3DS sd card curropted... Trying to save data, but extdata files seem impossible to recover. Any way to save my game saves?

[DaMegaTaco]

My SD card corrupted after trying to boot into god9 after without realizing I needed to update it, or at least I think that is what caused everything to go bad, and after that my luma3ds firmware seemed to be corrupted. After resetting my PC into safe mode in hopes of deleting the files the whole SD card was being shown as corrupted and I could not open it. I have tried using disk recovery tools such as disk drill, recoverit, and testdisk although even though the files are on there it seems it will be difficult to recover them without losing the directory structure where I would just have random files with no idea what folders they fit in. I was able to make a .dd file with testdisk that seems to be able to recover the files with the directory structure, but the extdata folder within the Nintendo 3DS folder seems to be impossible to recover, but from what little research I did it seems that the save data is in the titles folder. Although I don't think I had my account registered with an email or address either so I am not sure if I can get the save data that I would even be able to access it since I wouldn't have the same account profile. I honestly really don't know what I am doing here and just trying to figure it out as I am going along hoping that I can somehow save it.

I ended up using testdisk trying to see if I was having the same issue with the boot partition needing to be fixed or something like this person had and hoping their solution would work for me, but so far it doesn't seem to be leading to any results besides making the .dd file


If anyone could help me save the data on this SD card it would be really appreciated. I have a new SD card coming in tomorrow as I am trying to avoid formatting this one until I can safely get the data off of it and confirm that I can reload it onto an SD card for my 3DS without losing anything in case it is possible so any advice in the meantime would be super helpful.

Edit: So I think I have recovered most every file except a few besides the extdata folder that seems like I can not recover... I am hoping that's just the installed game files and stuff though rather than the save file. I might even have a backup of my SD from before I installed the CFW where I think I used the profile that I started using after, but I am not sure. Where would the user profile information be saved on the SD? Again any help would be extremely appreciated.

 

[Kwyjor]

but from what little research I did it seems that the save data is in the titles folder.

That is correct. Only a small number of games use extdata.

Where would the user profile information be saved on the SD?

I don't know what "user profile information" you're thinking of. The only thing that really matters is the encryption key, which is only changed when you do a System Format or a System Transfer. That's stored internally in the NAND, not the SD card.

 

[DaMegaTaco]

That is correct. Only a small number of games use extdata.

I don't know what "user profile information" you're thinking of. The only thing that really matters is the encryption key, which is only changed when you do a System Format or a System Transfer. That's stored internally in the NAND, not the SD card.

Do nintendogs or tamodachi use extdata?

"user profile information" = the nintendo account my save games are associated with. So even if I use emuNAND it still is saved in the sysNAND?

If so I might just be in luck, but am still going to wait to format my SD card until after I test out the files that I was able to recover from the SD card

 

[Kwyjor]

Do nintendogs or tamodachi use extdata?

According to https://www.3dbrew.org/wiki/Extdata - yes, actually, Nintendogs+Cats does use extdata. But it doesn't say what for – it could just be for videos or something.

Also, please be more careful with your spelling.

"user profile information" = the nintendo account my save games are associated with.

There is no such thing. Your NNID is used to download games from the eShop and has almost nothing to do with your save data. (The sole exception is Badge Arcade.) As I said, your save data is encrypted with an encryption key.

So even if I use emuNAND it still is saved in the sysNAND?

Save data is not stored in the NAND. Were you even using an emuNAND? Almost no one is anymore.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Do nintendogs or tamodachi use extdata?

"user profile information" = the nintendo account my save games are associated with. So even if I use emuNAND it still is saved in the sysNAND?

If so I might just be in luck, but am still going to wait to format my SD card until after I test out the files that I was able to recover from the SD card

If you were using emuNAND, but you never formatted the emuNAND or sysNAND after creating it, they still share the same SD data encryption key, so you can get the data back.
I suggest not using emuNAND anymore, there hasn't been a point for a long time.

 

[DaMegaTaco]

Holy crap!!!! YAAAAAAY!!!! My save data is still intact. Not sure how, but it seems I managed to also still have the installed games working... Are they actually saved to the sysNAND or something? Also not really sure how to set it up to boot into sysNAND vs emuNAND, which it might actually be setup to use the sysNAND if the 3ds.hack.guide website didn't suggest me to setup emuNAND. I honestly don't remember as I did it a while back. Anyways guess I am going to keep working on setting up everything again, replacing all the badges I had on the homepage, and reinstalling anything I need to reinstall as well as backing up my saves for WCS. Thanks again for helping me understand things better

Edit: Seems like some of the games aren't there, but it looks like all the ones I really cared about are still there so that's lucky.

Edit 2: Even though some of the games seem to be working I should probably do a clean install of each game and all the homebrew right? Just to make sure there aren't some parts of the data that are corrupted right? Or would I be fine if I just didn't bother with it and only reinstalled it if they ended up crashing at some point while playing or something?

 

[Kwyjor]

Not sure how, but it seems I managed to also still have the installed games working... Are they actually saved to the sysNAND or something?

NO, the installed games are not saved to the NAND. I would have thought that was clear from the other replies thus far.

 

[DaMegaTaco]

NO, the installed games are not saved to the NAND. I would have thought that was clear from the other replies thus far.

That's what I thought, but was just surprised I could even get some of the games to run from the files I was able to recover as it didn't seem that I recovered anything large enough to be a full game file.

Anyways the old data kept causing the SD card to corrupt so I tried starting with a fresh set of files. Although I wanted to check rustys real deal out, and besides the issues with getting it to work without the e-store working anymore, I tried applying the old save file and it keeps saying they are corrupted when I try to start it. I haven't tried it with any other games yet, but any ideas why it would say the save is corrupt after using JKSV to dump the save files from the old SD card data and applying it to the new card data? If it doesn't happen with other games I guess it just has to do with rusty's, but I'll update once I try it out with another one of the games that I extracted save data from.

 

[Kwyjor]

Although I wanted to check rustys real deal out, and besides the issues with getting it to work without the e-store working anymore, I tried applying the old save file and it keeps saying they are corrupted when I try to start it. I haven't tried it with any other games yet, but any ideas why it would say the save is corrupt after using JKSV to dump the save files from the old SD card data and applying it to the new card data? If it doesn't happen with other games I guess it just has to do with rusty's, but I'll update once I try it out with another one of the games that I extracted save data from.

You are going to have to provide more details about exactly what you are doing. I don't even know what you mean by JKSV; isn't that a Switch program? How are you using it to dump the save files from the old SD card, and how are you applying it to the new card? And why aren't you using Checkpoint?

 

[DaMegaTaco]

You are going to have to provide more details about exactly what you are doing. I don't even know what you mean by JKSV; isn't that a Switch program? How are you using it to dump the save files from the old SD card, and how are you applying it to the new card? And why aren't you using Checkpoint?

JKSM not JKSV... It's on the universal updater and I am more used to it since I use the switch more than the 3DS where I honestly forgot checkpoint was a save data manager on the 3DS. I might set up my original SD card with the old data and use checkpoint to extract the data and try to install it on the new SD, but I'm going to try and install tomodachi life first and see if restoring the save data will work fine with it. As far as rusty I am not really worried about the high scores and more so just wanted to avoid having to go through the whole process of getting through the story to unlock every game again, but I might just deal with it if the saves for my other games work without having to

Edit: Tomodachi life seems to work fine when I recovered the save data so I think it might just be Rusty's that has issue because of the weird mechanics with the game being heavily reliant on the e-shop and everything or something like that.

 

[Kwyjor]

I've never read anything about how the save data for Rusty's Real Deal works, except it uses Anti Savegame Restore, as per https://www.3dbrew.org/w/index.php?title=Anti_Savegame_Restore . It is quite possible that Checkpoint may handle it better than JKSM, as JKSM on 3DS is very old.

 

[DaMegaTaco]

I've never read anything about how the save data for Rusty's Real Deal works, except it uses Anti Savegame Restore, as per https://www.3dbrew.org/w/index.php?title=Anti_Savegame_Restore . It is quite possible that Checkpoint may handle it better than JKSM, as JKSM on 3DS is very old.

Good to know in case I have to deal with anti savegame restore with any other games... I should probably be fine without it since I am really not worried about the progress I had made and only having to deal with unlocking everything. I think I should be good at this point though, but if I have any other issues I'll make another post.

 

[XRTerra]

Good to know in case I have to deal with anti savegame restore with any other games... I should probably be fine without it since I am really not worried about the progress I had made and only having to deal with unlocking everything. I think I should be good at this point though, but if I have any other issues I'll make another post.

If anything else happens, (I'm surprised NOBODY mentioned this), try using Roadkil's unstoppable copier. It's a really underrated program that saved my Wii files once.

 

[Kwyjor]

If anything else happens, (I'm surprised NOBODY mentioned this), try using Roadkil's unstoppable copier.

Yes, that is a very useful program, but the OP suggested that the file structure was unreadable and that files were being copied from a .dd image, in which case it's beyond what Unstoppable Copier can deal with.

 

[DaMegaTaco]

Yes, that is a very useful program, but the OP suggested that the file structure was unreadable and that files were being copied from a .dd image, in which case it's beyond what Unstoppable Copier can deal with.

Well actually I made the .dd image from the corrupted SD card, but still have the corrupted SD card. That being said I do have another 8tb hard drive that started having issues recently that's totally unrelated so it might actually end up being a useful suggestion if I am unable to have success with disk drill or reoverit (if I still have the free trial by the time the replacement arrives).