#1602 "THE ROM HEADER IS INVALID" Can't access Soul Silver .dsv save

[Hazem Fahmy]

I was playing Soul Silver on 0.9.11 and it was working fine. After a while, I added Action Replay cheats and everything seemed to be still fine until I saved (in game), closed the emulator, and returned to find that it would not open the save file again. Every time I try to open the save file from the desktop I get a message reading: "The ROM header is invalid. The device size has been increased to allow for the provided file size."

The Soul Silver ROM itself is working fine, but it won't access the save file. So far I've tried: disabling the cheats and deleting the cheat file, re-downloading DeSmuME, changing the save file's file type to .nds and compressing the save file, but nothing has worked and I still get that message every time I try to open it.

Is there any chance I can retrieve my save? I would just start over, but I've made a lot of progress that I'd hate to just give up on.

[zeromus]

It is not possible to "open the save file from the desktop". Try again to explain what's happening.

[Hazem Fahmy]

Whenever I try opening the save file from the emulator itself, nothing happens. Does that make it clearer?

[zeromus]

It is not possible to "open the save file" from the emulator. There is no option called "open save file"

[Hazem Fahmy]

Can you please directly ask what you need from me? I assumed it was fairly clear I meant the "Load State From" option.

With the exception of a .dst save I made at the beginning of my playthrough as a test, I've always saved in game and, before the save stopped working, I would always just load the game and open the save from in the game itself. Now, when I open the game, it doesn't show record of an in-game save, but I can open the old .dst save if I use the "Load State From" option. Is this information enough for you?

[zeromus]

It wasn't clear at all. Your changed words entail changed meanings.

I'm going to compress your question. Tell me if I did it right.

"When I open a state from the desktop, I do not get the rom header is invalid message becuse I actually got that when I opened the ROM. As a separate problem, when I boot the game directly without opening a state from the desktop, my in-game save file which I have seen there before is not present".

This is usually caused by your security software deleting the .dsv file which contains the in-game save, or your running desmume from a directory that isn't a directory on your desktop, or directly from a zipfile

[Anonymous]

are u here to help or to argue about being "right"

[zeromus]

are u here to help or necro 5 yo threads

[Anonymous]

lol

[Anonymous]

homie's been on this website longer than i have been alive LOOOOOOOL

[Hazem Fahmy]

I extracted both DeSmuME and the ROM from their zip files. When I open the ROM from the desktop, it works fine, just doesn't show the save file. The .dsv file is still in its same position in the "Battery" file. Does this mean something is wrong with the .dsv file itself?

[zeromus]

If you made a savestate before creating your in-game save character, and then loaded that state, the .dsv would now contain no character. After loading a savestate made during gameplay, the .dsv will contain the last in-game save made with that character.

[Hazem Fahmy]

I made the savestate first before I made the first in-game save, and the in-game save was still working fine.

[zeromus]

OK, I forgot how this game works. Let me restate.

If you made a savestate before creating your in-game save character AND THEN saving in-game... and later loaded that state, the .dsv would now contain no character. After loading a savestate made during gameplay and in-game saving, the .dsv will contain that last in-game save.

What you just described is perfectly reasonable. You made an in-game-saveless savestate, then an in-game-save-containing savestate, then restarted the game and observed the in-game save being present-----and then loaded the in-game-saveless savestate which clobbered the .dsv with the empy in-game save.

You still need to load a savestate with an in-game save and restart the emulator in order to see your in-game save in the in-game menu.

[Anonymous]

hey zeromus just wanted to say a big thanks- "this guy's a piece of shit" is what i was going to say, but ur comments made my brain work for once and think "huh, i'm an idiot, i'm opening the wrong file". thanks so much, i would've never figured it out otherwise!

[zeromus]

huh. thanks for reporting your findings.

[Anonymous]

my desmume says that the " the rom header is invalid the device size has been increased to allow for the provided file size"

[zeromus]

cool. what's the problem?

[Anonymous]

my desmume says that the " the rom header is invalid the device size has been increased to allow for the provided file size". I am unable to drag and drop or load my game into desmume without the warning message appearing

[zeromus]

cool. what's the problem?

[Anonymous]

Thats the fucking problem dumbass, we cant play any ROMs

[zeromus]

That's a "warning message", dumbass, it doesn't prevent anyone from playing a ROM. It was added for about 2 common cases, if it's "any ROMS"/"every case" for you, then it's a sign all your roms are broken.

[Anonymous]

I have the same problem and after i click ok it says, "Sorry... right now, you can't use the default (stream rom from disk) with homebrew due to a bug with DLDI-autopatching." At this point i'm just going to search for a fix for that but do you have any suggestions?

[zeromus]

Config > rom loading

[Anonymous]

The .gba extension ROMs dont show up in the explorer window when I try to load the ROMs through Desmume(Open ROM). If I drag the ROM into Desmume, it shows a warning saying " header is invalid. the device size has been increased to allow for the provided file size" followed by an error message saying "loading xyz.gba failed." I know that my ROM isn't broken because it works fine in another emulator and because I have played it in Desmume before.

Any fix?