Hacking Failing to Migrate - boot.dat? Error

Ibinixer84

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Apologies in advance, I am evidently utterly incompetent at this.

Attempted to migrate from SXOS with an SX Core modded Mariko, followed the Rentry guide without joy. I had copied my entire SD card when I first received my modded switch, and again before I attempted the migration. After failing to get Atmosphere off the ground, I copied back the latest clone of my SD card, and I just get boot.dat? written over an image of an Micro SD sweating I think. Tried the earlier clone, same result.

My First Question is this: I made two copies, but simply copied and pasted in windows. I'm reading now that people are using specific software to create backups, so am I effed? Does this mean that I hadn't actually created backups?

Second question, is there anyone out there that will do recovery for like payment, or better yet, un mongolize my switch and complete migration?


Thank you for any help, I'm aging in dog years trying to figure this out.
 

aruto

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Are you sure you have an SXGear boot.dat file on your sd card with its boot.ini? A screenshot of your sd card root would also help

My First Question is this: I made two copies, but simply copied and pasted in windows. I'm reading now that people are using specific software to create backups, so am I effed? Does this mean that I hadn't actually created backups?
If you have file based emunand, you can just simply copy and paste the contents of your SD onto your PC, if you have partition based emunand, you should use either Hekate or the backup tool on SX bootloader. I recommend Hekate for backing up nands
 
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Ibinixer84

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Hey man, thanks for getting in touch.

Are you sure you have an SXGear boot.dat file on your sd card with its boot.ini? A screenshot of your sd card root would also help

Yeah, I've tried both in the folder SxGear Folder and in the root, and, desperately, both at the same time.


"If you have file based emunand, you can just simply copy and paste the contents of your SD onto your PC, if you have partition based emunand, you should use either Hekate or the backup tool on SX bootloader. I recommend Hekate for backing up nands"

I'm assuming I have a file based emunand, an assumption rigorously arrived at by reading around, then looking into the SD and seeing that there's a file in there called \NAND BACKUP\sxos\backup and then 10 files, boot 0 & 1 and full 0 -7

I've a Mariko Switch, SX Core hardmod. Your help is appreciated.
 

itchigo

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Hey man, thanks for getting in touch.



Yeah, I've tried both in the folder SxGear Folder and in the root, and, desperately, both at the same time.


"If you have file based emunand, you can just simply copy and paste the contents of your SD onto your PC, if you have partition based emunand, you should use either Hekate or the backup tool on SX bootloader. I recommend Hekate for backing up nands"

I'm assuming I have a file based emunand, an assumption rigorously arrived at by reading around, then looking into the SD and seeing that there's a file in there called \NAND BACKUP\sxos\backup and then 10 files, boot 0 & 1 and full 0 -7

I've a Mariko Switch, SX Core hardmod. Your help is appreciated.


Here this is what I did with my Switch lite with SX lite hardmod when I switched it from SX OS to AMS. I back up the SX OS files on my SD to my PC and then format the SD. Downloaded the SX gear file that have Boot.dat and Boot.ini extract them onto the root of your SD.
Download latest Hekate and Atmosphere and extract them onto the root of your SD also.
Put Fusee.bin in the payloads folder inside the Bootloader.
Edit the boot.ini to "file=payload.bin" and rename the hekate_ctcaer_x.x.x.bin to payload.bin.

1) Put the SD in the switch and it will boot into Hekate.
2) Go to Tool and Partition SD.
3) Click okay and drag EmuMMC (Raw) to 29gib.
4) Start and wait for it to finish.
5) Go back to Home menu and click EmuMMc.
6) Select Create EmuMMc.
7) Select SD partition and select Part 1.
8) Then wait for it to Finish and it will take a while so just relax.

After it done go back to Home menu click on Payloads and select Fusee.bin to boot into EmuMMc Atmosphere.

If you want to use "Launch" in the Home menu you'll need to create hekate_ipl.ini.
You can use this link as a template for your config.
 

aruto

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Hey man, thanks for getting in touch.

Yeah, I've tried both in the folder SxGear Folder and in the root, and, desperately, both at the same time.
It appears the modchip doesn't detect the boot.dat on your sd card, are you sure it's not an SXOS boot.dat? can you send a screenshot of the contents of your sd card? also, don't forget to rename your Hekate payload into payload.bin so that the boot.ini can detect the hekate payload.
I'm assuming I have a file based emunand, an assumption rigorously arrived at by reading around, then looking into the SD and seeing that there's a file in there called \NAND BACKUP\sxos\backup and then 10 files, boot 0 & 1 and full 0 -7

I've a Mariko Switch, SX Core hardmod. Your help is appreciated.
If you have an SXOS file based emunand, there should be files boot0/1 and full 0 - 7 in \sxos\emunand.
 

Ibinixer84

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Here this is what I did with my Switch lite with SX lite hardmod when I switched it from SX OS to AMS. I back up the SX OS files on my SD to my PC and then format the SD. Downloaded the SX gear file that have Boot.dat and Boot.ini extract them onto the root of your SD.
Download latest Hekate and Atmosphere and extract them onto the root of your SD also.
Put Fusee.bin in the payloads folder inside the Bootloader.
Edit the boot.ini to "file=payload.bin" and rename the hekate_ctcaer_x.x.x.bin to payload.bin.

Hey, thanks for responding.

I followed the steps you outlined above. SD Card backed up and then I formatted it, exFat.
My first attempt I used the SX Gear files, extracted to the root.
Used the Hekate and Atmosphere packages, again from Rentry guide, extracted to SD.
Transferred Fusee.bin to the hekate_ctcaer_5.6.2_Nyx_1.0.7/bootloader/payloads folder.
Checked boot.ini, already reads file=payload.bin
Renamed hekate_ctcaer_x.x.x.bin to payload.bin.

When I plugged it into the switch, black screen, no signs of life. Removed SD and turned on, got boot.dat? screen again. Blue light on the back flashes, goes green then off.

Tried again, downloaded latest Hekate and Atmosphere, stuck with the SX Gear from Rentry as I couldn't find an updated version via google. Rinsed and repeated. Plugged back into Switch and black screen again.

If there's anything glaringly stupid I'm doing wrong or misinterpreting let me know, but I'm at a loss. Had to put it down yesterday to avoid getting frustrated.
 

Ibinixer84

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It appears the modchip doesn't detect the boot.dat on your sd card, are you sure it's not an SXOS boot.dat? can you send a screenshot of the contents of your sd card? also, don't forget to rename your Hekate payload into payload.bin so that the boot.ini can detect the hekate payload.

If you have an SXOS file based emunand, there should be files boot0/1 and full 0 - 7 in \sxos\emunand.

Yep, whatever is happening, it definitely isn't recognizing the boot.dat. I've now tried the boot.dat from sx gear, reverted to the original and neither works.

My only, utterly ignorant guess, is that my switch is still on FW 10.2.0 SXOS and perhaps all the sxgear/atmosphere/hekate is for newer firmware?

Sorry I haven't posted photo of sd card yet, when you posted I had just formatted the card and tried the above method. Going to restore sd backup, and then follow the rentry steps again. Will post a pic when that's all up.
 

itchigo

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Hey, thanks for responding.

I followed the steps you outlined above. SD Card backed up and then I formatted it, exFat.
My first attempt I used the SX Gear files, extracted to the root.
Used the Hekate and Atmosphere packages, again from Rentry guide, extracted to SD.
Transferred Fusee.bin to the hekate_ctcaer_5.6.2_Nyx_1.0.7/bootloader/payloads folder.
Checked boot.ini, already reads file=payload.bin
Renamed hekate_ctcaer_x.x.x.bin to payload.bin.

When I plugged it into the switch, black screen, no signs of life. Removed SD and turned on, got boot.dat? screen again. Blue light on the back flashes, goes green then off.

Tried again, downloaded latest Hekate and Atmosphere, stuck with the SX Gear from Rentry as I couldn't find an updated version via google. Rinsed and repeated. Plugged back into Switch and black screen again.

If there's anything glaringly stupid I'm doing wrong or misinterpreting let me know, but I'm at a loss. Had to put it down yesterday to avoid getting frustrated.
Okay here try my files and it should work.
First of all after you back up your SD card make sure to format it to Fat32.
Here is the link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1b2D-yW3aK4zbVtpUWk6vpDPMOagPtGvE/view?usp=sharing
Don't change anything just download the zip file and extract it on to the root of your SD card.
Then try to boot up your system to see if it load up Hekate.
Also my Switch Lite is current on FW 10.1.0 and I'm able to boot into Hekate with the Boot.dat no problem so that's got nothing to do with it. You might be doing something wrong when setting the boot.dat and payloads.
 
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Ibinixer84

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1632935948486.png
 

aruto

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Here's the screenshot of my SDCard
Thank you for sending the screenshot, it appears you didn't put the hekate payload.bin to the root of the SD card.

Open the hekate_ctcaer_5.6.2_Nyx_1.0.7 and get the .bin file, and put it on the root of the SD card.
boot.dat, boot.ini, and the payload.bin should be in the same location.
same as the atmosphere-1.1.1 folder. open that folder and you should see 2 folders which is atmosphere and switch along with an hbmenu.nro file.
put those folders along with the same location as the boot.ini and boot.dat file

after you're done, you're free to delete the empty folders

it should look like this with just Atmosphere and Hekate

1632937656916.png


after that, you should boot fine without any errors. but you still need to setup your Emunand if you're planning to make one
 
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Ibinixer84

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Okay here try my files and it should work.
First of all after you back up your SD card make sure to format it to Fat32.
Here is the link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1b2D-yW3aK4zbVtpUWk6vpDPMOagPtGvE/view?usp=sharing
Don't change anything just download the zip file and extract it on to the root of your SD card.
Then try to boot up your system to see if it load up Hekate.
Also my Switch Lite is current on FW 10.1.0 and I'm able to boot into Hekate with the Boot.dat no problem so that's got nothing to do with it. You might be doing something wrong when setting the boot.dat and payloads.
Thanks man, trying this now as soon as my computer actually completes formatting 256GB.. 2025 maybe
 
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Ibinixer84

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Thank you for sending the screenshot, it appears you didn't put the hekate payload.bin to the root of the SD card.

Open the hekate_ctcaer_5.6.2_Nyx_1.0.7 and get the .bin file, and put it on the root of the SD card.
boot.dat, boot.ini, and the payload.bin should be in the same location.
same as the atmosphere-1.1.1 folder. open that folder and you should see 2 folders which is atmosphere and switch along with an hbmenu.nro file.
put those folders along with the same location as the boot.ini and boot.dat file

after you're done, you're free to delete the empty folders

it should look like this with just Atmosphere and Hekate

View attachment 277648

after that, you should boot fine without any errors. but you still need to setup your Emunand if you're planning to make one
OMFG. So my problem was that I needed to extract the contents of all folders into the root. Your kindness in reaching out and generosity with time and effort have exposed how much of a dipshit I am. The IT dept in work are right, I cannot be trusted with admin priviledges.

Will try, currently formatting the card to FAT32. Will get back if this all works.
 

itchigo

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Thanks man, trying this now as soon as my computer actually completes formatting 256GB.. 2025 maybe
Yeah no problem let's know if you're having problem. But I think you should be fine now.
Just remember extract those file to the Root of your SD card that's all.
 

Ibinixer84

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Any quick recommendations on third party software to format a 256GB card to Fat32? Windows powershell (admin) isn't cutting it
 

GothicIII

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I am personally using Guiformat because of this stupidity MS does. It has the neat feature to select a cluster size (just stick to default values if you don't know what to select).
 

Ibinixer84

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Yeah no problem let's know if you're having problem. But I think you should be fine now.
Just remember extract those file to the Root of your SD card that's all.
This is working, booted into Hekate.

Huge thank you to Itchigo, flsgd and GothicIII for the help.
 
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