| M3 Lite Professional Review | ||||
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M3 Lite Professional Review
M3 Lite Professional Black casing The usual complaint about M3 is that its cost among most Slot-2 flash cards is higher than its competition. This is because of it being one of the better all-around packages. So, G6/M3 Team decided to find a way to cut costs. They heavily reduced on-board memory, virtually removing Game Boy Advance functionality. Now, M3 Lite Professional has arrived. Does the lower cost equal a better purchase? Does it try to cheaply cash in on its own namesake? Read on for the answers.
As with the M3 Lite, Micro-SD memory snaps inside and remains in place. It is also as simple to remove as well as insert. It's a breath of fresh air that the eye of detail towards consumer ease is one of G6/M3's goals. They succeeed once again, which is something I wish other flash card manufacturers would take the time to work on. Many people may notice that having the memory load in the side of the card instead of the bottom means that you'll be removing the M3 Lite Professional each time you need to change files. Relax in the fact that the DS Lite will be fine with this repetative task. Let's revisit the tight fit issue once again. The cart is still a tight fit. It took a bit of strength to get the M3 Lite to fully insert. Removing it was even more tedious on the fingers. Fortunately, M3 Lite Professional's casing bears a rugid build, but it's still somewhat irritating to see that the installation and removal wasn't improved upon. You won't need to do anything drastic, like filing down the casings of the original EZ-Flash IV. After a few times, the cart will become easier to change out. The important attribute to mention, obviously as this is what you're probably buying it for, is that the casing sits flush as well as expected. In my previous review of M3 Lite, I mentioned that the Castlevania test did not do so well with my Sandisk 512MB Micro-SD. I did learn of formatting it at a higher bit rate (FAT16, 64k cluster) raised the Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow test to a perfect 5/5. However, formatting in this way cut out all GBA functionality. Well, since we don't have to worry about GBA anymore here, with M3 Lite Professional and a solid brand flash memory, such as A-Data, Kingston or Sandisk, you can ensure that you will have no slowdown or lagging whatsoever with games and their load times. Since my last review of the M3 series, a new addition has made its way into the software: Game Icons. Now, like its sister product, G6, when combing the game menu, you will see representations of each game's icon. One feature G6 does not have is that each game will also bear the official naming label just like it would be if you were running your real game card. For those scene purists, who refuse to change the filename, this is a nice advantage. A minor issue with this was that the addition broke several downloadable skins. Fortunately, most skin authors have fixed their works, or you can use a 3rd party skin program to fix all present ones yourself. Unfortunately, touch screen support isn't implimented at this time while navigating the M3 Menu. Perhaps, this will change sometime in the future. Let's address the one difference between M3 "Perfect" and "Professional". Professional is made strictly for NDS use. By reducing the memory size, which cuts costs and is cheaper for consumers to afford, GBA functionality has been stripped away. If you're considering this product, then you're already omitting GBA playback as a deciding factor. This means that GBA ROMs won't be on your day-to-day activities, though the smaller ROMs will still work. One distressing finding was the loss of NDS-GBA Linkage. While few game pairings take a strong advantage of this, it's still a loss that may shy some users away. If GBA support isn't something you absolutely need, then this is a moot subject. You'll find everything on the NDS side to be working and pleasurable. If NDS functionality is the sole factor in choosing a flash card, then you cannot go wrong with M3 Lite Professional. It continues to be one of the top flash cards. With a retail price of $30-45USD and teamed with a popular nopass, such as PassCard 3, it is possibly the most affordable yet attractive offerings today. Yes, you're cutting out GBA usage, but it's a conscious choice to make for such a huge price slash. Skins, as always, help make your M3 Professional more personalized. G6/M3 Team once again delivers their promises. DS Lite owners will find little reason not to purchase it. I still wish they'd rework the casing build, but again, it's tolerable. Pros: + Fits flush in DS Lite + Micro-SD locks in place + Skinable DS Menus + Near perfect DS playback + Cheat options for DS + Decent homebrew support + Price friendly + Can still run small GBA ROMs and applications Cons: - Tight fit - Official Skinning tool needs dramatically updated - No use of the touch screen within menus - Various performance results with media brands - Homebrew support is questionable in the future - Loss of NDS-GBA Linkage function
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