Using Old SD card (with Emulators & ROMS) in new 1GHz Pandora


spaceharrier

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Feb 11, 2011
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Hi Guys,


I traded in my old unit for the spankin' 1 GHz model.


Just a question to all if you too encountered that the old SD card stuff doesn't simply update on the new model?


Appreciate some advice on how to get my new unit reading the SD card - thought it would be as easy as putting my old SD in my new unit and all the same tabs and games would just appear.


Cheers! :rolleyes:
 
On Games Com I and Linux-Swat did some tests with our old models and the 1 GH models.


Simply take your SD and put it into an other Pandora. It's the PND system. It's all on your SD, not on your Pandora (except some Desktopp/OS settings).


Your Pandora is on your SD, not on your Pandora :D .


Change SDs and you change your Pandora.
 
@ Askarus - I simply booted my new 1Ghz Pandora, inserted my SD card (used from my old Pandora model) and in 'minimenu' version (I prefer) I can't see the game emulations and tabs I had created to put all the emulations on the front screen. But, If I change to 'desktop version' (from minimenu), then I can see some emulators.


@ mcobit - I'm unsure how to check how I set up the config? Is there a way I can check? I'm thinking that I may have set up the config on my old Pandora, not a setup with the SD card. As I like the minimenu - I added all emulators into a specific tab; so I can just click on the emulator to then select a game.


I'm sorry I must seem stupid; but I'm quite a novice with all this; hopefully my questions (and the answers) will help others too! :)
 
Maybe skeezix has an idea, where the config for minimenu is stored and which files you need to backup.
 
Maybe not the best solution, but you could sort them again (navigate to the entry and then press [space] to bring up the menu for the selected item)
 
Hi Guys, was hoping you might be able to help out: I checked my SD card on my computer and all the files are intact (they are unchanged since using my old Pandora).


The files are as follows:


pandora - appdata


- apps


- desktop


- menu


- roms


More details of every file:


- appdata - a2600


- appdata - colem


- appdata - gngeo_pepone


- appdata - mame4all


- apps - ???blank there is nothing in this folder??


- desktop - Atari 2600


- desktop - Atari Lynx


- desktop - Coleco Vision


- desktop - MAME


- menu - ???blank there is nothing in this folder??


- roms - atari lynx


- roms - nintendo 64


- roms - nintendo gba


- roms - nintendo nes


- roms - nintendo snes


I just don't seem to get the "mini menu" of my Pandora to show a tab with all my emulators in them..... Can anyone help out with this - it just doesn't make any sense... Thanks in advance for the help with this guys! I just haven't changed anything around on the SD card; so I thought by putting the SD card into my new 1Ghz Pandora would work exactly the same..! :blink:
 
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I'm, really stuck with this; I just don't seem to make heads and tails of this...


Would anyone kindly provide their SD Card tree (for their 1Ghz unit) in minimenu mode, please.


This way I can try to copy it; maybe that will make it work, cheers.
 
minimenu conf is in NAND in your homedir -- ie: it needs to survive when you eject one or both cards, or swap them around or other stuff, so it has to be there; ~/.mmpref.conf or something like that; look for ~/.mm* I imagine..


But thats no big deal to lose...


.. but yes yes, I know, I've said a dozen times we/I need to make a backup/restore script ;)


jeff
 
minimenu conf is in NAND in your homedir -- ie: it needs to survive when you eject one or both cards, or swap them around or other stuff, so it has to be there; ~/.mmpref.conf or something like that; look for ~/.mm* I imagine..


But thats no big deal to lose...


.. but yes yes, I know, I've said a dozen times we/I need to make a backup/restore script ;)


jeff


Hi Jeff, thanks for responding. I'm quite novice with all this - I believe that it may have not survived when I ejected the SD from the old Pandora to the new 1Ghz...


So, would this mean that I would need to delete everything from my SD card and start all over again? Creating files and adding all the roms, etc.. again?


Thanks for the help out!
 
Goodness no :) We designed things to be pretty portable.. pop out your SD, stick it into another Pandora and poof, you shoudl be up and going; a few minor things may have reverted or been lost, such as minimenu preferences; but it'll come up as default on the new device, and a coupel tweaks in the menu to set it back as you like; if you never tweaked it before, you're fine.


People should rarely store anything on NAND (internal memory to the actual device), unless they know what they're doijng; so most people.. pop out the SD, stick it into another, and you're done; thats it.


ie: The pnd files are your applications.. there is no install or uninstall; their files shoudl be on SD, with everything else; thats all your data nearly, 99.9% of it, on your SD; the pandora is just the machine.


jeff
 
Goodness no :) We designed things to be pretty portable.. pop out your SD, stick it into another Pandora and poof, you shoudl be up and going; a few minor things may have reverted or been lost, such as minimenu preferences; but it'll come up as default on the new device, and a coupel tweaks in the menu to set it back as you like; if you never tweaked it before, you're fine.


People should rarely store anything on NAND (internal memory to the actual device), unless they know what they're doijng; so most people.. pop out the SD, stick it into another, and you're done; thats it.


ie: The pnd files are your applications.. there is no install or uninstall; their files shoudl be on SD, with everything else; thats all your data nearly, 99.9% of it, on your SD; the pandora is just the machine.


jeff


Hi again Jeff, sorry if I'm hounding you with all this but there must be others in the same boat (or in the future) as me right now..


I'm thinking that my minimenu's preference is lost now - how do I create a new tab (for the minimenu) and add my emulator pnd files to it..?


This should make it work..? Right..? Would there by anything else I'd need to do?


Cheers! I feel like you're 'OBI one' right now!! You're a gun; I appreciate your help!! :)
 
Not sure what you mean --


You shoudl stick your old SD into the new device, and it should just work; the tabs should pop up, just as they did before.


Did you 'override' the categories of the emulators and applications, or just use them as they showed up before (their defaults?) Presumably, they shoudl show up in the right place all on their own; worst case, they shoudl show up in All anyway, and in other places..


What version of the firmware are you on? Probably pretty current.


In case it matters.. until 'recently', minimenu would scan pnd files itself; we cahnegd that a little whilea go (SuperZaxxon era, I dont' recall if it was before) so that it woudl use the existing scan that was being made durinmg startup for xfce/other environments; it shouldn't matter, it should work out the same, but as you're going from old to new, it may be of interest somewhere here, if you're having a problem.


But what exactly is the problem you are having?


No apps show up? Some but not all? Are they in All, or not at all? Are they in the wrong tabs? Or just different tabs?


ie: A pnd recommends which tabs it wants to show up in; most should be sensible, but a few pnds have silly tabs; you can override the tab they go to, or create your own tabs, and so forth, for more advanced users; if you did a lot of that, it coudl be confusing you between transitions, but it should work anyway. But if you did no overrides/customizations, it should all Just Work (it shoudl all Just Work anyway, but especially if you didn't mess around too hard :)


So let us know what sort of situation we're looking at.


jeff
 
Hey Jeff,


Just to make it clear with your questions:


1. I just popped my old SD into my new Pandora 1Ghz and the tabs didn't show up (how they were arranged) in my old Pandora.


2. I didn't override the categories (I won't know how to) - in minimenu version (when I put in my SD card) nothing shows from the SD card at all. But, in Desktop mode, a few emulators show up on the desktop. When I double click them; only MAME works... the others like Pico, Nintendo64, Coleco, etc don't work.


3. The Firmware is Super Zaxxon - I don't think my old original Pandora was super zaxxon (but I can't remember).


4. So the problem I am having exactly is: I've received my new Pandora and inserted by SD card (the SD is unchanged - no file moves, etc). In minimenu - I've lost all profile settings for tabs and emulators contained within them..


5. In minimenu: no emulators show up at all. In desktop: a few emulators show up ion the desktop but only MAME works.


Hope this makes a bit clearer - if you'd like me to arrange a video I can do that.


Thanks again
 
*shrug*


I'm a technological noob/cretin - but I had an SD card which worked on my wonky original edition, but didn't work on my rebirth edition.


Turns out that I needed to install the community codec pack as the SD card was formatted in NFTS (or NTFS - I dunno, couldn't be @rsed to look it up :) - once the codec pack was installed, voila, my new pandy recognised the card.


Like I say, *shrug*, probably got nothing to do with the problem here given it seems there's some recognition of the card, but thought I'd mention it anyways as another noob might suffer the same fate as me and find this helpful :)


Cheers


Simon
 
*shrug*


I'm a technological noob/cretin - but I had an SD card which worked on my wonky original edition, but didn't work on my rebirth edition.


Turns out that I needed to install the community codec pack as the SD card was formatted in NFTS (or NTFS - I dunno, couldn't be @rsed to look it up :) - once the codec pack was installed, voila, my new pandy recognised the card.


Like I say, *shrug*, probably got nothing to do with the problem here given it seems there's some recognition of the card, but thought I'd mention it anyways as another noob might suffer the same fate as me and find this helpful :)


Cheers


Simon


Hi Simon, thanks for that - it might be what I need to do too?


Do you know the steps of the "community codec pack"?


I also have no idea what NFTS is but my SD card could possibly be formatted in NFTS too?


Thanks mate
 
This is most likely what it is. If the card doesn't mount fully (i.e. you may see it's name on the desktop but in Thunar you can't see the contents of the SD card) then you're probably missing the correct filesystem.
 
This is most likely what it is. If the card doesn't mount fully (i.e. you may see it's name on the desktop but in Thunar you can't see the contents of the SD card) then you're probably missing the correct filesystem.

I'm sorry I have no idea what you mean; 'Thunar'?


To correct the file system - do I need to install the community codec pack? If so, I added it to 'desktop' (as per the following link)


But in desktop mode I was not able to open it (the file: CodecPack.pnd)....
 
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