Gamecube Memory Cards

[Spacecowboy]

My bro just got a Gcube, but no memory card. I gather that the official Ninty ones are 4mb, but will prob need more space. So i just wanted to know if the 3rd party memory cards are reliable (i was thinking of going no higher than 16mb off ebay for about ?6).

Also would all 16Mb's be available at once or do you need to press a certain button sequence on the joypad in order to cycle thru various pages?? The reason i ask is back in the day i had a 32Mb Psone card that required u to press some buttons in order to cycle thru the card 1 Mb at a time. Firstly this was a pain, and secondly after a while it was stuck on 1 page!! Although im pretty sure back then they used compression in order to provide 32Mb.

Sorry guys if this is a v. basic and amateur Q.

[Jaxon]

It's better to think of card storage in terms of "blocks" rather than how many bits it holds, because people think that the terms megabits and megabytes are interchangeable and it's a source of much confusion. In Gamecube terms, one block of memory is equal to 64 kilobits of storage.

Nintendo has made three different capacities of memory cards. The 59 block(4 megabit) version which is now discontinued, the 251 block(16 megabit) version, and the 1019 block(64 megabit) version. The Interact 16x card you're considering is roughly equal to the official Nintendo Memory Card 1019 in terms of storage space, but it costs half as much.

Accoring to the reviews of the Interact that I've read, it acts just like a normal card without having to resort to page swapping tricks. The testers did a lot of copying and moving files around on the card and everything came out intact. But that was only on one card. The general feeling around here is that the official Nintendo cards are more reliable than any third party card. It's not that Nintendo's cards are immune to failure, it's only that it's a lot more common to come across stories of third party card failure than first party.

The typical game's save file will only require around 4-15 blocks of memory. Unless you plan on playing a lot of sports games where saving a season file can take anywhere from 150-200 blocks of memory, a single 251 block memory card will be all you should need.

[mid]

I've got an official 251, which has absolutely everything on it apart from my 59-block Animal Crossing save. Which, strangely enough, lives on the official 59 block card which came with the game.

No real space problems here.

Oh, and don't touch 3rd-party cards with a bargepole. I've heard too many stories about Super Monkey Ball killing them, which when you've spent 3 months clearing Expert 7 is a nightmare.

[Rossco]

Yup, I would never go near a 3d party memory card ever again. It can be a life destroying feeling if it all goes wrong.

[Spacecowboy]

Ok thanks guys, you've convinced me not to go 3rd party! I will prob get a 16mb/251 block official card, that ought to be plenty for Resi 0, Resi 4, F-Zero and Zelda.

[kernow]

yeah it'll be fine for those titles.

[Papercut]

Buy an official 1019 block card from the states instead, will cost about the same as a 251 in the uk anyway:

http://www.videogamesplus.ca/product_info.php?products_id=8897

[Spacecowboy]

Thanks for the advice guys,but what about AV cables? RGB obviously, but are there any availble with a digital output, preferably co-axial since the xbox uses my only optical input.

And wot is the deal with Dolby with regards to the GC? Ive got Resi 4 and its only Pro-Logic 2, am i right in saying i can only take advantage of this via a digital av cable? Cause i thought PL II was a surround sound created from a stereo signal like form TV broadcasts??

[Papercut]

Audio is analog only with the Cube.

The digitial av port does provide digital audio, but there are no cables than use it afaik; oscar at atarilabs was trying to create a usable digital audio signal with it, but I don't think it ever happened.

Also, the digital av port will still only give you component video, or, if modded, RGB scart and VGA.

also the capacities you are quoting are Mbit rather than MByte - the 1019 card is 8MByte in size.

[Spacecowboy]

So how do i take advantage of PL II with Resi 4? I have audio outputs (the red & white cables) running from my TV to the Surround system to let me listen to TV programmes in surround mode, will this do?
Or do i need a RGB cable with audio outs (with red & white cables) for the GC?

[SharkAttack]

I used the basic cables to connect up to the tv and then played my sourround sound setup via the tv for the PLII and it worked with Rogue Leader so I'd guess it'll work with all the others.

[Papercut]

So how do i take advantage of PL II with Resi 4? I have audio outputs (the red & white cables) running from my TV to the Surround system to let me listen to TV programmes in surround mode, will this do?

No no, thats cool. For audio, thats all you can do with the cube.

A nice RGB cable will make things look a lot nicer though, of course

[dj898]

to take advantage of PLII your AV receiver has the built-in support for PLII.
Most recent receivers do nowadays...

[Jakeway]

Was thinking of getting a 1019 block card when it first came out, but I read that it was a bit iffy with saves deleting or becoming corrupt? anyone know much about this?

[Papercut]

Had no problems with mine...