GBAtemp review of the...

EZ Flash Omega

Developed by: EZ Team

Worldwide sales by: NDS Card, Axio Game, SHOP01 Media, RetroModding

Additional sales by: Various, full list here

Also known as: EZFO

Review by raulpica - Completed 22/07/2018

Introduction

After a few years of utter and total dearth of GBA Flashcarts, except for the trusty EZ-Flash IV which kept being produced on and off, the GBA Flashcart market ended up stagnating after its hey-day, back in the now-distant 2006. Almost nothing new came out since then. The EZ-Flash IV had its short-comings, like a clunky patching software and no RTC, and the few flashcarts which did have one were almost unattainable. Then suddenly, out of nowhere, came the EverDrive GBA X5. The first modern GBA Flashcart, which gave users the kind of features that were by then taken for granted on contemporary DS/3DS flashcards: no patching software needed, microSD and SDHC support, etc. etc. with just one "minor" issue. To fit all that goodness inside, Krikzz opted to make it slightly bigger than a GBA flashcard. Some users didn't care much for the oversized shell (yours truly included) while others chose to swore by their EZ-Flash IVs and their perfect size. The EZ Team didn't just stand there watching - they released a new patchless firmware for the EZ-Flash IV in response to the ED GBA X5's release, along with a new production run called "Reform" which added much needed features like a microSD slot and an easy to replace battery along with a brand new smaller PCB. But the hardware inside still wasn't up to snuff and the EverDrive GBA X5 was still plenty faster and offered better compatibilty than the Reform. But the EZ Flash Team didn't stop there and, as it turned out, the Reform was just a stop-gap solution until the...

EZ Flash Omega. Quite a flashy name it comes with. Will it be the one to end all other GBA flashcards? Let's delve deeper into this review and see what it brings forth with its mighty name.

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Special Thanks:

A special thanks must go out to the EZ Team for providing the review sample.

Product Information

Directly from the manufacturer, we get the following spec-sheet:

GBA game copy and play, no client needed

Fast patch engine, instant game load speed, additional manual patch engine to support modified rom

Hardware based direct save to SD card.

Cheat

Save states

Real time clock

Sleep

Hotkey customizable

256Mb PSRAM suppot all games, instant load

512Mb Norflash, keep your favorite games

GB/GBC/NES game copy and play

System on chip level recovery mode, prevent upgrade dead

Support FAT16/FAT32/EXFAT， 128MB-128GB SD card

Firmware and kernel both are upgradable

We can see a small technological marvel here. They managed to fit everything and the kitchen sink on a DS Lite sized board. It uses high quality components - we can see inside a Xilinx Spartan 3 FPGA with a Spansion MCP 64MBit RAM + 256MBit PSRAM, another Spansion IC which is a 512MBit NOR flash, and lastly, a Winbond SPI flash, presumably to keep settings saved. The microSD slot seems sturdy enough and yes, it isn't springloaded. A slight disappointment comes in the form of the soldered battery. I'd have loved to see the same battery holder used in the Reform in here as well, but since I can spy a small IC under the battery (which should be the RTC IC), I suppose it just couldn't have been done in any other way.

Oh well. Let's close up our sample again and let's see what else we get in the packaging!

Contents, Packaging, Design & Impressions

The box is nothing to write home about - it doesn't hold a candle to some of the most luxurious packages around (like the one the EverDrive Gameboy X7 comes in) but we're all here for what's inside it, aren't we? And that's where the EZ Flash Omega doesn't disappoint. The EZ Team also packed in an additional DS Lite-sized shell which can be swapped with the GBA-sized one in case you prefer to use your DS Lite to play GBA games or in case you're one of those "GBA Macro" users out there.

The plastic is nice and sturdy and I can see that it has been molded to perfectly fit the PCB inside, in order to not waste even a single millimeter of precious real estate. It comes in the usual smokey grey which is all the rage nowadays for flashcarts. The cart doesn't have any sticker on it, which for someone may be a let-down - personally I consider it a plus: no label that can get damaged to worry about.

Best of all: the plastic shell is 1:1 sized and it will fit flush in any kind of GBA, Micro included. Bravo EZ Team!

Setup and Usage

I do usually write a short "how-to" guide in this section, but, truth is, the EZ-Flash Team did such a good job with the official documentation that I'll just link it here .

One thing almost immediately stands out compared to the usual flashcarts - the EZ Flash Omega supports exFAT. While the good ol' FAT32 is still plenty serviceable for retro-flashcarts, it's nice to see the EZ Team supporting a newer filesystem.

Cards up to 128GB can be used (!) - even if it's obvious that the entire GBA romset would fit multiple times over in that much space, it also entails that in 10 years, when the smallest microSD you'll be able to buy will be around 128GB, you'll still be able to buy a replacement card for your EZFO.

The EZ Team also supplies its users with two zip packs: one filled with game thumbnails and the other filled with cheats for almost every game that came out on the GBA. These two packs are optional - you can just skip them if you're not interested in cheats and thumbnails.

It's advised to upgrade to the latest kernel before starting, since it much improved the initial firmware that came with the card. Put some games on the microSD and pronto, we're ready to go!

Before anyone asks, yes, the EZFO does auto-sorting. It's a true relief to know that you won't have to mess with FAT Sorter every time you add a new game. The controls are super-simple - L and R moves you between menus and A brings up the start game menu. START opens up the recently played list and SELECT enables the game thumbnails in the menu.

The menu is definitely better looking than what is offered on the ED GBA X5 and the thumbnails are a nice touch that will liven up your GBA while you choose a game amidst the hundreds of awesome title that came out on that platform.

Launching a game is a simple matter. You have Clean Boot, Boot With Addon and Write To NOR Clean / Write To NOR Addon. Along with a Save Type option you can use to force a save type (that can be quite useful for some homebrews). But what is this Addon wizardry, you might ask? It's how the EZ Team refers to every extra function that wasn't available on a standard retail cart - namely the in-game menu which will let you access stuff like cheats, real-time saves, a sleep mode and the useful ability to go back to the EZFO menu without physically turning off your GBA.

These two options usually write to the PSRAM memory the EZ-Flash Omega has onboard. The PSRAM is a volatile kind of memory (thus the -RAM part in its name) and it needs to be reloaded every time you turn your GBA off. Meanwhile, the NOR is a static kind of memory which keeps its contents even after being powered-off. This was a very big-deal in the EZ Flash IV days, when loading times were way longer and waiting a minute or so every time you had to load a game could bore someone out real fast. Also, the few 32MBit games that were released for the GBA only fit in the NOR on the EZF-IV, while this isn't the case anymore with the EZFO as it comes with a big enough PSRAM to store 32MBit games as well and on top of that loading times are blazing fast even while using PSRAM, so having a NOR flash onboard as well isn't as useful as it was in the past. It's a nice feature to have though, just to be sure to enjoy maximum compatibility with GBA games.

Some more settings can be tweaked in the Settings screen - namely you can set the time, decide which kind of "add-ons" you want, remap the sleep/in-game menu key combination and disable the Fast Patching Engine to enhance compatibility with hacked ROMs. It'll take longer to load games, but it should fix any kind of incompatibilities you might face with heavily hacked games.

One more thing has to be said about the EZ-Flash Omega - it has a new saving technology called Direct Save which will directly save to the microSD every time a game saves, which sounds great in theory - except when you find out in the worst way possible by turning off the GBA too early that there is a slight lag between the saving itself and writing on the microSD of the changes to the save file. To be on the safe side, always wait a few seconds before turning off your GBA after saving.

UPDATE: Forgot to say that the EZ Team open-sourced their EZFO Kernel some weeks before this review was published. That means we might see unofficial kernels popping up one day, improving on things like the menus' appearance or adding new features. Fingers crossed!

Compatibility

A 4GB Class 10 UHS-1 Sandisk microSD was used for testing. The card was formatted in FAT32 using the Windows Formatter. For comparison purposes, it's the same exact card I've used in my Everdrive GBA X5 review.

I've used the No-Intro Romset, which contains clean, 100% unaltered dumps of every GBA game out there. As with the ED GBA X5 review, the games come from a personal selection based on my favourite GBA titles - they were played for 5 to 30 minutes each. Please note that games are to be assumed to always be unpatched unless explicitly marked as such (which is the usually the case for fan-translated games or games requiring hacks to be played, like the Boktai series). The (Europe) version was always used when available, if that wasn't the case the (USA) version was used instead. Lastly, if there is no English release, the (Japan) version is the one that has been tested. My hardware of choice for this review has been my trusty Game Boy Advance SP and my Game Boy Micro.

Once again, to assure the fairness of comparison against the Everdrive GBA X5, exactly the same games have been tested on both, in order to show the difference between the two cards.

Commercial Games:

Advance Wars - PASS

Advance Wars 2 - PASS

Banjo Kazooie - Grunty's Revenge - PASS

Boktai - The Sun is in Your Hand (w/ Prof. 9's sensor fix) - PASS

Boktai 2 - Solar Boy Django (w/ Prof. 9's sensor fix) - PASS

Breath of Fire - PASS

Castlevania - Aria of Sorrow - PASS

Classic NES Series - Zelda II - PASS

Classic NES Series - Super Mario Bros. - PASS

Donkey Kong Country - PASS

Donkey Kong Country 2 - PASS

Donkey Kong Country 3 - PASS

Doom - PASS

Dragon Ball Z - The Legacy of Goku - PASS

Dragon Quest Monsters - Caravan Heart (w/ KaioShin's English Translation) - PASS

Elevator Action - Old & New - PASS

F-Zero - GP Legend - PASS

Final Fight One - PASS

Final Fantasy IV (w/ Bregalad's Sound Patch) - PASS

Final Fantasy V (w/ Bregalad's Sound Patch) - PASS

Final Fantasy VI (w/ Bregalad's Sound Patch) - PASS

Fire Emblem - Fuuin no Tsurugi (w/ Gringe's English Translation) - PASS

Fire Emblem - The Sacred Stones - PASS

Game Boy Advance Video - Sonic X - Volume 1 - PASS

Game Boy Advance Video - Yu-Gi-Oh! - Yugi vs. Joey - PASS

Golden Sun - PASS

Harvest Moon - Friends of Mineral Town - PASS

Kirby & the Amazing Mirror - PASS

Kirby - Nightmare in Dreamland - PASS

Legend of Zelda, The - A Link to the Past & Four Swords - PASS

Legend of Zelda, The - The Minish Cap - PASS

Magical Vacation (w/ magicalpatcher's English Translation) - PASS

Mario & Luigi - Superstar Saga - PASS

Mario Kart - Super Circuit - PASS

Mega Man Battle Network - PASS

Mega Man Zero - PASS

Mega Man & Bass - PASS

Metroid - Zero Mission - PASS

Metroid - Fusion - PASS

Mother 1+2 (w/ Tomato and Jeffman's English Translation) - PASS

Mother 3 (w/ Tomato and Jeffman's English Translation) - PASS

Oriental Blue - Ao no Tengai (w/ The Romhacking Aerie's English Translation) - PASS

Pokémon Emerald Version - PASS (see Note 1)

(see Note 1) Pokémon Sapphire Version - PASS (see Note 1)

(see Note 1) Pokémon LeafGreen Version - PASS

Rhythm Tengoku (w/ W Hat's English Translation) - PASS

Riviera - The Promised Land - PASS

River City Ransom EX - PASS

Rockman EXE 4.5 - Real Operation (w/ Prof. 9's English Translation) - PASS

Rockman EXE 6 - Dennoujuu Falzar (w/ exeguy11's English Translation) - PASS

Shin Bokura no Taiyou (w/ DarthNemesis, lordhuffnpuff and SpikeMan's English Translation and Prof. 9's sensor fix) - PASS

Shin Megami Tensei - PASS

Sonic Advance - PASS

Super Mario Advance - PASS

Super Mario Advance 4 (w/ ShadowOne333's eReader Patch) - PASS

Tales of Phantasia - PASS

Wario Land 4 - PASS

WarioWare, Inc. - PASS

Yggdra Union - We'll Never Fight Alone - PASS

Yu-Gi-Oh! - Worldwide Edition - Stairway to the Destined Duel - PASS

Homebrew:

Anguna - PASS

Another World - PASS

Rick Dangerous - PASS

Powder - PASS

Goomba Color - PASS

MSXAdvance - PASS

PCEAdvance - PASS

PocketNES - PASS

SMSAdvance - PASS

SNESAdvance - PASS

I tested most games with the Add-on mode but some issues with it were to be expected - for example, the infamous anti-piracy check in "Dragon Ball Z - Legacy of Goku" is sadly triggered when using it, while the game runs fine in Clean Boot mode. Another issue I have encountered is that the add-on menu just doesn't work at all in the Classic NES Series games I tested. While the add-on mode works just fine with plenty of games, it's really easy for something to go wrong when you're messing with game code on-the-fly like that by inserting features that weren't expected to be there in the first place.

As for cheats, they worked well in the games I tried them with. Be aware that a bunch of cheat descriptions will still be in Chinese even if you chose the English cheat files, though.

When it comes to performance, I couldn't notice any slowdowns even in taxing games like Final Fantasy V (which instead slows down on lesser performing flashcarts like the antiquated SuperCard series) which frankly is what is expected by a modern flashcart.

The homebrews I tested worked right out of the box, with no messing needed for the save types. Some of the more obscure homebrew titles might still require that though. The EZ-Flash Omega also comes with built-in versions of Goomba Color and PocketNES, which were absolutely top notch. Saves and Save-states worked as expected with no hiccups.

Arguably, the best part of the EZ Flash Omega is that it doesn't fall flat on its face like the ED GBA X5 did when it comes to RTC. Every game gets their nice RTC savefile to keep their time separately from other games. The Boktai games also automagically grab the correct time and date from the field that can be set in the settings. So you'll be able to play any of the Pokémon games at the same time, along with the Boktai games, without anything messin' up. Two thumbs up here. This was probably the biggest shortcoming the EverDrive GBA X5 had and it's very nice to notice its absence here.

EverDrive GBA X5 vs EZ-Flash Omega

Well... I assume pretty much everyone reading this review was waiting for this - knowing which GBA flashcart is the current king of the hill, no punches spared.

As you may have already thought for yourself, the answer lays there in plain sight. The EZ Flash Omega is simply a better product than its rival. It's faster, cheaper and it offers WAY more functionality than what the ED GBA X5 currently offers. Quite importantly, it also fixes the issue with RTC games. Oh. And that shell size thingy the ED GBA X5 that bothered quite a few people is not present here - you're getting BOTH a 1:1 sized GBA flashcart (instead of a slightly-bigger-than-usual cart like the EverDrive GBA X5) and a free DS-Lite sized shell in the package, in case you didn't want your shiny new flashcart to stick out from your DSL/GBA. All of that for almost half the price of the ED GBA X5 - "where is the catch?" you may be thinking. ...And well, there is no catch. Except for the slight delay added by the direct save technology, which honestly, is very very difficult to notice in normal usage.

Essentially, what we're seeing here is what the Chinese market can churn out when a team of experts puts their mind to it - an excellent product, with the best technology available, at the best price around. Sadly, a small indie developer like Krikzz just can't compete with that kind of manufacturing power. So, unless you're a die-hard Krikzz fan, as the end-user you will probably want to think with your wallet when deciding what you'll be buying. And the choice has never been simpler.

Conclusion

Thanks for sticking with us until the end - it's finally time to wrap up this review. While perfection is still some steps away (direct saves could be improved, along with RTS/Add-on support) we're almost there. The technological advancements of the last few years made this cart possible - I suppose we'll see a perfect flashcard one of these days, improving on the very few issues the EZ Flash Omega has. Still, it doesn't really get any better than this, right now. Even if you already have a GBA Flashcart, just go ahead and buy this one too - with that kind of price, it'd be a waste to miss on all the awesomeness it provides you with.

Verdict

What We Liked . . . No patching needed RTC support (better than the ED GBA X5) Pretty much perfect compatibility Blazing fast loading Built-in support for PocketNES and Goomba Color RTS and in-game Cheats support Auto-sorting in menus Cart is 1:1 sized Free DS Lite shell included Kernel is open-source What We Didn't Like . . . Direct save is not failproof Add-on mode doesn't always work Soldered battery