Hacking [A9lh] - Have you guys kept both sysNAND & emuNAND after flashing arm9loaderhax?

[stebrick]

Apart from knowing the result, I would like to hear the pros and cons of doing so and not doing so, and to decide how I should proceed to flash A9lh.

One of my considerations is whether it is possible to keep one ticket.db absolutely clean (like in emuNAND, by formatting that system) and being dumped to sysNAND (where I'd install most CIAs there) in case we need it.

 

[The Catboy]

My emuNAND is installed on another SD card, my current is SysNAND only

 

[Quantumcat]

SysNAND is more convenient. I was going to look at getting a 9.2 emuNAND to use Gateway with (badge arcade) but with their announcement that they'll support a9lh I decided to wait and see.

 

[CrispyYoshi]

I used to use A9LH with EmuNAND until someone pointed out to me how CFW on A9LH was just as safe/intuitive to use on SysNAND. In fact, if you have an N3DS, NAND read/write speeds are faster because it uses the internal hardware than the SD card.

 

[MajinCubyan]

I still have my emunand. Planning on keeping it on, for posterity.

My emuNAND is installed on another SD card, my current is SysNAND only

Thats a good idea. I'm gonna have to do that.

 

[Jhyrachy]

Old3DS

Sysnand only, much more easy to use VC games

 

[stebrick]

Old3DS

Sysnand only, much more easy to use VC games

Ar huh, how could you possibly know my reason of using A9lh..

But I guess there is no harm to keep the EmuNand too? Though I am not sure the advantages of having two systems co-existing...

 

[lpchaim]

New 3DS XL owner here, been using sysnand CFW only for some weeks now. I was afraid of migrating my emunand for quite some time but upon reading more about sysnand cfw and realizing it's not as dangerous as it initially sounds and not necessarily riskier than emunand anyway I finally jumped the shark. Couldn't be happier with how my n3dsxl is setup right now, honestly.
As for pros:

• Reclaimed SD space previously occupied by the emunand(s). Some NAND chip models in the n3ds get to be 1.8GB IIRC, although rednand support in recent emunand9 releases should mitigate that provided your card is reformatted for it.
• No need to go through the process of migrating emunand over if you happen to switch SD cards at some point.
  
• Booting is very fast, approaching a stock console (mine takes around 8 or 9 seconds).
  
• I don't have use for this function in particular, but installing Virtual Console stuff is pretty much painless compared to emunand setups, at least in AuReiNand AFAIK.
• It may sound stupid, but one of the perks I like the most is my console behaving like a vanilla one from boots and soft reboots, as in a9lhax makes it stealth enough that one'd be hard pressed to identify significant differences from a stock unity.

Now for cons... I honestly can't bring myself to think of any significant ones, provided you've already gone through the huge ordeal that is getting your otp key for a9lh anyway. Emunand to sysnand is a pretty painless although admittedly long process because of slow backups and whatnot. I suppose one would be if a future update managed to forcibly overwrite a9lh even with current protections, which isn't completely out of question I guess. Then again we already had to look up and confirm wether emunand worked on new system versions and fixes would most likely drop shortly after so it's not that big of a deal to me.

But I guess there is no harm to keep the EmuNand too? Though I am not sure the advantages of having two systems co-existing...

I suppose you could use emunand for testing risky injection stuff so that you don't have to mess with sysnand, but with proper support for a9lhax keeping in recent decrypt9 builds it's not really needed anymore. As you said there's definitely no harm, even if I honestly fail to see any real benefits either haha. I guess if you absolutely must have two separate accounts?

 

[Kurt91]

Aren't the newer versions of RetroArch rigged to only work on EmuNAND? I could have sworn they did that to encourage people to switch to EmuNAND as a safety net, unless they reversed that recently and I didn't catch it. I'd think I'd want to stick with EmuNAND just for that.

 

[Halvorsen]

Original region sysNAND and region changed (JP) emunand.

 

[lpchaim]

Aren't the newer versions of RetroArch rigged to only work on EmuNAND? I could have sworn they did that to encourage people to switch to EmuNAND as a safety net, unless they reversed that recently and I didn't catch it. I'd think I'd want to stick with EmuNAND just for that.

Wow, I really hope that's not the case. I can't fathom not being able to update retroarch because of such a stupid artificial limitation like this one.

Original region sysNAND and region changed (JP) emunand.

Oh, that's a use case for emunand I hadn't considered. And it's actually pretty neat.

 

[CrispyYoshi]

Aren't the newer versions of RetroArch rigged to only work on EmuNAND? I could have sworn they did that to encourage people to switch to EmuNAND as a safety net, unless they reversed that recently and I didn't catch it. I'd think I'd want to stick with EmuNAND just for that.

Where'd you hear that?

 

[XiaoDii]

Being lazy to copy emunand to sysnand, I just decided to keep it since it did not take a large amount of space. And with AureiNand, I can choose to boot into either sysnand or emunand easily.

 

[peteruk]

sysnand all the way, thanks to @Supster131 giving me the courage to go ahead with it

booting in around 7.4 seconds to a ready to use state

I can think of no downsides, I never used retroarch anyway

I guess we will all see if our bravery has paid off when a new kernel / firm update is released, then some fun and games (maybe)

 

[RustInPeace]

Flashing? Well, after installing a9lh, yes I kept a 9.2 emunand, mainly for browser exploits with the Pokemon games.

 

[mgrev]

i only use sysNAND on my 2 a9lhaxed o3ds consoles.

 

[daxtsu]

Aren't the newer versions of RetroArch rigged to only work on EmuNAND? I could have sworn they did that to encourage people to switch to EmuNAND as a safety net, unless they reversed that recently and I didn't catch it. I'd think I'd want to stick with EmuNAND just for that.

They weren't rigged, they just simply didn't work on sysNAND, but they do now.

 

[Kurt91]

Okay, I thought it was intentional or something, to keep people from possibly screwing up their SysNAND and flooding the board with help topics or general complaining.

Anyways, if you set up A9LH to run EmuNAND, does it slow down the boot sequence very much? I'd still rather have it as a safety net. Like they say, "Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it".

 

[daxtsu]

Okay, I thought it was intentional or something, to keep people from possibly screwing up their SysNAND and flooding the board with help topics or general complaining.

Anyways, if you set up A9LH to run EmuNAND, does it slow down the boot sequence very much? I'd still rather have it as a safety net. Like they say, "Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it".

I noticed no real difference in boot times when I used emuNAND + A9LH vs. sysNAND. If you have a decent SD card, the difference is probably not even humanly perceivable.

 

[yusuo]

I like keeping my emunand so if worst case scenario something does go wrong, I don't lose a n3ds xl, just a sd card