Fix a broken Gold Card Reader

Discussion in 'General Entropia Universe Discussion' started by Wistrel, Aug 8, 2016.

  1. Wistrel

    Wistrel Kick Ass Elf

    So my gold card finally packed in over the weekend. I'm not sure if anyone has ever tried to fix one before (probably) but I just had a shot and succeeded. For those who are interested this is what they look like inside. They are powered by 2 CR2016 panasonic 3V batteries. Of note is that the batteries were fine. Still registering 3.3V ish so I can't see them running out any decade soon. The fix then turned out to be mechanical. Inside there are 6 contacts for the card reading which touch the 6 contacts on the top end of the card (i.e. towards the Entropia writing). There is also an additional "contact" towards the back (see arrow) this is actually a pressure switch that connects with a contact below whenever you push your card fully in, this activates the reader. I believe that this had (through wear and tear) got stuck down in the permanent "on" position. The fix was to get my nail under it and lever it up ever so slightly. I suspect the reader contains some sort of automatic "timeout" feature so that if you leave your card in there, it doesn't drain the battery to nothing. My guess is that it had done this so the reader was stuck in permanent "off" mode.

    Anyhow, that fix saved a lot of hassle in sending it away and waiting for MA to send me a new one. I hear rumour they are rather slow at that. Here are some pics of the inside.

    Wist

    one.jpg two.jpg
     
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  2. RAZER

    RAZER Custom title ... uh ...

    All I have with my reader a few times before I get a code is the 'Error 72'
    But thanks for the tip.
     
  3. Back in the days someone cut out the chip of his goldcard, and "planted" it inside a printer with a display...so he could get a working code via keypress everytime,
    without tearing the card away. I still love the idea...but I dont use codes often, so....
     
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  4. Isn't there an app out to replace gold card method
     
  5. It's an app on Google play. U see it as another app by same dev as compets, but I have been afraid to test it for fear gc won't work afterwards
     
    • Like Like x 1
  6. RAZER

    RAZER Custom title ... uh ...

    • Like Like x 1
  7. RAZER

    RAZER Custom title ... uh ...

  8. Wistrel

    Wistrel Kick Ass Elf

    I was wondering about doing something like this... it might be possible to do 2 things. One, for min effort, have something that automatically talks to the card via hacking the reader and spits a number straight into the Entropia client during login or two, rig the reader up to some sort of back to the future delorian style 6 character LED 7 segment display that sits above your monitor or something.

    That would be a fun mod but I admit, rather pointless.

    One of the things I really like about the reader is the way it shunts the numbers out one at a time. That was a funky design decision.

    Wistrel

    PS I didn't know the login app was out already. Interesting that 50-100 people did... I don't want to use an app though. I have a gold card. I wonder how long it will be till someone decompilies it... in fact did anyone ever do that with that other entropia app that lets you login?
     
  9. Either simply open the app with winrar and / or google "apk decompiler" and SEE for yourself, if you are into XML/java etc.,
    or just want to SEE some graphics and stuff.
    But now go on, there is nothing to SEE here.

    The main auth / handshake stuff blah etc. all happens on the server.

    afaik the "new app", that is available but still unreleased, uses google authentication...so you would mess with google AND MindArk at the same time. ;D

    MindArk doesnt like if you post the inside of files here or anywhere else. No matter how harmless it is. I felt it already. ;p

    p.s.
    Just stick the card into your reader, put a piece of paper between one of the battery contacts and everytime you need a code you pull out the piece of paper...re-insert the piece of paper to "turn it off" ;D
     
    • Like Like x 1
  10. Wistrel

    Wistrel Kick Ass Elf

    Well there was that guy on here who said "the hackers are watching entropia" or some such shit. Well who knows.
     
  11. Its been some years when a discussion on the "unknowncheats-forum" ended like "Entropia has a very nice encryption, but we are afraid to cheat, because of the real money involved".

    Speedhacking probably stilll works (windows clock for example ;p) or years ago, stuff like running very fast, by messing with the winsock.dll...etc.
     
  12. Nope but if you were deed holder you could do beta compet. I've got one deed and have been playing compet a couple of weeks now. Kinda like Farmville with pet battles... but leveling is slow now that they turned off automated battles unless u pay for em
     
  13. Apparently no, I once forgot mine with the card inside for a weekend, it still was displaying the last code when I came back home 2 days later.
     
    • Dislike Dislike x 1
  14. Wistrel

    Wistrel Kick Ass Elf

    ahhh whaaaaaat...? lame!
     
  15. Wistrel

    Wistrel Kick Ass Elf

    Just repaired mine again... Well so the fix lasted 4.5 years of fairly infrequent use... not too bad. Now if only MA could maintain my connection....
     
  16. 2 years ago after 3 support cases asking mindark to let me continue to use my gold card, they simply refused and this is what motivated me to leave this game, particularily when I see that Auktuma (not to name him) was allowed to use his gold card, so why not me ?

    Again another proof showing that mindark are giving privileges to who they want, and if you are swedish, this is even better....
    I could list tons of things showing that swedish players are HUGELY advantaged in this game....

    But saddly, when it is so clear that they get huge advantage, they are kind of forced to leave the game,
    this is what happend to my friend Linzey and his partner "lady ho" ingame.

    In the swedish tradition....
     
  17. Wistrel

    Wistrel Kick Ass Elf

    I'm still using mine. Maybe they like me... shrug
     
  18. Wistrel

    Wistrel Kick Ass Elf

    I suppose I should say that mine is still going strong and I'll keep it going as long as humanly possible! (Hopefully until Untropia at the current rate things are going - I'm [sadly] not under any delusions they'll port the code over to Untropia to support the gold cards]). Maybe they'd accept some players offering to do it for free... (unlikely)

    Wistrel
     
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