I have pokemon emerald on visual boy advance and when i try use the in game save <start---save>
it goes to a new screen and says "save failed checking backup system please wait... time required about 1 min" so i wait 1 min and it says the same thing.

So this is stopping me from doing stuff like the battle tent and other stuff.

Can some one please help me.

Did you read this thread:

http://www.1emulation.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=17613

It may be able to help you.

10 to 1 that he didn't read it, otherwise, this thread wouldn't exist.