Notice: I am not receiving notifications for this thread. I didn`t realise people were still posting in it.

Please please accept my apologies if I haven`t replied to tags etc... I have no idea what is happening. I`m subscribed to this thread but I am not receiving notifications. Please inbox me if possible. Or tag me in another thread.

Its amazing that people are still checking all of this out. I thank you for all of the help and support I have received in this thread over this year.

Cheers. Matty.


A video showing a modchip in action. Thank you once again to @metaljay for providing this. This is what you can achieve by fitting a chip!

Section 1. Gather your software.

Get your chip software from THIS THREAD.
Follow the flashing instructions there...

Section 2. Removing USB port and unneeded LEDs. (Adafruit chips only)

• Next, we need to remove the USB port from the modchip. I recommend a heatgun or a rework station. Heat up until the USB port just lifts off the modchip.

• Do the same for the LED just to the right of the USB port.

See picture:

You are now ready to fit your device. Proceed to Fitting section.

Section 3. Fitting modchip to your Switch.
New Universal Method. All SAMD-based internal chips. If your chip is not supported and you cannot work it out, PM me.

Trinket M0.
Solder as laid out in the following picture

==================================================
Rebug SwitchME M0. Use Trinket files.
Solder as laid out in the following picture

==================================================
RCMX86 - Internal modchip version.
Solder as laid out in the following picture

==================================================
Gemma M0. Use Gemma files.
Solder as laid out in the following picture

==================================================
ItsyBitsy M0 Express. Use ItsyBitsy files.
Solder as laid out in the following picture

==================================================
Feather M0 Express. Use Feather files.
Solder as laid out in the following picture

BUILD YOUR OWN FROM A QFP ATSAMD21E18. Trinket equivalent pins.
Flash Trinket bootloader using OpenOCD via serial pins SWDIO / SWDCLK. Fit a reset switch somewhere... Or going to power / wake (aka method 2). If building for external use, it is good practice to fit a third capacitor between 3V & GND. This is deliberately vague and ambigious, as this needs research and you need to know what you are doing.

Link for setting the Pi up with OpenOCD: HERE
Raspberry Pi OpenOCD image in downloads section or HERE

Alternative Solder Points

Credit to @consolex for original pic. I`ve added alternative points to solder to:

Credit to @pyorin for this much tidier version showing the same info as the above one!

Replacement Parts List

Spoiler: Parts

Ok... So you have damaged your switch soldering your chip in. Not to worry.

First things first, DO NOT BRIDGE THE CONTACTS HOPING TO REVIVE YOUR SWITCH. With resistors, you may possibly get away with this, but with the capacitors listed below, if you jump these points, you will make a nice short-circuit to the PMIC and / or the M92T36, killing them instantly. Don`t do it.

OK... I`ll list these parts with METHOD 2 & 3 TRINKET PIN NUMBERS and the values of the components they solder to.

TRINKET 3V (POWER SUPPLY) - 2.2uF 0402 size MLCC capacitor. Voltage unimportant as long as it is over 6.3v
TRINKET PIN 2 (POWER ON RESET - goes to pin 5 on M92T36)- 4.7uF 0402 size MLCC capacitor. Voltage unimportant as long as it is over 6.3v
TRINKET PIN 0 (VOL+) - 150R (150 ohms) 0201 Thick Film resistor. 50mW
TRINKET RESET (SWITCH POWER BUTTON) - 150R (150 ohms) 0201 Thick Film resistor. 50mW

I recommend RS components.

FAQ

Q - How do I boot the switch into APX (RCM) mode?

A - You need to short out pin 10 on the right joycon rail to GND with a jig or modded joycon or paperclip (not recommended... Buy a jig you cheap-ass gyppo). Once shorted out, hold down vol+ and power. The switch screen should be off... Plug into your PC and it should recognise a APX device. Well done. You are in RCM.

Q - What glue should I use?
A - Only glue if necessary! Ideally if your soldering is of sufficient quality and your wire is thin enough, you don`t need glue. I use a bit because I am OCD. Anyway, use Epoxy. It`s what I use. Gives you some working time, is solid. Superglue makes a mess DO NOT USE SUPERGLUE. The only thing super about it is how it melts things. Epoxy won`t stick to the shield long-term, so bear that in mind. Pure Acetone will remove epoxy. Acetone tends to remove / melt anything to be warned. CHECK YOUR GLUE WON`T GO CONDUCTIVE OVER TIME - LOOKING AT YOU SCAMSUNG! The combination of heat cycles and absorbing of moisture can turn adhesive into a high-impedance connection!

Q - What size wire should I use?
A - I use AWG40 magnet wire or AWG30 Kynar. AWG40 goes onto components easier... And if you snap it, chances are the wire will snap and not the trace / component.
A2 - You can also use AWG30. I recommend Kynar wrapping wire but any will do. Looks nice, good resistance to elements, tidy. Nothing thicker than AWG30. You are just causing yourself more headaches. Trust me.

Q - Is AWG40 thick enough?
A - Yes. AWG40 is good for around 90mA.

Q - which methods do you recommend?
A - Connect all the straps...

Q - how do you recommend to set it up?
A - Fusee Suite. Search for Fusee Suite or go to link at top of this OP.

Q - My switch is flat and won't turn on.
A - Have you got the charger connected? Disconnect it or your switch won't boot! Boot to a payload (SX loader/Hekate), reconnect charger and leave on the payload menu and charge. Leave for 15 minutes and switch will start normally. It will continue charging one booted.

Disclaimer:
You have only yourself to blame. This voids warranty. This may or may not get you banned from online services. If it does, you got yourself banned. I`m not responsible if you kill your switch / your first-born with any of this in this post. I`m not infalliable. I`m partly senile. Do your own research. Kids, get bill payers permission before you attempt even using a screwdriver.
NUTSHELL: Don`t come having a go at me because you fooked your £300 console up. I`ll do my best to help you though if you do, Just don`t blame me.

Credits to Quantum-Cross, Atlas44, @Ninoh-FOX , @jcrorxp , @tecfreak, @mooglazer, @subcon959, @64Dp128k, @mikeleuskaldunak, @M-O-B, CTCaer, @evilsperm, @consolex and everyone else for valuable input.

IF YOU REQUIRE SUPPORT, IF YOUR CONSOLE ISN`T WORKING CORRECTLY... PLEASE POST A HIGH RESOLUTION PICTURE OF YOUR INSTALL. You might think it isn`t your soldering, but in all cases with the new methods, it is bad soldering. So, please post a picture.

A BRIEF WARNING - PLEASE READ

Spoiler: READ THIS

THIS MOD IS NOT FOR THE FEINT OF HEART. WE ARE SOLDERING TO TRACES AND COMPONENTS ON THE FRONT SIDE OF THE BOARD TO SAVE HAVING TO REMOVE THE BOARD AND SOLDER TO TESTPOINTS. IF YOU ARE STRUGGLING, OR THINK YOU ARE GOING TO STRUGGLE, PLEASE PLEASE SOLDER TO THE TEST POINTS NOTED IN THIS AND OTHER THREADS (YOU WILL NEED TO REMOVE THE MOTHERBOARD). DOUBLE - TRIPLE CHECK EVERYTHING. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!
Good soldering skills are needed!
A magnifying glass is needed!
Good soldering iron needed - ideally with a 0.3 conical tip. No more than 30w!
SECURE YOUR WIRES PRIOR TO SOLDERING. Stick them down with double-sided tape.
Only use glue if you need to and glue wires after soldering. Don`t glue the solder to the component!
Put the tiniest amount of glue on the PCB mask only. Never on components. Use a cocktail stick for more glue control!!!
Take a look at alternative solder points to get you out of the sh*t if you do rip something off the board
If you aren`t the best at soldering, then think very carefully about connecting to pin 6 capacitor (the one in these new methods). If you rip this pad, you WILL NEED TO REMOVE YOUR BOARD and run from a testpoint.

 

[hack_my_switch]

Question.

Looking at method 1, is the 3v solder point on the top of the capacitor?

 

[mattytrog]

Question.

Looking at method 1, is the 3v solder point on the top of the capacitor?

It has to be attached to it

 

[Nazosan]

Well I got a couple of scares with this. Man that capacitor is tiny. I don't even know how I did it. I thought I had a fairly steady hand, but not when I tried this. Somehow I got it. It truly frightened me when I finally got the SwitchMe trinket to show up on USB (I didn't realize it, but it seems you must be out of RCM mode to do this because nothing would make it show the "USB drive" to the computer until I let it boot the system then double pressed the reset switch at that point) and copied over the file only to have the system suddenly go blank and seem to refuse to turn on. I guess that was a hard power cutoff reset or something? It seemed to be unable to turn on, so I thought I did something bad for sure. (I did the simple four wire mode as I lack the confidence to do any more and I don't want unnecessary battery drain either.) When I held the power button for a bit for a hard poweroff then tried to turn it on again this time it turns on and delivers the payload (and I note with a bit of joy that it's even faster than TegraRCMSmash seems to be. Insanely fast and just so much more convenient without anything external.)

Anyway, one thing I do want to say: I noticed right away that in the instruction pictures it's more efficient to turn the SwitchMe board the other way versus what is shown there. You need much smaller wires going a much shorter distance that way. Worked fine for me. I cut a small hole out of the case with a rotary tool to minimize the effects and there was still plenty of room for running wires over the USB connector and such between the board and the case without any bulge.

BTW, did anyone else have troubles with the ground connector? For some reason it just would NOT solder for me. All the rest were fine -- even that capacitor didn't really fight with me thank goodness -- but that ground connection just would not stay soldered. It just popped right loose the moment I let go. Of note, the pictures are showing clean test points, but mine had a very tiny bit of solder on each of them instead. Still, the two data lines had no problem. I turned the heat up on my iron and it still took several tries. (I don't know how accurate it is on this iron. I normally use 325 on it as it seems to be the best balance between just hot enough to melt solder and actually get it to properly join with things without being too excessive. With this I had to raise it just a bit more to 350. Of course, this dial may not be accurate by any means.)

 

[consolex]

 

[olku]

BTW, did anyone else have troubles with the ground connector? For some reason it just would NOT solder for me. All the rest were fine -- even that capacitor didn't really fight with me thank goodness -- but that ground connection just would not stay soldered. It just popped right loose the moment I let go. Of note, the pictures are showing clean test points, but mine had a very tiny bit of solder on each of them instead. Still, the two data lines had no problem. I turned the heat up on my iron and it still took several tries. (I don't know how accurate it is on this iron. I normally use 325 on it as it seems to be the best balance between just hot enough to melt solder and actually get it to properly join with things without being too excessive. With this I had to raise it just a bit more to 350. Of course, this dial may not be accurate by any means.)

I also had trouble soldering ground, I tried several ground points but non would stick, it took like 10 tries until I finally got it to stick.

 

[Nazosan]

Well at least it's not just me. I actually put a tiny dab of rosin on it before raising the heat on the iron, but in the end it seemed to just take a lot more heat on that point versus all the others. I find it strange the ground connector would be the one that would be so resistant though. Oh well.

 

[bill55]

I'm having all sorts of problems with my SwitchMe.

1. I direct wired it to the PC. The REBUG_BOOT drive shows up. I can read from it. When I drag a UF2 file to it, it seems to go there. I cannot remove any of the other files. If I try to they disappear but if I reboot the system the 3 original files are all back and the new one is gone.

2. I have tried wiring the chip with method 1 and 3.
a. With method 1 I tried using the manual RCM jig, but I get no payload logo or anything. Just stock Switch boots up.
b. With method 3 I should not need RCM jig, but I get the same results as above.

3. With the chip installed when I double click the button and connect to PC the REBUG_BOOT drive shows up again, but functions the same as #1.

4. Is there something I am missing? I am thinking the chip might have an issue since those 3 files won't go away and every flash seems to do nothing. The CURRENT.UF2 file that is 512KB is there every time after reboot even if I drag over a new payload that is only 63KB. It's making me think that nothing is actually happening.

Please someone help! :-)
Thanks!

 

[Huntereb]

1. I direct wired it to the PC. The REBUG_BOOT drive shows up. I can read from it. When I drag a UF2 file to it, it seems to go there. I cannot remove any of the other files. If I try to they disappear but if I reboot the system the 3 original files are all back and the new one is gone.

All you should have to do is copy and paste your new UF2 to REBUG_BOOT and the device will automatically restart with the new payload (Eg; it should just disappear from your file explorer). You don't have to delete any of the original files, just try to give it a few seconds.

 

[bill55]

All you should have to do is copy and paste your new UF2 to REBUG_BOOT and the device will automatically restart with the new payload (Eg; it should just disappear from your file explorer). You don't have to delete any of the original files, just try to give it a few seconds.

I finally got this to work with the SX_OS.UF2 payload. The others I tried did not do this. The device just stayed there. Never rebooted. Now I am using the 4 wire method and a paperclip to jump the first and last pins of the right controller connection on the console when I power it up but I still get nothing different. Just a stock Switch. Am I doing something wrong?

 

[comput3rus3r]

Nice, now we can have a $9 SX Pro once the SX OS cracking is complete.

so how close do you think we are to a free sx-os?

 

[Akurosia]

Hi,
i used method 1 with a trinket m0 and the multiloader on it.
It loads all files sucessfully but i just can't get the trinket into the "pc" mode.
It just cycles between red and purple led color.
Any advice?

 

[Huntereb]

so how close do you think we are to a free sx-os?

We don't need it anymore, the free software solutions have far surpassed it in functionality.

 

[comput3rus3r]

We don't need it anymore, the free software solutions have far surpassed it in functionality.

really? what can you do with free solutions that you can't do with sx-os?

 

[Flying Scotsman]

Anyone know how much battery Method 3 would use?

I've got a SwitchME in the mail, and am trying to figure out whether Method 1 or 3 would be the better solution. I don't want to have to re-open my Switch further down the line to change the method config (don't like the idea of having to unsolder and solder onto different surface mount caps...) but the "will drain battery" without how much battery it'll drain is mildly concerning (are we talking 1 - 2% a night or are we looking more at 10 - 15% battery life?).

*Edit* Rebug posted an alternate 4 wire install which doesn't seem to use any caps but uses 5V instead of 3?

 

[mattytrog]

Anyone know how much battery Method 3 would use?

I've got a SwitchME in the mail, and am trying to figure out whether Method 1 or 3 would be the better solution. I don't want to have to re-open my Switch further down the line to change the method config (don't like the idea of having to unsolder and solder onto different surface mount caps...) but the "will drain battery" without how much battery it'll drain is mildly concerning (are we talking 1 - 2% a night or are we looking more at 10 - 15% battery life?).

*Edit* Rebug posted an alternate 4 wire install which doesn't seem to use any caps but uses 5V instead of 3?

Yes. But that will still use power from the battery. It is basically method 3 without the POR and RCM straps. I know the capacitor is hard to solder to, but it is the only way of doing it so your battery doesn`t go flat. You can remove the motherboard and go to the testpoint I highlighted in OP.

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

Hi,
i used method 1 with a trinket m0 and the multiloader on it.
It loads all files sucessfully but i just can't get the trinket into the "pc" mode.
It just cycles between red and purple led color.
Any advice?

Leave switch unplugged from everything.

Make sure you are on main screen of switch

Double-press reset

then plug into USB. Rebug-boot should pop up.

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

I finally got this to work with the SX_OS.UF2 payload. The others I tried did not do this. The device just stayed there. Never rebooted. Now I am using the 4 wire method and a paperclip to jump the first and last pins of the right controller connection on the console when I power it up but I still get nothing different. Just a stock Switch. Am I doing something wrong?

Yes. You aren`t holding vol+

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

Double-posted again... Shit.

Anyway...

I have made a few alterations to the ShaXLauncher if anybody is using it. Basically, you don`t need to convert payloads to <whatever>.dat any more. Just drag and drop. Anyone interested?

 

[Flying Scotsman]

Yes. But that will still use power from the battery. It is basically method 3 without the POR and RCM straps. I know the capacitor is hard to solder to, but it is the only way of doing it so your battery doesn`t go flat. You can remove the motherboard and go to the testpoint I highlighted in OP.

Am I right in saying with method 3 (and the capacitor) - I wouldn't be at risk of the battery going flat and the Switch not booting (the battery issue AutoRCM users had in other words)? That was my biggest concern but if that's not an issue, I'll go with method 3.

 

[mattytrog]

Am I right in saying with method 3 (and the capacitor) - I wouldn't be at risk of the battery going flat and the Switch not booting (the battery issue AutoRCM users had in other words)? That was my biggest concern but if that's not an issue, I'll go with method 3.

With method 3 (and with rebugs "always on"), the problem is the Trinket / SwitchME is constantly powered (although asleep).

In my tests, this uses 1.2mA. Which doesn`t sound a lot. And it isn`t.

Most of that 1.2mA is used by the Low-Drop-Out regulator on the "chips" PCB rather than the "chip" itself. The actual chip uses very very little.

This cannot be switched off, so the Rebug / Trinket will be powered all of the time in method 3.

This 1.2mA figure I quoted is just powering the chip externally in bench tests.

It may use more than this when actually fitted into the switch as there will be constant power going through the switch motherboard, possibly keeping other parts running (almost like parasitic power). Though I haven`t tested this. This is a theory.

So, if you do method 3 or Rebugs always on method, while very easy, don`t be surprised if you put your switch away for a few days/weeks/months/whatever, come back to it, and find it completely flat. Like I said in another thread, portable devices will only let you discharge the battery to a certain "safe" level.

But with method 3, there is no "safe" level and the chip will keep running until the voltage in the battery gets that low, the regulator drops out.

This will be close to 0 volts. That is DANGEROUS territory for a lithium battery.

EDIT:
Actually I just looked over my notes and I have a figure where it dropped out at 2.1v. This is still damaging to the battery if not as dangerous. Bear in mind all regulators aren`t created equal. Some may drop out later or earlier. Depends on which regulator is fitted. This could still be dangerous though so keep it in mind.

 

[mattytrog]

Added Hekate-dev for itsy to OP. Get from my Github. Will try to keep it updated, but I forget.

 

[Huntereb]

really? what can you do with free solutions that you can't do with sx-os?

Game cheating/debugging, full service permissions, legitimate telemetry disabling, custom boot logos, background audio playback, and infinitely more because it's open source. Oh, and you don't have to rely on daddy TX to push out three or more updates to fix shit that's already been fixed for weeks or months on the free software solutions.

 

[comput3rus3r]

Game cheating/debugging, full service permissions, legitimate telemetry disabling, custom boot logos, background audio playback, and infinitely more because it's open source. Oh, and you don't have to rely on daddy TX to push out three or more updates to fix shit that's already been fixed for weeks or months on the free software solutions.

how do you do game cheating?

 

[evilsperm]

I also had trouble soldering ground, I tried several ground points but non would stick, it took like 10 tries until I finally got it to stick.

This is why I solder gnd right to the USB shield

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

I finally got this to work with the SX_OS.UF2 payload. The others I tried did not do this. The device just stayed there. Never rebooted. Now I am using the 4 wire method and a paperclip to jump the first and last pins of the right controller connection on the console when I power it up but I still get nothing different. Just a stock Switch. Am I doing something wrong?

Told you 10 times on Twitter your doing it wrong.
The name never changes because that what the uf2 instant flash changes it to no matter what you name it to.
And on top of that if your not using rcm strap mode you need a jig and have to press POWER & VOL + at the same time.