Introduction
First and foremost, I would like to congratulate all those who have gotten a NDS. It may be known as a “kid’s machine”, but getting an R4 or any 3rd party storage solution, its functionality can boost all the way to ALMOST on par with PSP (able to store games, play music, movies and emulators. My purpose of writing this guide is to answer some common question I see in the forum, and some questions are asked far too many times, therefore, I hope that my guide would be useful in answering any question you may have in mind.
3rd party storage
Slot-1
From the forum, I can see that most people have gotten an R4, and some beginners are asking what an R4 is. R4 is just one of the many Slot-1 storage devices available in the market, and it is very popular because of its user-friendliness. Other Slot-1 solutions includes, M3 simply, Acekard, CycloDS, DS Linker, SuperCard, EZ-flash V and many more. Slot-1 solutions are only capable of loading NDS games, not GBA, and will NEVER be able to, because Micro SD's are too slow. Slot-1 solutions are not able to load Opera browser as it needs a Slot-2 device to function as a RAM.
3rd party storage
Slot-2
Slot-2 solutions are basically GBA’s flash carts. Now, manufacturers have released Slot-2 solutions, which supports expandable memory (MicroSD), and flushes with the cart slot. This type of carts allows both GBA and NDS games to load. Some of them are, GBA Movie Player, M3 Perfect, M3 Lite.I recommend getting EV Flash 3in 1 expansion cart. It has a rumble feature for compatible games, like Metroid Prime Pinball, it works as a RAM expansion for homebrews like LinuxDS and the Official Nintendo Opera internet browser, and loads GBA games. EZ flash 3in1 don’t work by itself, but requires a slot-1 device to work and an R4 works fine with it.
MicroSD
It is ideal to format your memory card to FAT16(or FAT, they are the same). As FAT16 runs faster then FAT32, and FAT32 allows larger capacity(>2GB). Since the largest MicroSD available in the market is only 2GB, so format it to FAT16. If you are confused over what brand of MicroSD to use, I recommend Kingston 2GB, since R4 allows you to store games, music, movies, homebrews and pictures. I specify using Kingston as they are some reports over the internet saying that Sandisk runs slower than Kingston, and Castlevania is one game which does not work with Sandisk’s MicroSD. It is said that R4’s 1.12 patch or future would support SDHC(Secure Digital High Capacity) cards, for microSDHC, its capacity goes up to 8GB, but such cards are still in experimental stage, and would be released worldwide last this year and early next year. R4’s current 1.11 patch only supports up to 2GB microSD memory.
Compatibility
R4 have very high compatibility rate with games and supports automatic DLDI patching(if you are using the lastest patch, 1.11) for homebrews, so it’s a pretty good Slot-1 device. For those who are wondering what DIDL is, it is actually something created for different Slot-1 devices to read a homebrew program. Different device reads homebrew differently, so if you want to make a program, you have to keep recoding for different device with automatic DLDI patching, just put a homebrew program(.nds file) into your MicroSD, and you R4 would automatically patch it so that it would work even if the program isn’t designed to run on R4. Certain games like Worms Open Warfare have problems loading. When you start the game, it says that it cannot detect a save file even though you have created one when you first load the games, such games requires ARM7 fix. You would have to download a special ARM7 file, unpack your .nds game file(break up the .nds file into its components), then use the new ARM7 file to override the old one.
Internet browser
I personally have it, and it works pretty decently for me. Sure the speed is kind of slow, but the input speed is a lot faster than using a PSP. It works fine for foruming and more text-focused websites. As mentioned above, R4 alone cannot load the internet browser, and requires a Slot-2 device as a RAM expansion, but not all Slot-2 device would work, the only one I know that would work is EZ flash 3in1, which requires patching. The internet browser is from Nintendo, and Opera, is a internet browser, like Internet Explorer and FireFox. The Nintendo DS browser uses Opera as the browser, so it Nintendo were to work with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer team, it would be a a DS browser which uses IE as the browser. Therefore, the program is known as the Nintendo DS browser which is developed by Nintendo and Opera. The browser would connect to the internet with a wireless router. If you have played on Nintendo WiFi Connection before, that means that you have configured your wireless network settings on your NDS, so your browser should work just fine. Your NDS already have the ability to connect to a wireless router, so there is no need to modify your NDS.
Video
Moonshell only reads ,dpg(nDs-mPeG) video files, so its kind of hard to find a program to convert videos. Fortunately, I have found one, Its Super Video converter. Another .dpg converter is BatchDPG, but I don’t know how to use it, so I’m just sticking to Super. Moonshell is the homebrew R4 uses to do you media stuff like loading pictures, playing songs and musics.
Soft Reset
When you first start up your NDS, go to your games folder, on the top right hand corner, there should be an "R" button, press the R shoulder button to make the icon turn Green. When you are done with the game you are playing, Press A+B+X+Y+R+L, all together, it should restart. Note that the soft reset only works for NDS games, and not homebrew (although it works for some, but I have no idea which are the "some")
Cheats
Another value-added feature of R4, it have Action Replay code support, it saves you tons of money from buying an Action Replay DS. To add in your cheat codes, first open up your Cheat Code Editor, click on File(F), choose Open cheat database, then open your usrcheat.dat cheat file or click on New Cheat database if you don't have a usrcheat.dat file. Click on Code(C), then Add game. On the left side of the editor, there should be a new branch that says Input game name here, then on the left, type in the game's name, then the
game ID (the ID is very important because it is used to match the game with the code, so if the ID is wrongly typed, the code will not be available for the game you are playing to play). Note then the game with (U) and (J) have different ID.
Next, click on Code(C) again, then Add code. Type in the cheat name, then all the code for the cheat, after that click on Update Code. Do the step in red again until you have added all the codes you want for the game. When you have finished what you need to do in the Cheat Code Editor, save it over your existing usrcheat.dat file, or create one if you don't have it(make sure that its named usrcheat.dat). After that, enjoy your enhanced game with the cheat code!
Recommended
Homebrews (not in any order):
-DSOrganize (makes your NDS something like a PDA)
-LMP-ng (iPod clone)
-ComicBookDS (a comic book viewer)
-Beup (MSN client)
-SvSIP (able to make phone calls on your DS)
-DSPad (turns your NDS into a wireless game controller for you computer)
-DiagnoSe (test parts of your NDS like speakers, microphones, to see if they are working fine)
Recommended Games (not in any order):
- The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass
- Brain Age series
- Phoenix Wright series
- Dementium: The Ward
- Bleach DS series
- Jump Super/Ultimate Star
- New Super Mario Bros
- Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
- Sonic Rush Adventure
- Daigasso! Band Brothers
I will update this thread when I see more questions popping up.
P.S. If anyone knows where to get EZ flash 3in1 expansion cart, please let me know, thanks in advance.
Nintendo DS Informations 
thxs alot.
