Hacking Luma3ds and the Black Screen of Death

Quantumcat

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Did you try downloading Hourglass9 and putting the .bin on the root of the SD card and renaming to arm9loaderhax.bin? If that works you can restore the backup without needing a hardmod.

Also test the SD card using H2testw. (Backup the files first).
 
Cuphat

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The blue light turning itself off means A9LH seems to be installed and working fine, but can't find arm9loaderhax.bin on the SD card. If the SD card is fine and arm9loaderhax.bin is on it, then I wonder if the SD card reader in the 3DS is not working.

You said you replaced it, but the blue light turning off implies that the console isn't bricked, just unable to boot without an SD card.
 
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aragorn23

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pixelmasher said:
Looks like a fairly recently a9lh'd console by the files in the files9 folder.
Getting a fresh copy of latest nightly of Luma3DS didn't work?
Click to expand...

Yes. Tried that with no luck.

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

Quantumcat said:
Did you try downloading Hourglass9 and putting the .bin on the root of the SD card and renaming to arm9loaderhax.bin? If that works you can restore the backup without needing a hardmod.

Also test the SD card using H2testw. (Backup the files first).
Click to expand...

OMG! Okay. So I downloaded Hourglass9, copied it to the root of the SD like you said, and renamed it "arm9loaderhax.bin" as you said. NOW it turns on with the blue light staying on...but there is nothing on the screens. Any ideas?

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

Okay everyone! I made (some?) progress. Like Quantumcat suggested, I downloaded Hourglass9, copied it to the root of the sd card, and renamed it "arm9loaderhax.bin". Now the blue light stays on when I power up, but there is still nothing on the screens. Honestly this is the first thing that's made any difference so far.

Suggestions on what I should try next?
 
RHOPKINS13

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Maybe somebody here will have a more definitive answer, but it sounds like your 3DS has an older version of A9LH on it, and it's not compatible with your latest version of Hourglass9. I would start with the latest and try every release they have on their GitHub page, until you find one that boots.

At that point, you probably don't need to do a restore. Probably just need the right version of arm9loaderhax.bin that matches the version of A9LH that's installed. It sounds like a borked A9LH upgrade, where somebody upgraded their arm9loaderhax.bin without upgrading A9LH using SafeA9LHInstaller.
 
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aragorn23

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RHOPKINS13 said:
Maybe somebody here will have a more definitive answer, but it sounds like your 3DS has an older version of A9LH on it, and it's not compatible with your latest version of Hourglass9. I would start with the latest and try every release they have on their GitHub page, until you find one that boots.

At that point, you probably don't need to do a restore. Probably just need the right version of arm9loaderhax.bin that matches the version of A9LH that's installed. It sounds like a borked A9LH upgrade, where somebody upgraded their arm9loaderhax.bin without upgrading A9LH using SafeA9LHInstaller.
Click to expand...


So go back and download every version of arm9loaderhax.bin, starting with the most recent, and copy/test each until I see something that is compatible with the A9LH launcher on the SD card? Okay. Going to try that later today after work.
 
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aragorn23

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GerbilSoft said:
The NANDmin.bin on that SD card is 144 MB. Way too small to be usable.
Click to expand...

Well, I suppose I had better hope that I don't have to do a restore?

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

Quantumcat said:
Did you test your SD card with H2testw? I think that's your problem.
Click to expand...

Test passed without any errors.

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

RHOPKINS13 said:
Maybe somebody here will have a more definitive answer, but it sounds like your 3DS has an older version of A9LH on it, and it's not compatible with your latest version of Hourglass9. I would start with the latest and try every release they have on their GitHub page, until you find one that boots.

At that point, you probably don't need to do a restore. Probably just need the right version of arm9loaderhax.bin that matches the version of A9LH that's installed. It sounds like a borked A9LH upgrade, where somebody upgraded their arm9loaderhax.bin without upgrading A9LH using SafeA9LHInstaller.
Click to expand...

Do I need to download different versions of hourglass then change the .bin to "arm9loaderhax.bin" to test, or should I just download the different verisons of Luma3DS and test those "arm9loaderhax.bin" that are included?

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

I also keep getting "This XML file does not appear to have any style information associated with it" when I try to download anything but the latest version of Luma3ds from github. So I suppose that option is out.
 
RHOPKINS13

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aragorn23 said:
Do I need to download different versions of hourglass then change the .bin to "arm9loaderhax.bin" to test, or should I just download the different verisons of Luma3DS and test those "arm9loaderhax.bin" that are included?
Click to expand...

Yes, do that with hourglass. At this point successfully booting any payload would be an improvement. Then we can work from there.
 
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RHOPKINS13 said:
Yes, do that with hourglass. At this point successfully booting any payload would be an improvement. Then we can work from there.
Click to expand...

Tried every version of hourglass there is. Nothing beyond the blue light staying on. I changed each .bin file in the hourglass download to "arm9loaderhax.bin" without any change.

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

somethingwet said:
can you show the contents of the luma folder
Click to expand...

They are "config.bin" at 1KB, and the folder "payloads". Inside "payloads" folder are "start_Hourglass9.bin" at 407 KB and "up_Decrypt9WIP.bin" at 219 KB.
 
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Something odd. I downloaded Luma 6.2.3 and copied over the arm9loaderhax.bin from that zip file. When I tried to boot the blue light came on and then switched off, but for the FIRST time the lower screen flashed.
 
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Quantumcat said:
Try renaming the arm9loaderhax.bin files you have tried to arm9loaderhax_si.bin.
Click to expand...

When I do that it goes back to just blue light for one second and then shutting off.

So here is a recap (in case anyone still cares at this point)

1. Copying over Hourglass .bin file and changing it to arm9loaderhax.bin makes it so the ds doesn't boot BUT the light stays on. I have to remove the battery to get it to shut off.
2. Copying over older versions of arm9loaderhax.bin from older Luna3Ds makes the blue light come on briefly and the lower screen flash before both shutting off.
3. Going with the latest version of arm9loaderhax.bin does nothing other than making the blue light turn on and off again without any screen flash.

Honestly, everyone, I'm ready to give up and sell it or replace the entire motherboard. I don't have any idea what else it could be.
 
PrincessLillie

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aragorn23 said:
When I do that it goes back to just blue light for one second and then shutting off.

So here is a recap (in case anyone still cares at this point)

1. Copying over Hourglass .bin file and changing it to arm9loaderhax.bin makes it so the ds doesn't boot BUT the light stays on. I have to remove the battery to get it to shut off.
2. Copying over older versions of arm9loaderhax.bin from older Luna3Ds makes the blue light come on briefly and the lower screen flash before both shutting off.
3. Going with the latest version of arm9loaderhax.bin does nothing other than making the blue light turn on and off again without any screen flash.

Honestly, everyone, I'm ready to give up and sell it or replace the entire motherboard. I don't have any idea what else it could be.
Click to expand...
Try going back to the flashing screen and booting Hourglass9 or Decrypt9WIP, just to see if it can even load payloads. That'll get us one step closer.
Have you tried blowing in the SD Card to remove possible dust?
Have you tried booting without an SD Card?
You say the 3DS came with a9lh. Try contacting the original owner and see if he did anything before sending it to you.

aragorn23 said:
They are "config.bin" at 1KB, and the folder "payloads". Inside "payloads" folder are "start_Hourglass9.bin" at 407 KB and "up_Decrypt9WIP.bin" at 219 KB.
Click to expand...
If I remember correctly from my a9lh setup, the Luma folder should have more files in it.
 
aragorn23

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sks316 said:
Try going back to the flashing screen and booting Hourglass9 or Decrypt9WIP, just to see if it can even load payloads. That'll get us one step closer.
Have you tried blowing in the SD Card to remove possible dust?
Have you tried booting without an SD Card?
You say the 3DS came with a9lh. Try contacting the original owner and see if he did anything before sending it to you.


If I remember correctly from my a9lh setup, the Luma folder should have more files in it.[/QU

I am not even able to get anything to show up on the screen. Nothing comes up aside from a briefly flashing lower screen. I am not sure how to boot hourglass or decryptWIP when nothing comes up to look at.
Click to expand...
 
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aragorn23 said:
I am not even able to get anything to show up on the screen. Nothing comes up aside from a briefly flashing lower screen. I am not sure how to boot hourglass or decryptWIP when nothing comes up to look at.
Click to expand...
According to what you listed, it's hold Start before and while turning on the 3DS to open Hourglass9 and hold Up on the d-pad before and while starting the 3DS to open Decrypt9WIP.
Try contacting the guy that you purchased the 3DS from and see if he did anything before putting the listing up.

This is why I don't buy stuff on eBay.
 
aragorn23

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sks316 said:
According to what you listed, it's hold Start before and while turning on the 3DS to open Hourglass9 and hold Up on the d-pad before and while starting the 3DS to open Decrypt9WIP.
Try contacting the guy that you purchased the 3DS from and see if he did anything before putting the listing up.

This is why I don't buy stuff on eBay.
Click to expand...

Yup, it's a hard lesson to learn, but I think I will be avoiding eBay purchases of broken items in the future. Oh well. At least I didn't pay much for it.
 
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aragorn23 said:
Yup, it's a hard lesson to learn, but I think I will be avoiding eBay purchases of broken items in the future. Oh well. At least I didn't pay much for it.
Click to expand...
Have you tried contacting the seller yet? Have you tried booting Decrypt9WIP or Hourglass9 according to what I said yet?
 
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