The situation looks different depending on which Pocket you have or are thinking about buying.

If you own a newer Analogue Pocket and use EverDrive carts: Krikzz describes the failure as occurring during routine file system write operations. His account: the Pocket reads a sector containing directory data, applies modifications, and writes it back, but in new-batch units some bits reportedly come out wrong, damaging file system sectors, according to Android Authority. He characterizes this as what appears to be a hardware-level problem on Analogue's side. Back up your SD card contents now. Treat the file system as potentially unreliable until one of the vendors confirms a resolution.

If you own an older Analogue Pocket: Krikzz states that the same firmware runs correctly on older units, with the failure apparently specific to the new production batch, per Android Authority. The write corruption issue does not appear to affect earlier hardware. Pre-existing limitations still apply, though: the Pocket cannot distinguish between different games loaded from the same EverDrive, so its save state system will silently overwrite states across games, and loading a mismatched state will typically crash, according to haxor.no. For anything worth keeping, use the EverDrive's own save system rather than the Pocket's.

If you're considering buying a new Analogue Pocket to use with EverDrive carts: The affected hardware revision has not been publicly documented, and there is currently no reported way to distinguish at purchase which units may be affected, per Time Extension. Time Extension's own editorial read on this: if you intend to use a flash cart, you might want to wait and see what happens before buying.

Krikzz's account is the most detailed on record. He describes the failure this way: when the new Pocket writes to a file, it reads the relevant sector, applies changes, and writes it back, but in new-batch hardware, some bits are corrupted in the process "for an unknown reason," resulting in damaged file system sectors, per Android Authority. His working conclusion is that something appears to have changed at the hardware level on Analogue's side, because identical firmware behaves correctly on older Pocket units but not new ones.

A competing explanation is also circulating. Some sources suggest the issue may instead stem from component changes inside newer EverDrive Mini units, rather than anything Analogue changed. Android Authority notes the information it received is conflicting on this point, with sources split between the two possibilities. There is no manufacturer confirmation, no teardown, and no changelog entry behind either claim. Neither can be ruled out; neither has been substantiated.

Analogue, when contacted, said it does not provide customer support for third-party devices and directed users to the third-party manufacturer, per Time Extension. That response lands awkwardly here: the third-party manufacturer is the one pointing at Analogue's hardware as the source of the fault. No engineering statement, no hardware revision disclosure, no coordinated troubleshooting between the two companies. The root cause remains open, which matters practically, because an unattributed problem has no clear owner of a fix.

The current situation is more serious than past friction between these products, but friction isn't new. In late 2022, Krikzz shipped a firmware update for the EverDrive GB X7 that added a "Pocket fix" toggle. As Krikzz clarified at the time, that toggle wasn't a new feature it was a way to expose manual control over a compatibility workaround that had been permanently baked into the cart since it was first used on the Pocket, per RetroRGB. The previous firmware had left the workaround on by default; the update gave users the ability to switch it off when running the cart on original hardware. A vendor-side firmware patch resolved that round of incompatibility.

That precedent matters. If the current fault has any software-addressable component, a similar path is at least plausible. But Krikzz's framing this time is different: identical firmware behaves differently on old versus new hardware, which points toward something physical. A firmware workaround is still possible, but it would be compensating for a hardware difference rather than correcting it and patches built on that logic can be fragile.

The contrast with older EverDrive/Pocket friction is worth spelling out. The Pocket's sleep function has never worked with any EverDrive cartridge, requiring users to approximate it through a ten-step manual process: pause, save state, quit the cartridge, power off, then reverse the sequence on restart, according to haxor.no. Annoying, but learnable. Write-level file system corruption is a different category of problem entirely. It can happen silently, with no indication that anything went wrong until a save is gone or a file system scan turns up damaged sectors.

A Krikzz firmware update specifically addressing write behavior on new-batch Pocket units would be the clearest signal that a software fix is possible. An Analogue OS update naming the same issue would mean the company has accepted some responsibility and acted on it. As of today, neither has appeared, per Android Authority.

The most concrete thing to watch: Krikzz's firmware changelog and Analogue's OS release notes. A specific reference to write behavior, file system handling, or new-batch Pocket compatibility in either would be the first real signal this is moving toward resolution. Until then, Pocket owners using EverDrive carts sit between two vendors one declining to support third-party accessories, the other unable to push a fix to hardware it doesn't manufacture.