Hacking Deleted a 0-block blank file from Data Management = Everything gone

CraddaPoosta · Nov 10, 2014

While looking through Data Management at all of the .cia files I had installed, I noticed one that was blank, took up zero blocks, and had no banner. Tried to delete it, which it tried to do for about a full minute, before returning with a message that that file could not be deleted.

It deleted everything on my big SD card. All my Gateway saves. None of the games I had installed showed up anymore. My theme was gone. All of my eShop purchases were gone. My card still showed that it was almost full, as it was before I tried deleting that blank file.

My only option was to format my SD card, and now I get to start over for the third time.

Don't delete this file, if you see it under Data Management.

y03usw6e · Nov 10, 2014

Were you on sysnand, or emunand?

CraddaPoosta · Nov 10, 2014

I guess I should have specified. I was on EmuNAND.

Ryft · Nov 10, 2014

Neo Draven said:
While looking through Data Management at all of the .cia files I had installed, I noticed one that was blank, took up zero blocks, and had no banner. Tried to delete it, which it tried to do for about a full minute, before returning with a message that that file could not be deleted.

It deleted everything on my big SD card. All my Gateway saves. None of the games I had installed showed up anymore. My theme was gone. All of my eShop purchases were gone. My card still showed that it was almost full, as it was before I tried deleting that blank file.

My only option was to format my SD card, and now I get to start over for the third time.

Don't delete this file, if you see it under Data Management.

Ick that sucks. That's the risk we take when we fiddle with hacked stuff. I wonder how many people were reminded to backup saves after reading this.

daxtsu · Nov 10, 2014

Another reminder: Don't visit data management on realNAND either at all, it accomplishes the same thing by deleting all of your installed CIA files.

cearp · Nov 10, 2014

i'm a little scared that by mistake i will press that 3 button combo to delete all the installed things, i'll just be careful

gamefan5 · Nov 10, 2014

And if that happens, thank god I backup everything XD

Qtis · Nov 10, 2014

Generally it's recommended to backup all your stuff when you do or plan to do any kind of modifications. In most cases it's just a few minutes of waiting (even a full 128 GB SD cart transfers quickly on USB 3.0). Still, rarely people actually do it.. Neo Draven: Did you happen to backup your SD at some point before or are all the files gone?

CraddaPoosta · Nov 10, 2014

All of the files are gone. Something I did when I deleted that file corrupted the file system structure, so it didn't show any of my games in the Nintendo DS folder, which was practically empty, but it still showed 20/28GB used. I had to format it and start over this morning.

mvmiranda · Nov 10, 2014

cearp said:
i'm a little scared that by mistake i will press that 3 button combo to delete all the installed things, i'll just be careful

I'm afraid you don't mean CTRL+ALT+DEL

AHHAhAHAH

Yup, that sucks, but backup is a must when tinkering with these features.

Zidapi · Nov 11, 2014

Neo Draven said:
All of the files are gone. Something I did when I deleted that file corrupted the file system structure, so it didn't show any of my games in the Nintendo DS folder, which was practically empty, but it still showed 20/28GB used. I had to format it and start over this morning.

Ahh too bad! I've was able to restore my data from a corrupted file system error recently (I hadn't backed up any saves or anything else for that matter).
It took a lot of work, and a lot of reading, but I'm confident with it now.

I was successfully able to restore my MiiPlaza data including hats/costumes, puzzle progress, as well as standard and doc minigame progress. All mail and stationary from letterbox. Save games for all eShop titles, along with extdata from a couple of cartridge based games.

Sorry I didn't see this thread til now, I'd have been happy to share my wisdom.

Maximilious · Feb 4, 2015

Neo Draven said:
While looking through Data Management at all of the .cia files I had installed, I noticed one that was blank, took up zero blocks, and had no banner. Tried to delete it, which it tried to do for about a full minute, before returning with a message that that file could not be deleted.

It deleted everything on my big SD card. All my Gateway saves. None of the games I had installed showed up anymore. My theme was gone. All of my eShop purchases were gone. My card still showed that it was almost full, as it was before I tried deleting that blank file.

My only option was to format my SD card, and now I get to start over for the third time.

Don't delete this file, if you see it under Data Management.

I just had the same exact thing happen to me just now. I had Shovel Knight installed from eShop before I got my GW card on 9.2. After installing NES Remix CIA I found I wasn't able to open either NES Remix or Shovel Knight. Went into Data Management on emuNAND and deleted NES Remix and found a new CIA to install, but noticed that when I deleted NES Remix, Shovel Knight also dissapeared. I'm assuming they both shared the same game ID which is what caused the issue. So anyway, I really wanted NES Remix to work and found a 0 block file as you did - Tried to delete and got the same error. Booted back into GW mode and all CIA's are gone although they still show in Data Management. What's strange is my MiiPlaza CIA and Theme's pack are still installed and working in emuNAND. I'm going to try reinstalling the CIA's without a format and maybe by some magic they will work.

Apache Thunder · Feb 5, 2015

Visiting Data Management while in Classic Mode will likely result in unauthorized apps being removed as well regardless if you are in emunand or not. I don't think you said if you were in classic mode or Gateway mode so can't say for sure. A zero block app with no name could be the result of a bad CIA installation and that caused the system to erroneously remove everything when you attempted to remove it.

Maximilious · Feb 5, 2015

Apache Thunder said:
Visiting Data Management while in Classic Mode will likely result in unauthorized apps being removed as well regardless if you are in emunand or not. I don't think you said if you were in classic mode or Gateway mode so can't say for sure. A zero block app with no name could be the result of a bad CIA installation and that caused the system to erroneously remove everything when you attempted to remove it.

I was in GW mode - I was trying to salvage my streetpass data since I got quite a bit this week by uninstalling CIA's in GW mode that still showed, even though they weren't "there" anymore. But that didn't work after trying a few different things between data management and title browser. Trying to reinstall a CIA resulted in BigBlueMenu saying the CIA already existed at the end of the install.

I know for a fact it was Ultimate NES Remix CIA with the eShop version of Shovel Knight I had installed. After uninstalling NES Remix, Shovel Knight's icon dissapeared, and I also didn't see a Shovel Knight item in data management which means it had to of been the 0-block item that caused the issue. I'll be using Title Manager to uninstall items from now on though!

ka_kui · Feb 5, 2015

when im in emunand mode, and go to data management all the installed items show well, with numbers and banners.....but, when i enter in classic mode happen what you say.......are you sure you weren't in classic mode?

sgtkwol · Feb 5, 2015

If you have a way to read the contents of the SD Card, you may be able to get your saves. Backup the folder that CIAs are installed to. Format the SD card, restore the folder. May not be able to play the games at that point, but SDF should still work.

Maximilious · Feb 5, 2015

sgtkwol said:
If you have a way to read the contents of the SD Card, you may be able to get your saves. Backup the folder that CIAs are installed to. Format the SD card, restore the folder. May not be able to play the games at that point, but SDF should still work.

Yeah, I was backing up games through Data Management and found the saves on the SD card, but I decided not to save them. I didn't have much on their anyway and I'm only installing games that are less than 500MB on the SD card. All my important games are on the micro SD for GW. Just backed up the root saves on the SD and restored them. Hopefully I'm covered, if not oh well and big learning experience haha.

CodyWGamer · Dec 10, 2018

thank god i found something that could help ME i was also fiddiling around and i saw that ? 0 blocks file i deleted it cause i didnt know what it was thank god im not the only one lol anyways how can I restore everything with or without save data i dont care can someone at least help me tho i have 11.9 cfw with luma9.1

Maximilious · Dec 10, 2018

CodyWGamer said:
thank god i found something that could help ME i was also fiddiling around and i saw that ? 0 blocks file i deleted it cause i didnt know what it was thank god im not the only one lol anyways how can I restore everything with or without save data i dont care can someone at least help me tho i have 11.9 cfw with luma9.1

Well I can't say I fully recall this issue, but based on what I went through I just started over from scratch at the time. I don't think there is an easy way to recover from this unless you have a backup to restore from.

TurdPooCharger · Dec 11, 2018

CodyWGamer said:
thank god i found something that could help ME i was also fiddiling around and i saw that ? 0 blocks file i deleted it cause i didnt know what it was thank god im not the only one lol anyways how can I restore everything with or without save data i dont care can someone at least help me tho i have 11.9 cfw with luma9.1

When you used System Settings → Data Management and deleted that 0 block entry, it most likely corrupt one or both of these files found at sdmc:/Nintendo 3DS/db/ folder:

import.db
title.db

Backup the Nintendo 3DS folder and see if GodMode9 can dump your titles as *.cia files. Try the guide found in this thread:

I made a NAND backup awhile back, now had to recover, missing games.

Ignore the part about looking for X's in the System Setting's... Nintendo 3DS → Software. If you don't see them marked, don't fret yet.

Hacking Deleted a 0-block blank file from Data Management = Everything gone

Sepatown, my damie.

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Sepatown, my damie.

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瓜老外

Kid Icarus Uprising connoiseur

Grey Knight Inquisitor

Sepatown, my damie.

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Whistles a familiar tune

I have cameras in your head!

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Meh.

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