart (not the same one you send back), and did the same testing: format and copy the japanese games up to the full memory, and test on japan pc-e one by one, to make sure this cart is 100% work able exactly, then ship back to you.
[3] about the burn program, because your console is tg-16,so you need use the old app to burn : the v1.1 Save APP, download address:  http://www.neoflash.com/download/pce_save/Neo_Power_PCE_Writer_V1.1_SAVE_APP.rar
don't use the last 1.03,because you need choose the "TG-16" option before you burn it,but the new 1.03 app don't haev this option yet,that's why you can't run any rom. 

here is one test rom ,please try, it's 100% workable.

[mic_]

don't use the last 1.03,because you need choose the "TG-16" option before you burn it,but the new 1.03 app don't haev this option yet,that's why you can't run any rom. 

Isn't the european TG16 just an american unit with different  video output (and input voltage)?
I use Manager v1.03 to burn games to my Neo PC-E card, and they work on my european TG16, as long as I set the region to "USA" when adding the games.

One problem with the Manager though, is that it doesn't remove the 512-byte header that some PCE ROMs have. But that doesn't seem to be JruASAP's problem, because then the games wouldn't have started at all.

[Dr.neo]

I use Manager v1.03 to burn games to my Neo PC-E card, and they work on my european TG16, as long as I set the region to "USA" when adding the games.

yes JruASAP do you select the "USA" version when you burn the games?

[JruASAP]

ok,  so I've tried some of your suggestions and still cannot get this cart to work.

First off, The older 1.1 program does not detect the cart, it says "connection fault".  I tried reinstalling the old drivers off the cd that came from ic2005, but it cannot detect it.

Neo2 Manager still detects the cart, so I tried using your "Timeball" rom, making sure that I am formatting the cart as USA and it doesn't work.  After I select the game the screen goes black, I am able to use the reset button on the cart to get back to the menu, but that's it.

[mic_]

ok,  so I've tried some of your suggestions and still cannot get this cart to work.

First off, The older 1.1 program does not detect the cart, it says "connection fault".  I tried reinstalling the old drivers off the cd that came from ic2005, but it cannot detect it.

Neo2 Manager still detects the cart, so I tried using your "Timeball" rom, making sure that I am formatting the cart as USA and it doesn't work.  After I select the game the screen goes black, I am able to use the reset button on the cart to get back to the menu, but that's it.

So when you highlight any of the games you've burned in the Neo2 Manager, it shows "USA" as the region in the information fields on the right-hand side?
And there's not a single game that loads/runs successfully? They all freeze?

If you look at the .pce files you're using in a hex editor, do the first 512 bytes in the files contain mostly zeroes? If that's the case then they most likely have a header, and you'll need to remove it.

If you know that you're already using headerless ROMs, and you're burning the ROMs using the correct region, and your TurboGrafx works fine when playing original HuCards, then yeah; it does sound like the flash card (or slimloader) is faulty. Good luck sorting that out with ic2005 though. I wasn't even able to get hold of a human being when I wanted to contact them..

[Dr.neo]

i can sure it's not the neo pc-e cart hardware issue, the ic2005 sales team have burn full pc-e roms in it and full test one by one to make sure it's 100% working well before ship.
so i think you should get other one pc-e console to test again if possible.

[spelosi]

The quality of his card could very well be dodgy.

I just got one yesterday and its quality is suspect.

I've spent 10 hours trying to get this thing working consistently and have so far failed.

the best I've gotten is 37 of 40 roms working. Keep in mind all these roms have worked at one time or another. The failures are random.

I can't get any street fighter 2 rom working. they freeze the loader, freeze at black screen, load and have yellow background with garbled sprites. The closest to having it work I've come is perfect  background with garbled sprites.

I'm beginning to think my card is defective.

[spelosi]

Now my flash cart is only reporting 63/128MB available after a low level format...

Anyone else experience this?

I think it's time to send it back.

Steve

[mic_]

Regarding the wrong game sometimes starting..  did you make sure to remove the header? I.e. that your .pce files are exact multiples of 1024 bytes before you burn them? If some of them still have headers you could get that issue depending on the order in which the ROMs are burned. IIRC I had that issue in the past, as well as games that didn't start up properly. And that was because some of them had headers.

[spelosi]

Mic,

When you say "remove the header" do you mean the "SNES header" on Japanese games? If so then yes. If not, I need an education.

I'm very disappointed to have lost half my flash memory. I really would love this cart if it worked properly though, so I am going to get a replacement.

Steve

[Conle]

It would be cool if neoflash release a brand new PCE flashcart to match the same level of quality of N64/MD/SNES flashcarts and of course with SD support 
Loading games from the SD solves 95%(Minus %5 because you have to burn the menu once  ) of the issues reported 

[mic_]

It would be cool if neoflash release a brand new PCE flashcart to match the same level of quality of N64/MD/SNES flashcarts and of course with SD support

Someone would have to port the diskio and FAT stuff to the HuC6280, and that might be a lot of work. There's a C compiler available called HuC, but I don't know how well it works or how efficient the code it generates is.

[spelosi]

Mic,

Can you help me with the header removal? I did a search but I didn't see much.

Thanks.

Steve