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  M3 DS Simply Official Review - Read the ...cial review inside.
Posted by Vaskituh on Wed, January 10th, 2007 at 22:49 - 40 Comments
 
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Vaskituh Portugal

 


Introduction & Packaging



The M3 DS Simply is made by the same creators of M3 Perfect, basically the team one of the leading manufacturers.

The M3 DS Simply comes in a package made out of cardboard, it has the symbol of the M3 in it, and shows in transparency the actual M3 DS Simply, and the Micro SD/TF Usb Reader that are inside the box. The back of the box shows all the features that the M3 DS Simply has.

  • Same Size as an original cart
  • Build in PassMe
  • Using Micro SD/TransFlash as external storage
  • Boot clean dumps
  • Super simple to use, drag and drop to the Micro SD/TF
  • No drivers necessary
  • Standard FAT system support
  • Support different speed of Micro SD/TF
  • Upgradable firmware
  • Touch screen control & robust skinning support
  • No need battery, back up the save file into the Micro SD/TF card directly
  • Auto detect the save type & automatically creates save
  • Homebrew support, IO Lib released
  • Direct watch movies, listen to Mp3 & read on the DS using the MoonShell


Sounds good enough, lets see if the M3 Simply does all that and maybe more ?


Hardware



The M3 DS Simply is the perfect fit for the Nintendo DS & Nintendo DS Lite, just like the official DS Cards it has the best possible plastic, and has no type of creaking’s or anything like it. The Micro SD/TF slot is on the top of the M3, and NO! The Micro SD/TF wont fall off, cause its so perfectly tied up, that only comes out and in, if you want to. This in fact is one of the best features of the M3 Simply, so now, you don’t need to take your flashcard out anymore to put more games, music, or homebrews.


Software & Menu



The CD comes with both English and Chinese v1.00 of the M3 Simply firmware, Save converter (M3, SC, G6), Trimmer and the Shell Folder for MoonShell. To update the firmware you just need to copy and paste the files that come in the update .rar to the root of your micro SD/TF.

The Gaming takes us to select the games, its sorta like MoonShell, where you can choose the folders, but on the bottom screen you can see the icon of the game, etc. On the Multimedia, it accesses MoonShell, so thats it.. Slot-2 option takes you to whatever is on the Slot-2



Game Compatibility

The M3 boasts clean dump support with no need for patching though they do provide a rom trimming utility for saving you some space it is not needed. Here are the results:

PLAYED FINE
Animal Crossing Wild World (USA)
Castlevania: Dawn Of Sorrow (EUR) – No Slowdown on Intro movie
Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam (USA)
Rafa Nadal Tennis (EUR)
Nintendo DS Browser (EUR) Patched for SuperCard
Hiite Utaeu DS Guitar M-06 (JPN)
EyeShield 21 (JPN)
Final Fantasy III (USA)
Jump Ultimate Stars
Elite Beat Agents (USA)
Fifa 2007 (EUR)
Kirby PaintBrush (EUR)
Pokemon Pearl (JAP)
Jump Super Stars (JAP)

All this worked without any patching or anything, basically I drag and dropped the Clean Dumps to the microSD card.



The patching utility is as simple as it comes and is only used for trimming the roms to save room. Open your rom with the patcher, choose where you want to output the trimmed rom to and click start. Not much more to say on this, it works well but of course some games do not support trimming.



Save games

The M3 DS Simply when prompted to enter a game, if it doesn’t  detect any save file, it ask to create one, play the game without saving, or ignore. All needed to do, is say you want it to create a save, and then when you enter the game after turning the DS off, it will automatically load the save.



The save converting software is equally as simple as the trimming software. Open your save file, choose the destination name and click to let the software do the rest for you. You can then transfer your save across with your game. This is a nice feature wich adds a guarantee that your save games are going to work.



Homebrew Compatibility



Bearing in mind that we need to wait for the developers to update thier software with DLDI support, I tried out some of the homebrew available:

DSOrganize 2.4 - Works, Patched with DLDI
beup Live 0.3 - Works without avatars and emoticons
Comic Book DS - Doesn't Work
MoonShell - Works



Conclusion

PERFECT, ok ok, MORE THAN PERFECT. The M3 Simply does all the stuff it says it does. All the games work fine, easy to manage Saves, don’t need to worry with set up saves, or patch games, nice GUI that can be skinnable, etc.

PROS
+ 100% rom compatability
+ Excellent build quality. Card fits flush in the DS and slides in and out as if a commercial card
+ No patching required, just drag and drop to play 100% of games
+ No Slowdowns in game
+ No Slowdowns in game
+ GUI that lets you choose Three options, Games, MoonShell or Access Slot-2


CONS
- The Menu GUI, and the MoonShell Skins are totally different, it should come with Similar Skins
- Micro SD/TF slot is a little awkward to remove the SD
- There aren’t many Homebrews that lets the use of M3 Simply for now, but them M3 Team has released the IO Lib, so it could go better in the future



Overall Score


  96%



DS-Scene would like to thank KickTrading for sending us a sample of the M3 DS Simply for reviewing purposes. Check out kicktrading for all the flashcards reviewed on ds-scene




 
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 » Comment On: - M3 Simply Official Review
#1
 
vitius Canada

  Thu, January 11th, 2007 at 00:12
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Thanks for the review. It seems almost exactly the same as my Supercard Slot-1, except the GUI is different.

My supercard also runs beup without working avatars/emotes. I hope they fix that later on. Good review but I still think Supercard is slightly better (it works with comicbook DS btw)
 
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 » Comment On: - M3 Simply Official Review
#2
 
gamesphere United States

  Thu, January 11th, 2007 at 00:21
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How is Download play?
 
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 » Comment On: - M3 Simply Official Review
#3
 
retrohead United Kingdom

  Thu, January 11th, 2007 at 00:54
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I don think Vaskituh had 2 DSs to test download play. We are waiting on a Supercard DS to review aswell, looking forward to that one ;)
 
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 » Comment On: - M3 DS Simply Official Review
#4
 
zukoso Chile

  Thu, January 11th, 2007 at 04:04
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wich microSD card did you use?
 
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 » Comment On: - M3 DS Simply Official Review
#5
 
FifthE1ement United States

  Thu, January 11th, 2007 at 08:37
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Great review vash! I see you have a DSLinker too! I have one on the way but it looks to also be a great device!

I have a very detailed review on www.Moddz.com that goes through three different microSD cards, DS Download play and more. My SuperCard DS (ONE) was faulty and Im waiting on a new one but from what I hear its the same as the NinjaPass. The M3 and R4 are nothing like the Ninjapass. Performance is amazing with no slowodowns with even the crappiest slowest microSD cards. Check out the review of both the M3 DS Simply and R4 Revolution (two different reviews) www.moddz.com

FifthE1ement :yaylite:
 
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 » Comment On: - M3 DS Simply Official Review
#6
 
retrohead United Kingdom

  Thu, January 11th, 2007 at 09:10
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We have an R4 on the way, Im looking forward to comparing that to this. I also noticed Vaskituhs DS Linker in there and he has promised a review for us for this weekend, which is now set in stone because of this post :lol:
 
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 » Comment On: - M3 DS Simply Official Review
#7
 
BlueStar United Kingdom

  Thu, January 11th, 2007 at 15:20
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Just noticed something from that pic, not only is it exactly the same hardware as the R4 you get exactly the same bundled TF card reader (Which is a proper christmas-cracker job by the way, throw it out and buy another)


 
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 » Comment On: - M3 DS Simply Official Review
#8
 
FifthE1ement United States

  Fri, January 12th, 2007 at 07:10
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No, if you check out the link to my review youll see that you don get the same card reader and the hardware is modified just a bit. We have high res images on the review that show how the cards are different. Also the card reader switch is probably since he received them from the third party vendor as I received mine direct from M3. My r4 card reader looks like his but the M3 one is silver and looks quite cool.

FifthE1ement :playlite:
 
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 » Comment On: Comment On: - EZ Flash V Kernel 1.32 Released
#9
 
Perkele Finland

  Fri, January 12th, 2007 at 07:18
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Quote 
FifthE1ement Yesterday at 08:37

I have a very detailed review on www.****
8< snip
www.****


Stop plugging your website on every forum!
 
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