ROM Hack Question Possible to transfer saves from old exploitable Switch to Mariko? (Without updating OG’s firmware)

[Joe Battams]

Hi all,

Ive been a lurker on this forum for many many years, and bought my first switch in Nov 2017, I found out about it being exploitable and was quite happily tinkering with the tools back then on firmware 4.10 and before Nintendo started banning units! I’ve a TX SX dongle for payloads and jig, but things were starting to get a little complicated, especially in finding and installing latest patches...

Anyway, I put it aside and forgot about it for a while, but when the new Mariko unit was newly released I saved up and bought one in the Black Friday sales to keep completely clean (no other choice I guess!) and play the brilliant games I had previously bought (still cringe about burning fuses though). Have only had it a couple of days, but had put a lot of hours into Zelda- my original unit has been in aeroplane mode since early 2018 and still running on 4.10- I tried to get my head round emuNAND (was easy on 3ds!), but am struggling I must admit.

I ideally don’t want to update the firmware of my original unit (I know there are ‘tools’ and a certain IRC site where I can get firmware to do this), but was hoping someone could point me in the direction of an easy to understand emuNAND guide, and whether it’s possible to have that on latest firmware and switch itself on 4.10?

I guess though that doesn’t really help with save transfers, as from what I’ve seen, it looks like both units have to be connected to web and not just each other (was hoping I could just unplug router and transfer across... haha), so was also wondering if there are any ways to dump save states e.g. like though checkpoint, but then somehow import them into new switch? Or are save games encrypted to each switch?

Sorry for all my questions, don’t think it’s going to be possible, but on the plus side get to enjoy Zelda all over again!

Cheers!

 

[8BitWonder]

Since saves are stored in the NAND you would need a means of dumping, modifying and restoring the modified user partition of the NAND.

This can be done with exploitable units just fine (though checkpoint is better for obvious reasons) however there are no public means yet for dumping/modifying/restoring the NAND of Mariko units.

TL;DR You can't currently transfer saves from an exploitable switch to a Mariko unit offline/unofficially.

 

[Joe Battams]

Ok, thanks @8BitWonder! I thought it was probably the case- I think if I were to try taking my OG exploitable switch off aeroplane mode and try to get it to transfer to the mariko unit, it will just say 'it needs to connect to the internet to see if a firmware update is needed'- regardless of what firmware it's on- which would prob result in an instaban from all the crap that it's collected over the heydey of Switch hacking! I did backup my NAND actually when I first 'exploited' it, but am not quite sure where I stored it tbh- think google drive (which is a bit silly in retrospect, I've always been meticulous at keeping important things in the cloud- but I think Dropbox baulked at the size of the files (think it has 25GB max file size), not that there's anything wrong with google drive, I've just always used Dropbox as my main cloud provider....) and I'd be very hesitant at restoring it without any MD5 type check or something similar!!

 

[DocKlokMan]

Ok, thanks @8BitWonder! I thought it was probably the case- I think if I were to try taking my OG exploitable switch off aeroplane mode and try to get it to transfer to the mariko unit, it will just say 'it needs to connect to the internet to see if a firmware update is needed'- regardless of what firmware it's on- which would prob result in an instaban from all the crap that it's collected over the heydey of Switch hacking! I did backup my NAND actually when I first 'exploited' it, but am not quite sure where I stored it tbh- think google drive (which is a bit silly in retrospect, I've always been meticulous at keeping important things in the cloud- but I think Dropbox baulked at the size of the files (think it has 25GB max file size), not that there's anything wrong with google drive, I've just always used Dropbox as my main cloud provider....) and I'd be very hesitant at restoring it without any MD5 type check or something similar!!

Not that it would matter since your backup wouldn't have the save you want to transfer. Making an emuNAND would only let you play updated games (but since your sysNAND is already dirty there's no point in making an emuNAND honestly).

Really, the only hope you have is the following:

1. Dump your saves from your 4.1.0 Switch using Checkpoint
2. Restore your pre-CFW backup (make a new backup first incase restoring your old backup fails for some reason)
3. Update your sysNAND to latest and make sure your NNID is signed in on both consoles
4. Use Checkpoint to restore your saves you exported earlier
5. Now, as long as you don't do the following, you should have very little risk of ban going online:
   • Do not install pirated NSPs or converted XCIs
   • Do not try going online with XCI games (that don't have a personal certificate)
   • Do not install homebrew NSPs or forwarders (only use homebrew Launcher to run homebrew)
   • Do not use any dev apps as they have blacklisted title IDs
   • Do not use cheats blatantly online in games like Splatoon or MarioKart 8
6. As long as you don't do the above you can briefly connect online to do the local save transfer from your CFW Switch to your Mariko unit

These are the rules that the Atmosphere-NX team follow and they've been going online with CFW since it came out without any bans.