Hacking cfw 2ds xl has black screen on bootup and cant get to home menu

ThatOneCookie

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I have been having this issue for over six months now and tried fixing it but it didn't work I dont get a error menu but i can get to the power-off menu but still cant get to the home menu When attempting to load the home menu it freezes I dont know what to do at this point can someone please help
 

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I have been having this issue for over six months now and tried fixing it but it didn't work I dont get a error menu but i can get to the power-off menu but still cant get to the home menu When attempting to load the home menu it freezes I dont know what to do at this point can someone please help
What happens if you boot without the SD card? If the blue light goes on then off can you try on a different SD card with a freshly downloaded boot.firm from Luma 9.1?
 
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ThatOneCookie

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What happens if you boot without the SD card? If the blue light goes on then off can you try on a different SD card with a freshly downloaded boot.firm from Luma 9.1?
tried it with a fresh sd card with nothing but boot.firm still gets the issue and the 3ds stays on its just a black screen also tried with no sd card and same issue is there anything else i can do
 

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tried it with a fresh sd card with nothing but boot.firm still gets the issue and the 3ds stays on its just a black screen also tried with no sd card and same issue is there anything else i can do
Can you access GodMode9? Get the GodMode9 payload, rename it to boot.firm and put it on the root of the SD card.
 

ThatOneCookie

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upload_2019-5-29_21-44-56.png

which one do i rename
 
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Hmm I have no idea. Weird that you can't get to GodMode9. Do you have an ntrboot flashcart?

I shall summon some more experienced troubleshooters @TurdPooCharger @KleinesSinchen
I tried helping @ThatOneCookie before with no success. :(
I used a ntrboot flashcard to install CFW and i can get to godmode but i dont know what i should do there
Your n2DSXL has access to GodMode9, right?

There's an unconventional way to troubleshoot your CTRNAND... Due to the nature of how the method works, further discussion would have to continue by private message.
La la la, nothing fishy going on here, la la.
 
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ThatOneCookie

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Last edited by ThatOneCookie,
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You guys probably won't believe certain parts of this story that's told here. Just ignore the unimportant details. The only thing that matters is how the n2DSXL was fixed.

For the unconventional idea I proposed, @ThatOneCookie agreed to overnight ship his n2DSXL to me with included prepaid return label. While we came to an agreement on what was to be done on his system, his package nevertheless arrived at my door step as a very quick surprise. It's a darn shame because what I requested from him could have saved him money if only there was another way they could have been sent. Hmm...
This part "totally happened" because of, you know, the forum implications if it didn't. Sorry, can't provide proof or details. I forgot to take pictures of his n2DSXL while it was in my possession, and the mail recipe were hastily thrown away from aggressive recycling. :creep:

Found in the [S:] SYSNAND VIRTUAL, the ctrnand_full.bin, twln.bin, and twlp.bin from his n2DSXL were dumped. These three (3) BIN files are the raw decrypted images of the [1:] SYSNAND CTRNAND, [2:] SYSNAND TWLN(AND), and [3:] SYSNAND TWLP(HOTO).

While I don't condon NAND swapping, sharing, or cloning under normal circumstances, I took his images and flashed them onto my n3DSXL. The idea behind this is to debug the NAND on a substitute 3DS system of the same (new/old)-series that's known to fully work and doesn't have major hardware issues. Even though I could have troubleshooted his n2DSXL as it was, having that Pokeball edition model in my hands proved too distracting with that push button. :mellow:

At first glance in the CTRNAND, none of the n2DSXL's important files were missing or appeared out of place. The [title / import / certs / ticket / tmp_i / tmp_t] *.db, movable.sed, LocalFriendCodeSeed_B, SecureInfo_B, HWCAL0.DAt, HWCAL1.DAt, etc. were all present and looked fine in hex viewer. There was ticket.bak found in 1:/dbs, which meant @ThatOneCookie did attempt built-in GodMode9 CTRTransfer.

I renamed his original ticket.bak back to ticket.db and ran the CTRTransfer (Type D9) script. At the time, I felt a mixture of bored, disappointed, and smug thinking this softbrick was going to be like the others we've witnessed. Surely, no softbricks based in the CTRNAND could withstand the might of Decrypt9 style of CTRTransfer. Muwahaha!

Upon attempting to boot HOME Menu, I was hit with this gut punch.

An exception occurred
Processor: ARM11 (core 0)
Exception type: prefetch abort (svcBreak)
Fault status: Debug event
Current process: menu (0004003000008F02)

Here's a little background information about the 3DS firmware that makes the above event a little startling. Of all the files that are absolutely needed, a 3DS system with custom firmware will successfully boot to HOME Menu if these conditions are met:
  1. The SecureInfo_A/B that's in place is compatible and is set to the correct region hex value.
  2. The title folder containing system titles is mostly intact. You can uninstall almost everything except:
    • 00040130 - System Modules
    • 00040030 - System Applets
    • 00040138#0000002 - (old/new)-series NATIVE_FIRM
    • several some titles related to HOME Menu (can't recall which ones)
  3. The title.db and import.db found in 1:/dbs tied to the title folder is likewise intact.
  4. The CMACs for all the files within CTRNAND are matching or corrected.

Things that can be missing in the CTRNAND.

  • One doesn't need the movable.sed because there's a backup 0x30 slot KeyY found in another file called the otp.bin that the 3DS will default next.
  • You don't need tickets.db in order to boot to HOME Menu, but icons for system titles will be missing.
  • The certs.db handles online services and installing games, etc. Again, not needed to boot to HOME Menu.
  • tmp_i.db and tmp_t.db are the (DS mode) temporary versions of the DSiWare title & import. They're used when switching to TWL_FIRM. Booting to HOME Menu means booting in NATIVE_FIRM.
  • The HWCAL0.DAt and HWCAL1.DAt are hardware calibration files for the two LCD screens. Not having them will make the image quality look bad but doesn't stop anything from functioning.
  • The data folder contains the user's profile. Without it, the 3DS will start a new one like when you set up a fresh profile after doing Format System Memory.

My first assumption for why HOME Menu failed to boot was because the n2DSXL's SecureInfo_B isn't cross compatible with my n3DSXL. However, when I put back in my n3DSXL's own SecureInfo_B, it still refused to boot! NANI?!
I can only surmise my initial shock as something akin to medical biologists who have discovered strains of superbugs that are fully resistant to last line of defense antibiotics.
Luckily, the bad feelings would come to pass as the root cause of the softbrick was eventually found after some dragging/dropping process of elimination.

The bug that long plagued @ThatOneCookie was found at:
the section 'NAND Shared Extdata' said:
ExtdataID
0xf000000b

Description
Contains idb.dat, idbt.dat, gamecoin.dat, ubll.lst, CFL_DB.dat, and CFL_OldDB.dat. These files contain cleartext Miis and some data relating (including cached ICN data) to Play/Usage Records.

Within that folder,
f000000b
00000000
00000001
00000002
00000003
00000004
00000005
00000006
00000007
00000008
Quota.dat

All the files had valid CMACs as calculated by GodMode9. A single suspect file couldn't be isolated because they're interrelated. If one was changed out, this affects the others.

So what are the lessons that can be gleamed from this?
  • :!: Both built-in GodMode9 CTRTransfer and CTRTransfer (Type D9) cannot fix this "gamecoin" softbrick because they're conservative. These two leave alone the data folder.
  • Ironically, the (older program) Decrypt9WIP CTRTransfer could have fixed this, but at the expense of wiping out the user's entire profile. :lol:
    • Decrypt9WIP might not have worked for a different reason. The program has a weird bug where it can abort the CTRTransfer run if it detects a borrowed ticket.db.
  • Anyone who still thinks it's not important to back up a clean *.bin image of the SysNAND should give me his or her 3DS/2DS.
  • The majority of CTRNAND-based softbricks occur in title and dbs folder often due to someone's misuse of FBI, sysUpdater, or system update failure.
  • This is an extremely rare type of CTRNAND-based softbrick. Maybe even the first example of it's kind that's ever heard of. @ThatOneCookie hit the unlucky jackpot of becoming a 3DS case study. Lmao.
  • This type of brick can occur in any of the other extdata and sysdata subfolders found in data, and there are a lot of them. It does not necessarily have to be "gamecoin".
  • The closest SD card equivalent to this NAND brick is this one: Clear Home Menu extdata
    • If the problematic XXXXXXXX subfolder is found, either slowly re-add the files one-by-one after each reboot or delete the folder outright to fix this.
Conclusion
The n2DSXL was reflashed back with its fixed up NAND images, updated to firmware 11.10.0-43U, had its TWL system titles reinstalled, and DS mode tested with flashcart before being sent back. Oh, if @ThatOneCookie tells you a vastly different story than the one listed here, that's just him being modest.
La la, fishiness no where in sight.
 
Last edited by TurdPooCharger,

Focus0685

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For the past two weeks I've been reading about CTR transfer and all related soft bricks that happen with the 3DS, many Turd's posts (very helpful all of them). It turns out until yesterday when I found this post about the gamecoin soft brick that I tried Turd's solution and it fixed my 3DS again. I tried everything: restoring with my CTR backups, updating, restoring CFW file (Luma and the like), quadruple reformat, three times with different SD cards (even with a new 128 GB I did the quadruple reformat), endless verify with H2test, CTRTransfer Type D9, and it kept failing. I were able to boot to the home menu, but after a few hours it would fail again. THIS finally did the trick.

The error was on the extdata folder in my case. Deleted it and I've been playing again, I didn't care about saving information from that folder and everything been working great (except PKSM, I don't seem to be able to recover the bank information, so all my Pokemon are gone as of right now, I'll just keep looking for a way to get them back, I have the files but the program doesn't seem to recognize them.

Anyway, Turd you're awesome, thanks again.

My unit is a New 3DS XL.
 

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