[Brother]

I keep forgetting this thing exists but its kind of cool - nintendo are only just realsing the one in the UK for the old DS so its worth remembering that you can import the next gen one right now:

http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-...e-70-1fgo.html

[INSOMANiAC]

The only trouble is, its only worth using with metroid pinball and you get one free with that anyway

[Hi/zuum]

for anyone interested, here's a great little rumble pack. Ebay is full of 'em but fear not, it may be 3rd party but it works a treat. It's a lot quieter & with a better feedback than the official one thrown in with Metroid pinball. Whether it's better than the official lite version I don't know but that one seems be MIA to buy & this one's cheaper anyway.

http://img116.imageshack.us/my.php?i...sc04594vv6.jpg

[andytabor]

isnt it compatible with starfox as well?

[Hi/zuum]

Originally Posted by andytabor

isnt it compatible with starfox as well?

yeah it is, just had a 4 player wifi blast to find out! cool.

[andytabor]

Originally Posted by Hi/zuum

yeah it is, just had a 4 player wifi blast to find out! cool.

nice!

[Hi/zuum]

...oh & it works (from my games) with 42 ATC (rumbles when it's you're turn), Diddy kong racing (when you hit stuff), Metroid PH (only when you get hit apparently), Metroid pinball obiviously very well & a drum roll please... the best of all, Elite Beat Agents!! Yay!! (but not Quendan sadly). The highlight has definately gotta be EBA for me, plug you're earphones in (as this also masks the rumble sound) & you're away. Brilliant! just made a great game even better.

more info -

The Rumble Pak for the Nintendo DS is a DS Option Pak shaped like a Game Boy Advance cartridge and is designed to be inserted in the system's Game Boy Advance game slot. In North America, it was first made available bundled with Metroid Prime Pinball,[6] but is now available through promotions[7] or as a stand-alone purchase. The accessory is not easily available in Europe, pending the (as yet undated) release of Metroid Prime Pinball, although various DS games supporting it (Metroid Prime Hunters, Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time, and the recent Clubhouse Games) have been released in Europe. However Codestorm, Nintendo's UK customer services contractor sell original-DS-style Rumble Paks as a spare part for a little under £10. The recently released game 'Actionloop' now contains a rumble pak in the UK.

Although the Rumble Pak works with both the Nintendo DS and the redesigned Nintendo DS Lite, it protrudes from the Nintendo DS Lite when inserted. For this reason, a smaller version of the Rumble Pak is available in Japan, which is flush with the system when inserted. It is only available at present in black. Other colour variations and releases in other regions have yet to be announced.


List of Nintendo DS games supporting the Rumble Pak

Clubhouse Games
Diddy Kong Racing DS
Elite Beat Agents
Hotel Dusk: Room 215
Magnetica
Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time
Metroid Prime Pinball
Metroid Prime: Hunters
Picross DS
Star Fox Command
Star Trek: Tactical Assault
Super Princess Peach

[G a f f e r]

Brother: I was thinking of getting the same thing for my DSlite (which hasn't arrived yet )

Hi/zuum: I was looking at the same thing on ebay . One advantage is the cheap price, the other is that I am due to get a white DS, and this was the only one that matched (all the others are black).

Quick Q though: Some of these 3rd party packs don't actually fit well with the DSlite. Does yours fit flush with the casing or does it stick out a tiny bit?

[Hi/zuum]

It's a great fit, nice & flush & in fact it's in all the time. I'm currently playing DKR with it these days. One point of note, it's a matt texture like the inside of the dslite(blk) but on the outside it kind of goes with the matt hinge & top buttons part. cool. For the money it's definately worth it.

[G a f f e r]

Thanx for that ....looks like it's the one I'll get then

ADDENDUM: Rather than start a new thread on the subject, I thought I'd add to this one.

Woohooo....yet another jiffy bag from HK

Following your advice Hi/zuum, I had bought this rumble pack from Ebay. It only comes to £8.50 inc. delivery

Before buying one I had a few concerns:
1) The official one bundled with games is always black in colour.....as mentioned I wanted to retain the same colour as my DS if possible.
2) I was still slightly worried about the fitment.
3) I wanted a rumble, not a rattle, and I wasn't sure how well this 3rd party offering would work in comparison to the official one.
4) How strong was it compared to the official one?

Well, as mentioned it arrived today:

Re:Q1, as you can see it's white, so it matches my DS.....he also sells pink and black ones to match your particular colour if you want.

Re:Q2, as you can see from this picture, it fits flush with the DS casing (ignore the crystal case I have the DS in).

So I tried it.
1st problem: Re:Q3, Despite this pack apparently offering similar rumble but with less noise, I felt it rattled way too much. Now I haven't got a true rumble-enabled game yet, but 42 All-Time Classics works well. When your go arrives for whatever game you're playing, a quick rumble eminates from the pack.
To cut a long story short, I simply felt it rattled too much and.....knowing me....I couldn't resist opening it up to have a quick look inside (not only this, but re:Q4, it rumbles slightly less than the official, although you may consider this a bonus as the official rumble pack may be a bit too powerful ....this one is less annoying, but still gives a good rumble sensation.)

It's a very simple design inside that uses a motor with an offset weight to produce the rumble effect. It SO simple that I wasn't sure I'd be able to alter anything to rid me of the annoying rattle :frown: ......
....BUT fear not, my avid readers......Gaffer, International Modder of Mystery to the rescue .

The thing I noticed straight away was that even though the motor appears stuck down fast, the circuit board isn't, and it was this that was rattling.
So the fix I came up with started with a bit of careful lifting, with which you can prise the circuit board up, away from the lower casing:
[Before I forget....DISCLAIMER....I take no responsibility if you decide to open up your rumble pack and end up breaking something.....]

Now roll up 4 small balls of blutack. Place these under the circuit board (as indicated by -->) in the positions shown by O.

Now firmly press the pcb back into place. It should resit back flush with the lower casing as intended (if it is too high, use less blutack....I've shown the blutack in the images above to give you an idea of the size I used).

As an optional extra, pinch off the smallest bit of blutack you can (about the size of three pinheads) and place it on top of the motor as indicated by *. The motor will never get hot enough to soften the blutack, and I simply added it to fix it to the top casing to reduce possible rattles even further.
You don't have to add this tiny extra blutack if you don't want though.

Tried the pack again.....voila.....much less noise without affecting the rumble at all

However, there was still a slight cosmetic issue here. If you look at the pictures so far, whereas the DS is "glossy/lacquered", the rumble pack is matt.
Looking closely at the two reveals why:

The original cap is made of a white case with a clear "lacquer" outside it (O = lacquer layer).
Without this layer, the 3rd party casing is simply full thickness white casing ({) (no outer layer).

The final part of my mod therefore required the use of a sister/mother/other half. Nick some clear nail varnish from them. "Paint" the outside surface of the 3rd party rumble pack:

et voila...gloss finish has arrived

Overall a great little accessory (which can be easily improved upon) for not very much outlay. Also the fact that it rumbles slightly less than the official may be a bonus to many who find the official's rumble too intrusive {coupled to the fact that a less powerful motor will use less battery power}....overall = I also HIGHLY RECOMMEND it.

[lovelldr]

Some good tips there. Might get meself one of these after the review and tips