Hacking Bricked N3DSXL won't boot ntrboot

curlyburl

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I've got a New 3DS XL here which has been bricked for over a year. I don't recall exactly what I did, but it was when I was much less competent at CFW - I think I updated the OFW accidentally while setting up CFW. In any case, it's stuck with two black screens when I turn it on, and it was suggested that I buy the R4i Gold 3DS Plus and use ntrboot to get it working again.

Well, a year later I finally bought one, and it doesn't seem to be doing the trick. I made sure to switch to the N mode, I put all the files + folders on the micro SD (and put that in the 3DS as well as the cart), I have a magnet which I'm 99.9% sure I'm putting in the right place (right below the ABXY buttons, and I've experimented with moving it around anyway), I'm holding X + Select + Start and then turning it on. It just turns on with the blue light and both screens are blank as if I didn't have the R4i cart.

Is there something I'm probably doing wrong? Or have I been mislead and I'm going to need to hardmod?
 

MrMcTiller

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I've got a New 3DS XL here which has been bricked for over a year. I don't recall exactly what I did, but it was when I was much less competent at CFW - I think I updated the OFW accidentally while setting up CFW. In any case, it's stuck with two black screens when I turn it on, and it was suggested that I buy the R4i Gold 3DS Plus and use ntrboot to get it working again.

Well, a year later I finally bought one, and it doesn't seem to be doing the trick. I made sure to switch to the N mode, I put all the files + folders on the micro SD (and put that in the 3DS as well as the cart), I have a magnet which I'm 99.9% sure I'm putting in the right place (right below the ABXY buttons, and I've experimented with moving it around anyway), I'm holding X + Select + Start and then turning it on. It just turns on with the blue light and both screens are blank as if I didn't have the R4i cart.

Is there something I'm probably doing wrong? Or have I been mislead and I'm going to need to hardmod?
OK, so ntrboot is flashed to the Flashcart right? (Switch to the N mode.)

Make sure that the boot.firm is at the root of the 3ds sd card. (Make sure to have SafeB9Sinstaller as boot.firm.)

Put the magnet on and hold Start + Select + X + Power. It should boot.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

Oh and can you send a picture of the front of the Flashcart.
 

curlyburl

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OK, so ntrboot is flashed to the Flashcart right? (Switch to the N mode.)

Make sure that the boot.firm is at the root of the 3ds sd card. (Make sure to have SafeB9Sinstaller as boot.firm.)

Put the magnet on and hold Start + Select + X + Power. It should boot.

Oh and can you send a picture of the front of the Flashcart.

Yep, that's right! Here's a picture of the board itself to show that it's in the left (N) position.

rsz_21img20171207032142.jpg


And here's the front of the cart.

rsz_img20171207032309.jpg


91fd568a-5633-4548-b780-ec4e53ac004e

Here are the official instructions. As stated above, you have to hold power as well.

That's the guide I followed, what's on my SD card is from the links they provided :) sorry for not phrasing it clearer, I have been holding Power + Select + Start + X and waiting for anything to show up - but nothing!
 
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mikey420

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Which SD card did you put the files on? The SD in the 3ds or the one in your flashcard? The boot.firm file should be on the 3DS card the micro SD slot on the card is useless in ntrboot mode.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

Oops missed that are you sure the internal SD isn't corrupt?
 
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MrMcTiller

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If that doesn't work, you can use another 3ds to flash NTRBoot to the flashcart while it is in N mode. ALWAYS KEEP A BACKUP OF THE FLASHCART
 

curlyburl

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Which SD card did you put the files on? The SD in the 3ds or the one in your flashcard? The boot.firm file should be on the 3DS card the micro SD slot on the card is useless in ntrboot mode.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

Oops missed that are you sure the internal SD isn't corrupt?

The files are on the SD card put into the SD slot in the 3DS itself :) is there some way I can make sure it's not corrupt? I formatted it fresh before I went through with this.

If that doesn't work, you can use another 3ds to flash NTRBoot to the flashcart while it is in N mode. ALWAYS KEEP A BACKUP OF THE FLASHCART

I guess I could give that a try! It's a brand new flashcart that arrived only hours ago, but I guess there's a chance it's messed up out of the box?
 

MrMcTiller

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The files are on the SD card put into the SD slot in the 3DS itself :) is there some way I can make sure it's not corrupt? I formatted it fresh before I went through with this.



I guess I could give that a try! It's a brand new flashcart that arrived only hours ago, but I guess there's a chance it's messed up out of the box?
Or The switch doesn't work
 

curlyburl

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I just tested the R4i on my working 3DS (regular 3DS XL). It works in flashcart mode (comes up in the main menu as a Konami game), and then I tested it in NTRboot mode and it got to the NTRboot screen without me even having to do the magnet + button combo. So it looks like there's nothing wrong with my R4i. Could it maybe be something wrong with my microSD? I wouldn't have thought so, because it shows up just fine in my PC and lets me put files on it...
 

curlyburl

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Bumping in case anyone has any ideas, I might try to pick up a different MicroSD today to see if maybe it's a brand/model issue
 

curlyburl

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How exactly did you confirm that ntrboot mode was working? What are you referring to when you say "NTRboot screen"?
Is this 3DS hacked? Did you use the luma nightly?

I just tried it again on my working 3DS, and it's booting up GodMode9 every time. Last time I tried, it booted up the SafeB9SInstaller screen. It does still show up on the main 3DS menu screen as a cart when I switch it to cart mode.

The 3DS I'm trying to fix had arm9loaderhax installed, I believe, but about a year ago I mistakenly updated the firmware through the 3DS update menu and it never booted up properly again. Both screens are black but the blue light comes on. I would install the Luma nightly if I was actually able to boot the 3DS up, but it can't even load up GodMode9. I'm doing exactly the same stuff I've been doing with the working 3DS, but no dice.

Sorry if what I'm saying doesn't make complete sense, I'm kinda new to all of this and it's hard to remember precisely what I did to this bricked 3DS since it was over a year ago.
 

GothicIII

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I just tried it again on my working 3DS, and it's booting up GodMode9 every time. Last time I tried, it booted up the SafeB9SInstaller screen. It does still show up on the main 3DS menu screen as a cart when I switch it to cart mode.

The 3DS I'm trying to fix had arm9loaderhax installed, I believe, but about a year ago I mistakenly updated the firmware through the 3DS update menu and it never booted up properly again. Both screens are black but the blue light comes on. I would install the Luma nightly if I was actually able to boot the 3DS up, but it can't even load up GodMode9. I'm doing exactly the same stuff I've been doing with the working 3DS, but no dice.

Sorry if what I'm saying doesn't make complete sense, I'm kinda new to all of this and it's hard to remember precisely what I did to this bricked 3DS since it was over a year ago.

You normaly can‘t brick when updating your 3DS to a newer version when a9lh is installed.
Somethings fishy going on. a9lh payloads dont work either? (Arm9loaderhax.bin onto the sd card‘s root directory)
 
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MrJason005

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I just tried it again on my working 3DS, and it's booting up GodMode9 every time. Last time I tried, it booted up the SafeB9SInstaller screen. It does still show up on the main 3DS menu screen as a cart when I switch it to cart mode.

The 3DS I'm trying to fix had arm9loaderhax installed, I believe, but about a year ago I mistakenly updated the firmware through the 3DS update menu and it never booted up properly again. Both screens are black but the blue light comes on. I would install the Luma nightly if I was actually able to boot the 3DS up, but it can't even load up GodMode9. I'm doing exactly the same stuff I've been doing with the working 3DS, but no dice.

Sorry if what I'm saying doesn't make complete sense, I'm kinda new to all of this and it's hard to remember precisely what I did to this bricked 3DS since it was over a year ago.
The only way to confirm if a flashcart was correctly flashed with ntrboot, is by using the latest luma on it (9.0). You cannot use a normal boot.firm (e.g. safeb9sinstaller or godmode9), because, even if you do see the payload boot up, you cannot know what is actually booting it. Is it B9S from your 3DS's NAND? Or is it the flashcart that is booting the boot.firm?

By using the latest luma (9.0), you can have the config screen of luma tell you the entrypoint; either B9S from NAND, or B9S_NTR from ntrboot.

(I no longer refer to it as luma nightly because a new release of luma came out)
 
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curlyburl

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Okay, because I'm a little confused with all the terminology, I'll recap what I'm doing so I can make sure I do this right:

I'm got my New 3DS XL which is bricked. It does turn on - the blue light appears - but both screens stay black. I don't recall exactly how I bricked it because it's been over a year now, but I had been installing CFW and flashed something at the wrong time. I regretfully can't remember exactly what.

I've got an R4i Gold 3DS Plus that came in the mail a few weeks ago. I've pushed the internal switch to N for the NTR mode. I've loaded a microSD with the files listed here: https://3ds.guide/installing-boot9strap-(ntrboot). I'm putting the microSD into my 3DS' SD slot, and the R4i flashcart into the 3DS' game slot. I then put the magnet in the right spot (between the B button and Start button), and I press + hold X + Start + Select + Power for a few seconds at the same time. The blue power light comes on, but nothing boots up.

Does it sound like I'm doing anything wrong here? I'm sorry this is probably confusing. I'm confused myself.
 

Lemon_

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Is the magnet strong enough to trigger sleep mode on another 3DS? Also, remember to hold Start, Select and X before pressing and holding Power.
 

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