Hacking Doubts Regarding having CFW on switch (mostly about emuMMC)

ThunderbInazuma · Sep 28, 2021

Hi. I am going to hack my "v1" switch and I've been reading and searching information about it on guides and threads here on GBATemp and I've got some questions that I didn't understand completely.

From what I understand, when the process of creating the emuMMC, you get an emuMMC that is an exact copy of the sysMMC (or sysNAND, I'm not 100% sure about the correct term). Do you need to unlink them like on old days on the 3DS? I have this doubt because I assume that, whatever you install on the console (be it on emu os sys) will stay on the place you installed it. But if I, for example, install a game on emuMMC and then move it to the SD card, will it show on sysNAND?
Regarding updates, all the info I found was a bit old, so I wanted to check it again. Is it possible to keep emuMMC and sysNAND on different versions (for example, having the sysNAND at the current version to play online and run it without any CFW loaded and then having emuMMC on an older version because, for example, it is a new version and the CFW still doesn't have support for it?
In case I buy an OLED in the future, I might want to do a System Transfer from my sysNAND (which will probably be "clean") to the new console. Will this affect emuMMC?
This is related to 1), but, let's say that I buy an 128GB SD Card, should I make a bigger emuMMC (like 64GB for it) and install everything inside it, or is it better to move the games to the SD card itself.

Thank you in advance

kidkat210 · Sep 28, 2021

1) what you do in emunand/sysnand stays in that nand. So you install a game to the sd while in emunand, emunand will only read it. Same goes for sysnand. You dont need to unlink anything if you take the proper precautions. The only thing to "unlink" would be your emunand profile from you nnid. Then create a fake linked account, since some games require a linked account

2) it is possible to keep the 2 on separate ofw (official firmware) but before updating your sysnand, check and see if the new firmware breaks emunand. This can happen when a new ofw comes out, but not always. So look on here and various places like gbatemp to see if its happened to a decent amount of people. If it does break, just wait for a update for your cfw (the only one for the switch now is atmosphere)

3) see answer in answer 1, what you do in emunand stays in emunand

4) tbh it doesn't matter. When creating an emunand, it creates it on the sd card (if i remember correctly, on the 3ds it would create an emunand on the actual nand of the 3ds. This could also just be something I heard, I never created one on the 3ds)

ThunderbInazuma · Sep 29, 2021

kidkat210 said:
1) what you do in emunand/sysnand stays in that nand. So you install a game to the sd while in emunand, emunand will only read it. Same goes for sysnand. You dont need to unlink anything if you take the proper precautions. The only thing to "unlink" would be your emunand profile from you nnid. Then create a fake linked account, since some games require a linked account

2) it is possible to keep the 2 on separate ofw (official firmware) but before updating your sysnand, check and see if the new firmware breaks emunand. This can happen when a new ofw comes out, but not always. So look on here and various places like gbatemp to see if its happened to a decent amount of people. If it does break, just wait for a update for your cfw (the only one for the switch now is atmosphere)

3) see answer in answer 1, what you do in emunand stays in emunand

4) tbh it doesn't matter. When creating an emunand, it creates it on the sd card (if i remember correctly, on the 3ds it would create an emunand on the actual nand of the 3ds. This could also just be something I heard, I never created one on the 3ds)

Thank you for your answer

TehCupcakes · Sep 30, 2021

1) When you create an emuNAND partition, it will clone from your sysNAND. That means you'll get the accounts, save data, etc. all as it was. After that, you are free to delete things from the emuNAND and it will not effect sysNAND (and vice versa.) You don't really need to unlink your account if you are planning to use Atmosphere, as it disables telemetry data. That said, you should remain offline or block Nintendo servers with something like 90DNS any time you are using hacked firmware.

2) Yes, you can keep them on different versions, but bear in mind that updating the official way (e.g. from sysNAND) will burn efuses. This can make it impossible to downgrade sysNAND, and thus might prevent you from using a (theoretical, non-existent) coldboot exploit, if it should only support older firmwares. As far as I understand, emuNAND is unaffected. There are ways to update without burning fuses. Tbh I might be missing part of this, as I can't be bothered to do this myself; I just wait until Atmosphere is patched before I update (usually happens within a day or two) and then I update both at the same time.

3) It will not.

4) When you create an emuNAND, it will reserve a partition as if it was "system memory" even though it's really stored on the SD card. The rest of the SD card's capacity will then be available, which means it should theoretically have access to the games you had previously transferred to the SD card... That said, I think there is something in the system memory that tells it where games are installed, so it might think the game files are missing and ask you to update. All this to say, if you want to play the same game on emuNAND as you have on sysNAND, it may well require reinstalling, regardless of whether you move it to the SD card or not. At least that's my experience.

LeyendaV · Dec 13, 2021

ThunderbInazuma said:
Hi. I am going to hack my "v1" switch and I've been reading and searching information about it on guides and threads here on GBATemp and I've got some questions that I didn't understand completely.

From what I understand, when the process of creating the emuMMC, you get an emuMMC that is an exact copy of the sysMMC (or sysNAND, I'm not 100% sure about the correct term). Do you need to unlink them like on old days on the 3DS? I have this doubt because I assume that, whatever you install on the console (be it on emu os sys) will stay on the place you installed it. But if I, for example, install a game on emuMMC and then move it to the SD card, will it show on sysNAND?

Regarding updates, all the info I found was a bit old, so I wanted to check it again. Is it possible to keep emuMMC and sysNAND on different versions (for example, having the sysNAND at the current version to play online and run it without any CFW loaded and then having emuMMC on an older version because, for example, it is a new version and the CFW still doesn't have support for it?

In case I buy an OLED in the future, I might want to do a System Transfer from my sysNAND (which will probably be "clean") to the new console. Will this affect emuMMC?

This is related to 1), but, let's say that I buy an 128GB SD Card, should I make a bigger emuMMC (like 64GB for it) and install everything inside it, or is it better to move the games to the SD card itself.

Thank you in advance

1. Emu and sys are two completely, utterly separated environments with less than zero connection between them. What you do with one won't impact the other in any way. Think about them as two separated consoles withing the sace case.
And yes, an emunand is created based on a sysnand. Your sysnand.

2. As stated, they have no relationship, treat them as different consoles.

3. Transfering date to a console doesn't affect the console itself. Why would with an emunand then?

4. The emunand will be as bigger as you want, being it either partition or file based. Mine's 10GB (less it's perfectly possible, tho not recommended), but can be 500GB if you feel like doing it, or whatever you want. In any case, the "system memory" for an emunand is the exact same SD the emunan is stored into, so that's 100% up to you.

pr0dukt · Dec 14, 2021

A perfectly isolated system in essence. Though I have always found it a tad annoying that you have to double up on game installs if you want to be able to read them on both your sysNAND and EmuNAND, saves don't carry over either. Alas it's worth having them completely severed like this in the long haul however if you plan to keep your prodinfo and creports on your sysNAND's logs completely clean from any brew usage or related crashing, and away from Nintendo's prying eye..

Draxzelex · Jan 3, 2022

ThunderbInazuma said:
Hi. I am going to hack my "v1" switch and I've been reading and searching information about it on guides and threads here on GBATemp and I've got some questions that I didn't understand completely.

From what I understand, when the process of creating the emuMMC, you get an emuMMC that is an exact copy of the sysMMC (or sysNAND, I'm not 100% sure about the correct term). Do you need to unlink them like on old days on the 3DS? I have this doubt because I assume that, whatever you install on the console (be it on emu os sys) will stay on the place you installed it. But if I, for example, install a game on emuMMC and then move it to the SD card, will it show on sysNAND?

Regarding updates, all the info I found was a bit old, so I wanted to check it again. Is it possible to keep emuMMC and sysNAND on different versions (for example, having the sysNAND at the current version to play online and run it without any CFW loaded and then having emuMMC on an older version because, for example, it is a new version and the CFW still doesn't have support for it?

In case I buy an OLED in the future, I might want to do a System Transfer from my sysNAND (which will probably be "clean") to the new console. Will this affect emuMMC?

This is related to 1), but, let's say that I buy an 128GB SD Card, should I make a bigger emuMMC (like 64GB for it) and install everything inside it, or is it better to move the games to the SD card itself.

Thank you in advance

There is no "linking" or "unlinking" like on the 3DS since emuMMC and emuNAND operate differently
The whole purpose of emuMMC is to be on a different firmware than sysMMC; that's why it was created in the first place
emuMMC and sysMMC operate independently of one another
The size of the emuMMC is kind of irrelevant because everything will be installed to the SD card anyways. If you plan on using sysMMC a lot, making emuMMC as small as possible would be your goal

Hacking Doubts Regarding having CFW on switch (mostly about emuMMC)

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

The One and Only

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Similar threads

Popular threads in this forum