Hacking [Question/Review] Changing from Gateway 3DS to A9LH w/ Luma3DS now

[Traiver]

Hey y'all,

First of all, I really appreciated the work of Gateway 3DS's flashcard since today. But today is the day for me to change from GW to A9LH with Luma on my new3DS and to say goodbye to Gateway.

I really had fun over the last 2 years with Gateway and I still think they're doing a great job. But now I'm on a point to think about it, what would be the best Firmware for future updates, games, hacking and other stuff on my console. That means, I'm done with Gateway (for now!) on my primary console.


Now guys, I really need your help with setting the whole things up because I really have no clue about the A9LH and Luma thingys, only read some things about it.

So my questions are: What would be the best setup? Where do I find a complete tutorial here on gbatemp which includes A9LH setup (of course the safest way) and the newest Luma3DS commit. Do I need Emunand anymore or is it possible to have Luma3DS in Emunand or make it no sense? Any more advantages or disadvantages?

Many questions but I think y'all can answer this who are familiar with A9LH and Luma3DS. I really appreciate any answer to helping me through the whole progress!

I deleted my Gateway 3DS Emunand (11.0.0-33E) yesterday and have a freshly formatted new3DS XL (european) w/ 9.2.0-20E Sysnand (Cubic Ninja & OOT, too).


Thanks again in advance!

-Traiver

 

[Ramzh]

Guide with best setup: https://github.com/Plailect/Guide/wiki/Part-3-(RedNAND)

You don't need emuNAND you can have Luma with sysNAND updated

Advantages: 100% boot rate, fix bricks, always on the latest firmware

Disadvantages: setup is long, possible brick on 2.1 but rarely happens just followed the guide as written and everything should be fine.

At the end of the guide you will able to update Luma directly from the 3DS itself to the latest commit (unstable version (but not that much)) or you can keep the official luma release 5.4 (stable version)

 

[Traiver]

Guide with best setup: https://github.com/Plailect/Guide/wiki/Part-3-(RedNAND)

You don't need emuNAND you can have Luma with sysNAND updated

Advantages: 100% boot rate, fix bricks, always on the latest firmware

Disadvantages: setup is long, possible brick on 2.1 but rarely happens just followed the guide as written and everything should be fine

Don't worry, when i brick my 3DS, I still have hardmod on it. x) So you're sure that's the best setup? Never really heard of RedNand...
Any more disadvantages? What about BootNTR, is it working? Or any other Homebrew apps like Decrypt9WIP or isn't this necessary anymore?

 

[astronautlevel]

Don't worry, when i brick my 3DS, I still have hardmod on it. x) So you're sure that's the best setup? Never really heard of RedNand...
Any more disadvantages? What about BootNTR, is it working? Or any other Homebrew apps like Decrypt9WIP or isn't this necessary anymore?

I'll answer your questions in stack order.
Decrypt9WIP is launched at boot from a9lh, making bricking nearly impossible (less relevant because you have a hardmod, but it's nice to have everything on system imo)
BootNTR works fine on Luma
RedNAND is EmuNAND with some minor technical differences. You use it in the setup because backups take much less time. At the end though you switch to updated sysnand mode.

 

[Deleted member 386348]

Don't worry, when i brick my 3DS, I still have hardmod on it. x) So you're sure that's the best setup? Never really heard of RedNand...
Any more disadvantages? What about BootNTR, is it working? Or any other Homebrew apps like Decrypt9WIP or isn't this necessary anymore?

BootNTR works, although it's been discontinued. Decrypt9WIP, Uncart, EmuNAND9 are all a9lh payloads. A9LH is the best setup so far.

 

[Ramzh]

EDIT: Ninj'd

 

[retrofan_k]

Don't worry, when i brick my 3DS, I still have hardmod on it. x) So you're sure that's the best setup? Never really heard of RedNand...
Any more disadvantages? What about BootNTR, is it working? Or any other Homebrew apps like Decrypt9WIP or isn't this necessary anymore?

I just ditched GW for a9lh today and it's fantastic, 100% boot rate, etc and wish I done it sooner. You lose .3ds drag and drop and cheats that GW has, yet just use CIA installs instead.

Rednand is basically Emunand but its a better version than GW. You can also do the following:

You will no longer be able to boot without the SD card in, that is normal.
You will now boot a Custom Firmware based SysNAND by default.
You can now hold Select on boot to launch the Luma3DS configuration menu.
You can now hold Start on boot to launch Decrypt9, a full featured NAND tool.
You can now hold Y on boot to launch EmuNAND9, a full featured RedNAND and SD management tool.
You can now hold X on boot to launch Uncart, a tool for converting a physical game cart to an installable file.

Trust me, you wont look back and who knows what GW installs with their locked down DRM a9lh payloads. It may interfer with open source files we have now and create a messy system.

My GW is up for sale on EBAY now

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Hey y'all,

First of all, I really appreciated the work of Gateway 3DS's flashcard since today. But today is the day for me to change from GW to A9LH with Luma on my new3DS and to say goodbye to Gateway.

I really had fun over the last 2 years with Gateway and I still think they're doing a great job. But now I'm on a point to think about it, what would be the best Firmware for future updates, games, hacking and other stuff on my console. That means, I'm done with Gateway (for now!) on my primary console.


Now guys, I really need your help with setting the whole things up because I really have no clue about the A9LH and Luma thingys, only read some things about it.

So my questions are: What would be the best setup? Where do I find a complete tutorial here on gbatemp which includes A9LH setup (of course the safest way) and the newest Luma3DS commit. Do I need Emunand anymore or is it possible to have Luma3DS in Emunand or make it no sense? Any more advantages or disadvantages?

Many questions but I think y'all can answer this who are familiar with A9LH and Luma3DS. I really appreciate any answer to helping me through the whole progress!

I deleted my Gateway 3DS Emunand (11.0.0-33E) yesterday and have a freshly formatted new3DS XL (european) w/ 9.2.0-20E Sysnand (Cubic Ninja & OOT, too).


Thanks again in advance!

-Traiver

This is the one and only A9LH guide you should be using: https://github.com/Plailect/Guide/wiki
You will need emuNAND as part of the OTP process but you can get rid of it once you're done with the guide.

 

[Ramzh]

I just ditched GW for a9lh today and it's fantastic, 100% boot rate, etc and wish I done it sooner. You lose .3ds drag and drop and cheats that GW has, yet just use CIA installs instead.

Rednand is basically Emunand but its a better version than GW. You can also do the following:

You will no longer be able to boot without the SD card in, that is normal.
You will now boot a Custom Firmware based SysNAND by default.
You can now hold Select on boot to launch the Luma3DS configuration menu.
You can now hold Start on boot to launch Decrypt9, a full featured NAND tool.
You can now hold Y on boot to launch EmuNAND9, a full featured RedNAND and SD management tool.
You can now hold X on boot to launch Uncart, a tool for converting a physical game cart to an installable file.

Trust me, you wont look back and who knows what GW installs with their locked down DRM payloads. It may interfer with open source files we have now and create a messy system.

My GW is up for sale on EBAY now

I actually complete forgot about not be able to boot with SD
Oh BTW make sure to create saves compatible for .cias from .3ds games via this guide before getting into the A9LH so you can inject them later if you need to
OT: My GW has been sold today

 

[Traiver]

I'll answer your questions in stack order.
Decrypt9WIP is launched at boot from a9lh, making bricking nearly impossible (less relevant because you have a hardmod, but it's nice to have everything on system imo)
BootNTR works fine on Luma
RedNAND is EmuNAND with some minor technical differences. You use it in the setup because backups take much less time. At the end though you switch to updated sysnand mode.

Okay, thanks. What's if I'm unhappy though (I know the situation will not happen, I think...) and my Sysnand is already on 11.0.0-33E and I haven't any hardmod installed, what could I do to downgrade back to the original system with 9.2.0-20E (Question from another friend) I know, for me it's easy to downgrade with my .bin file but not for my friend.

Is it even possible to use A9LH with Luma3DS and GW at the same time like: Luma3DS in Sysnand with A9LH and GW in Emunand just for playing .3ds files (it's necessary for my rom project, that I'm doing) because creating a .CIA file every single time and install it then costs too much time for me.

 

[Ramzh]

Okay, thanks. What's if I'm unhappy though (I know the situation will not happen, I think...) and my Sysnand is already on 11.0.0-33E and I haven't any hardmod installed, what could I do to downgrade back to the original system with 9.2.0-20E (Question from another friend) I know, for me it's easy to downgrade with my .bin file but not for my friend.

Is it even possible to use A9LH with Luma3DS and GW at the same time like: Luma3DS in Sysnand with A9LH and GW in Emunand just for playing .3ds files (it's necessary for my rom project, that I'm doing) because creating a .CIA file every single time and install it then costs too much time for me.

If you mean A9LH sysNAND you can downgrade it back to 9.2 by using Decrypt9 while holding start on 3ds boot and flash the 9.2 NAND backup to get the original 9.2

 

[Traiver]

I just ditched GW for a9lh today and it's fantastic, 100% boot rate, etc and wish I done it sooner. You lose .3ds drag and drop and cheats that GW has, yet just use CIA installs instead.

Rednand is basically Emunand but its a better version than GW. You can also do the following:

You will no longer be able to boot without the SD card in, that is normal.
You will now boot a Custom Firmware based SysNAND by default.
You can now hold Select on boot to launch the Luma3DS configuration menu.
You can now hold Start on boot to launch Decrypt9, a full featured NAND tool.
You can now hold Y on boot to launch EmuNAND9, a full featured RedNAND and SD management tool.
You can now hold X on boot to launch Uncart, a tool for converting a physical game cart to an installable file.

Trust me, you wont look back and who knows what GW installs with their locked down DRM a9lh payloads. It may interfer with open source files we have now and create a messy system.

My GW is up for sale on EBAY now

It's still interesting what's possible now, wow! Can I still use my GW Menu, that I can make easily copies of my physical cartridges?

 

[astronautlevel]

Okay, thanks. What's if I'm unhappy though (I know the situation will not happen, I think...) and my Sysnand is already on 11.0.0-33E and I haven't any hardmod installed, what could I do to downgrade back to the original system with 9.2.0-20E (Question from another friend) I know, for me it's easy to downgrade with my .bin file but not for my friend.

It's entirely possible! You have CFW so you can just downgrade using the PlaiSysUpdater CIA. If you have a 9.2 NAND.bin you can restore that using Decrypt9WIP, there's even an option to keep a9lh when restoring!

Is it even possible to use A9LH with Luma3DS and GW at the same time like: Luma3DS in Sysnand with A9LH and GW in Emunand just for playing .3ds files (it's necessary for my rom project, that I'm doing) because creating a .CIA file every single time and install it then costs too much time for me.

You can create a 9.2 EmuNAND to launch the Gateway CIA from, or you can try what liomajor is working on for GW a9lh. I don't know much about this because I never owned a GW, but if you want I'm sure someone here can help you

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It's still interesting what's possible now, wow! Can I still use my GW Menu, that I can make easily copies of my physical cartridges?

Uncart (which is an arm9payload, meaning you can launch it at boot) does this as well

 

[Traiver]

Phew, thanks for answering my questions. I'm still thinking if I forgot something but I think I'll try it now and teach my friend through the whole progress, too. This will be a long night now...

 

[kublai]

If CFW can play .3ds roms directly, I would dump my GW cart. Takes too much time to convert and install .cia files.

 

[astronautlevel]

If CFW can play .3ds roms directly, I would dump my GW cart. Takes too much time to convert and install .cia files.

Fortunately, you don't need to!

If you're dumping from a cart this will still be the only option, but if you just want CIA files the best option is probably CIAngel - it downloads and installs games directly, using the proper protocols, straight from Nintendo's servers! Plus, it runs on your 3ds directly and has a search option. If you don't want that, you can use shameless to generate a QR code which you can then install using FBI, which will also download it from Nintendo's CDN.

 

[Traiver]

Oh I found another question: I have a Supercard DSTWO flashcard and I want to play with it sometimes. Is that also possible with Luma3DS & A9LH and what about GBA .cias?

 

[Asia81]

you can use your flashcard fine, same for gba vc cia

 

[Traiver]

you can use your flashcard fine, same for gba vc cia

You already changed from GW to Luma, too? x)

 

[Asia81]

from a long time

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mine is collecting dust

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I wait for a bin payload, if no, I sell it