Hacking New 3DS XL Recovery Assistance

[intrnt_dolphin]

Oh man. Hate to have my first post after lurking GBAtemp for so long be in regards to un-bricking assistance, but here we are.

I'm a casual homebrew enthusiast when it comes to the 3DS, but I had nonetheless installed a CFW on my "new" 3DS XL around the end of 2016. I didn't pay much attention to it for a long while, but sometime later in early 2017 I followed the A9LH to B9S guide and upgraded my 3DS to (I think) 11.4 with redNAND. However, at some point later I did something and ended up busting my sysNAND (and possibly the redNAND?) -- I now get a kernel panic on every boot. I know that's not very specific, but at that time of that screw-up I had a backup of my sysNAND -- so I simply said "meh" and thought I'd restore it at a later date. Now, I no longer remember what I did, and my sysNAND backup was lost during an HDD bust.

I am able to enter Luma3DS's config (v9.1/boot.firm) through B9S, and I can also successfully enter GodMode9. I also have a backup of my SD card at the time of my system's failure, in case it's possible to recover the redNAND and boot from that. So far, I have tried finding the instructions I followed for redNAND in an effort to see if I could reverse-engineer to locate any problems or discrepancies -- didn't find 'em.

So with all of that in mind, do I have any options for recovery here? I have a couple other friends with a new 3DS XL, would getting a dump of their sysNAND be of any use to me? Have I, truly and finally, bricked my 3DS?

Thanks for putting up with this.

P.S. Let me know if you'd like to see my SD card backup at the time this issue started to occur.

 

[Hayato213]

Beside CTR Transfer NAND , you can only use NAND backup associated to your system. Don't use your friends or other console NAND backup, or you will brick.

 

[intrnt_dolphin]

Ahhh. I was afraid there may be some keys or serials associated with each 3DS' NANDs that would make reflashing to stock harder than it seemed...

So I guess what it boils down to is this: a) do I need a CTRT NAND of the same version as my system's corrupted sysNAND, or can I just willy-nilly install any 11.4+ CTRT NAND with no consequence (other than an updated system), and b) how could I retrieve my sysNAND's version without being able to boot into it since I can't remember what version I was on?

And finally, just so I have this correct, I should be able to boot back into my sysNAND by installing an appropriate CTRT in it's place? And that would essentially just bring my 3DS back to stock, yeah?

 

[Hayato213]

https://3ds.hacks.guide/ctrtransfer.html

https://quantumcat1.github.io/9.2.0-ctrtransfer.html

These are what available for CTR Transfer, 9.2.0-20U/E/J, and 11.5.0-38U/E/J.

Only use this if you don't have your own nand backup and have like a black screen when your sysnand doesn't load and your Luma3DS config menu and chain loader works. CTR Nand Transfer is basically a clean nand transfer, you would lose data of previous games you installed.

 

[intrnt_dolphin]

Hey thanks for your continued help Hayato.

The last sentence sounds exactly like me -- no NAND backup, black screen on boot/sysNAND doesn't start up, and my Luma3DS config menu works and so does the chain loader (entering GM9 just fine). I'm okay with losing any saved game data -- just wanna use my 3DS again.

I followed the first guide you linked and used the US v11.5 CTRTransfer .bin for the new 3DS/2DS. I followed each step successfully, but I still couldn't boot. I held the power button down for a couple of seconds at the black boot screen, released it, and was greeted by the same kernel panic.

Did the CTRTransfer not perform properly, or do you something else might be wrong with my 3DS?

 

[Hayato213]

Hey thanks for your continued help Hayato.

The last sentence sounds exactly like me -- no NAND backup, black screen on boot/sysNAND doesn't start up, and my Luma3DS config menu works and so does the chain loader (entering GM9 just fine). I'm okay with losing any saved game data -- just wanna use my 3DS again.

I followed the first guide you linked and used the US v11.5 CTRTransfer .bin for the new 3DS/2DS. I followed each step successfully, but I still couldn't boot. I held the power button down for a couple of seconds at the black boot screen, released it, and was greeted by the same kernel panic.

Did the CTRTransfer not perform properly, or do you something else might be wrong with my 3DS?

As far as I know for some people 11.4 and 11.5 CTR nand transfer doesn't work for them, try the 9.2.0 one

 

[intrnt_dolphin]

Ahhh good to know there's still hope then. I'll try the 9.2.0 image next.

I noticed the (I'm guessing older) 9.2.0 CTRTransfer guide doesn't use the GM9 script to automatically transfer tickets after the CTRTransfer. Would it be easier and safe for me to just use the script that the 11.5.0 guide called for?

 

[Hayato213]

Ahhh good to know there's still hope then. I'll try the 9.2.0 image next.

I noticed the (I'm guessing older) 9.2.0 CTRTransfer guide doesn't use the GM9 script to automatically transfer tickets after the CTRTransfer. Would it be easier and safe for me to just use the script that the 11.5.0 guide called for?

You can use it with Godmode 9, godmode9 require certain scripts to restore nand backup, if Godmode9 doesn't work for you use Decrypt9wip.

https://github.com/d0k3/Decrypt9WIP/releases

 

[intrnt_dolphin]

Hm... no dice. Performed a CTRT to 9.2.0 and was greeted by yet another black screen.

This time, however, holding the power button down to turn the device off did not lead to a kernel panic -- sort of. The blue light just sort of faded out.

I redid the CTRT once more just in case, but nothing. I can still access Luma3DS' config and GM9 just fine.

EDIT:
I'm guessing that with my only option for NAND recovery not working, this is pretty much a bricked console, yes? Unfortunate, but please let me know if there are any other options or resources that may be available to me.

 

[Hayato213]

Hm... no dice. Performed a CTRT to 9.2.0 and was greeted by yet another black screen.

This time, however, holding the power button down to turn the device off did not lead to a kernel panic -- sort of. The blue light just sort of faded out.

I redid the CTRT once more just in case, but nothing. I can still access Luma3DS' config and GM9 just fine.

EDIT:
I'm guessing that with my only option for NAND recovery not working, this is pretty much a bricked console, yes? Unfortunate, but please let me know if there are any other options or resources that may be available to me.

I'm afraid there are no other method, hardmod only works for people that brick if you have your own nand backup.

There use to be a 11.4 CTR Transfer nand file, but it seem it gotten replaced with 11.5.

You can try the 11.2 and 11.4 below, as your current situation it doesn't hurt to see if these two if it load up. You did said you also tried the 11.5 one?


https://github.com/LioMajor/Guide-v2/wiki/CTR-Transfer

 

[intrnt_dolphin]

Ah, that sucks. Well, I still have two more shots with 11.2 and 11.4 -- I'll try 11.4 and then 11.2, hopefully one of them will do the trick. Unfortunate that I no longer have my NAND backup.

And yes, 11.5 is the very first one I tried.

I guess I'll try to see if I get some use out of the 3D display screen if everything else fails, haha!

EDIT:
The images on the GitHub page you linked are for European consoles -- would that be okay on my US device or do I need to hunt down other CTR images?

 

[Hayato213]

Ah, that sucks. Well, I still have two more shots with 11.2 and 11.4 -- I'll try 11.4 and then 11.2, hopefully one of them will do the trick. Unfortunate that I no longer have my NAND backup.

And yes, 11.5 is the very first one I tried.

I guess I'll try to see if I get some use out of the 3D display screen if everything else fails, haha!

Well unless you are good at taking stuffs apart and putting it back together and still functioning then I wouldn't recommend it. If the 3ds is like completely unrecoverable maybe it is time to move on to a new console like the switch if you don't have one. 3DS do have a lot of good titles but the system is moving toward it end of life cycle. As for the switch, SciresM has Atmosphere coming out this month if you are interested in buying/hacking a switch.

 

[intrnt_dolphin]

Oooh. I just might get a Switch for cheap off of eBay or something -- thanks Hayato.

In the meantime, I edited my post above with this question, but do I need to track down some CRT's for my region of the console, or will the EU versions work?

 

[Hayato213]

If it work you system would be under an E not U if you are in the US.

Basically you would be region changing
https://3ds.hacks.guide/region-changing

 

[intrnt_dolphin]

...nope! I think my 3DS is done for. Unfortunate as I spent less than 4 hours actually playing with the console, haha!

I tried CTRTransfer with both 11.2 and 11.4 (as well as 11.5 and 9.2 earlier), and none of them booted -- just a black screen with either a kernel panic or a power LED fade-out.

Thanks a lot for your help anyways, Hayato!

P.S. idk if mods like to lock threads or not, but you have my permission to do it whenever -- I think we're done here.