e-Reader for Nintendo DS

Posted Jan 20th 2006 11:00AM by Eliot Phillips
Filed under: gameboy hacks

The e-Reader is an add-on product for the Nintendo Game Boy Advance. It has a simple optical card swipe for loading programs off of specially encoded cards. The location of the link port adapter keeps the device from being used with the Nintendo DS. Reader [Caitsith2] has posted instructions for modifying the reader for use with the DS. If you don't plan on using it with your GBA you can pull the entire board. Once you've got the e-Reader switched you can do fun stuff like printing out your own homebrew e-Reader cards.

Reader Comments

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1. I tried it out and It's awsome. It's graphics are a lot better on DS And I don't know why.

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by fat cat

2. i was just wondering how to connect the e-reader between 2 GBA's. I tried but i couldn't figure out how to connect it to the pokemon ruby/sapphire versions in order to scan pokemon from cards onto the e-reader and then transfer it to the pokemon game. If anyone knows how to do this please email at theceng@hotmail.com

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by theceng

3. Is there any way to connect a DS to a GBA(SP) in order to play multiplayer games (GBA ones)?

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by Mr dan

4. Oh, I know full well that GBA stuff works on the DS, but I had just plain accepted that I'd never be use an e-Reader on it. Not any more! In fact, I was playing some king of fighters EX 2 on my DS earlier today (living up to my screen name I guess :)

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by danadamkof

5. Looking at my first comment, I can see that I did word it a bit confusingly. My bad.

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by danadamkof

6. Amz!!!

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by uplink12

7. I would take my e-reader apart to put it in my ds, but I still might use it to get those things for mario 3. The link probably won't work anymore if I did that, so I'm just going to use it in my gba player or gba.

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by Brian

8. hey, i was the first one to think of this hack :P but i had a better way, you can remove the port extender with a screw driver, so your E-reader doesn't get messed up at all :D anyway glad to see someone else realize this works ;)

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by swimgod

9. There's another simpler hack for this that requires less disassembly of the e-reader. Because the port extender is just a *little* too long to allow the e-reader to fit in the DS, you can take off the back cover to the unit, leave the optical assembly attached but gently flip up its circuit board and remove the two screws holding the port extension. You don't really need to do anything more. Leave the port assembly in, put the optical card back down, and put the back on again and the port assembly will slide back just enough to let the e-reader work in the DS just fine. Just did it with my son's unit, works like a charm, took about 2 minutes, tops. No power tools needed, less mucking about with the innards, and all essential parts still in place.

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by Celia Finsel

10. Don't forget that there is also homebrew dotcodes available at http://www.caitsith2.com/ereader/index.htm under the save section.

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by Caitsith2

11. Sweet hack!! I always wanted to try this but I only have a DS; e-Readers are really cheap used at GameStop, so I may well try this out.

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by danadamkof

12. Interesting, I was pretty sure this was 2006, not 2004.

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by TJ

13. that '7' near the upper lefthand corner of the picture is really taunting me...

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by alex

14. danadamkof: The nintendo ds is completely compatible with gba related things, since the gba archetecture is built into the ds cpu. the only thing not included in the ds cpu is the gbc/dmg cpus. (would have costed more to maintain full backwards compatibility.) The original japanese ereader, which doesn't have the link port, is the only one that needs no modification whatsoever to work with the nintendo ds system. The japanese ereader plus is just a port of the us ereader, and as such, has the same link port passthrough, and as a result, needs to be modified for ds use. In the absolute worst case, where you don't have any means whatsoever to open your ereader, and you don't mind not being able to use the link port connection on the original gba (the kind that needed an afterburner kit to have decent lighting), you can just cut/grind the link port connector off altogether, as it is just a passthrough.

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by Caitsith2

15. i wasn't aware of e-reader homebrew, but seeing it and the mod to make it fit my ds makes me want to start modding

Posted at 3:08PM on Sep 3rd 2006 by matt

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