Hacking All games dissappeared

[AikoT_T]

EDIT: irrelevant info removed..

I had posted a question in another section, regarding the the online updater not being present in v1.7.6 of Retroarch for the 3DS,
even after enabling 'show advanced settings', the 'show online updater' was not available at settings>user interface>views
but, only after choosing 'show advanced settings' did i find something called online updater, under network, but when selected, it says 'no settings' or similar.
so after posting that, i just decided to go and get a nightly (some games weren't running right and i wanted to try an updated ver.)
unrelated, but relevant,

(do not use the nightly build for the 3DS for anything built on 5/5/2019, I don't know if it has been fixed yet, or if it's just my hardware,
I'm not sure if others can replicate this problem, and i would advise NOT to do so anyways...)

I downloaded the latest nightly

2019-05-05_RetroArch_cia.7z
These hashes are for the .7z file:

SHA1: C98190DBEC7ECFFAC193195CB721669215624F5C 
CRC32: 81F47D68

(I forgot the exact time of the build, but i believe there were only 2 available at the time, and i chose the second one.
at the time of the last edit of this post, there are now 4 builds for 5/5/2019.
I also want to state, that when waiting on h2testw to finish, i went to retroarch's website to check the 3DS nightly builds and the links gave me a 404,
same with windows,
but the links for the other platforms worked, i think they screwed up, and knew it,
I did not go to their discord.

I installed the newest nightly retroarch cia, replaced my retroarch folder,
when i launched it, it gave me an arm11 crash,
I noticed in the crash dump that it gave the name and TitleID for 2048 instead of retroarch.
weird.
I rebooted, sure enough, 2048 was also available to 'unwrap' even though i didn't install it.
I opened FBeye and went to uninstall both retroarch and 2048,
i got an error, i tried to uninstall another non-emulator related game,
error.
After that third attempt at trying to uninstall a game, and subsequently getting an error, > something in the last line of the error message about certificate failure i didnt read it because i was going to test another game, but....
it booted back to the home screen without my consent, and ALL apps and games are gone,
save system apps & TWL titles.

I went into 'system settings>data management>Nintendo 3DS>software' and got the message;
"the microSD card software management information is corrupt, reset now? this will delete all software and save data..."

Obviously, I can still boot using the SD card, because my theme is present, but i cant use anything on it, all games, fbeye,
er'thing

dieded T_T

What do?

 

[TurdPooCharger]

You should not Format System Memory as that will delete all your games and saves in the Nintendo 3DS folder.

Copy everything off your SD card, reformat it in FAT32 + 32 KB cluster size with Windows File Explorer or guiformat, and full Write + Verify the empty card in H2testw.

 

[AikoT_T]

You should not Format System Memory as that will delete all your games and saves in the Nintendo 3DS folder.

Copy everything off your SD card, reformat it in FAT32 + 32 KB cluster size with Windows File Explorer or guiformat, and full Write + Verify the empty card in H2testw.

Edit: followed your advice,
no cigar.

 

[TurdPooCharger]

You should not do Format System Memory because that'll also change the encryption key tied to your Nintendo 3DS folder, rendering everything it unreadable.

Not properly checking the SD card for hardware issues with H2testw means whatever further assistance to you will be moot.

 

[AikoT_T]

You should not do Format System Memory because that'll also change the encryption key tied to your Nintendo 3DS folder, rendering everything it unreadable.

Not properly checking the SD card for hardware issues with H2testw means whatever further assistance to you will be moot.

Ok,
I will copy everything off and do a read/write with h2testw, i did not know about the IDO getting +1

unfortunately, at least 4gb worth of games, i dont know which, had been corrupted. before i came here i tried using the command
chkdsk F: /f /r /x

I am doing the h2testw on the 256gb 64kb card formatted with GUIformat now..
I just want to state that i already know of this method from reading around.
and have this in on my HDD.
I just dont think its the card thats the issue, i believe something in the code of that retroarch build was malicious. intended or accidental.

 

[AikoT_T]

Not properly checking the SD card for hardware issues with H2testw means whatever further assistance to you will be moot.

First off, i want to thank you for your advice/time.



I copied everything off the SD card,
i formatted the SD card to fat32 64kb (its a 256gb sd card)
Then i did a read/write with h2testw,
no errors,
i copied everything back,
and its still the same, there are no apps or games on my home screen.
nothing...
Still getting the message in settings>data management>3ds>software that the SD card management information is corrupted and giving me a prompt to format.


___

I have another SD card that i transferred from a while ago and it is working correctly.
I guess i will use USB-Image tool and USease partition manger to transfer it over again to this SD card that wont work,
My guess is there is some corrupted files on the SD card, and i wouldnt know where to even start looking to remove these because of the amount of data on there..

 

[ThoD]

Did checkdisk find no errors at all? Just in case the 3DS did something retarded by itself and momentarily stopped recognizing your SD card, try going in the "Nintendo 3DS" folder, then in the folder with the 32 character string as a name (only folder there, that's the ID0 folder), then tell us if you see only one or two folders with 32 character strings as a name inside it (that would be the ID1 folder).

 

[AikoT_T]

Did checkdisk find no errors at all? Just in case the 3DS did something retarded by itself and momentarily stopped recognizing your SD card, try going in the "Nintendo 3DS" folder, then in the folder with the 32 character string as a name (only folder there, that's the ID0 folder), then tell us if you see only one or two folders with 32 character strings as a name inside it (that would be the ID1 folder).

I did as Pooman said,
and i copied everything off onto my pc,
i reformatted with guiformat 64kb, as its a 256gb.
then ran h2testw with no errors, (that took forever and a day)
i copied everything back, and there are still no games on the home menu.


I actually have another sd card that i transferred from to this SD in the first place, and it is working.

i am going to do a quad reformat the 'faulty' SD,
use usb image tool to make and exact copy of this working sd card,
then restore the backup on the problematic sd card,
then ill use USease partition manager to extend the partition the rest of the way out, because the sd card im making a backup of is only 128gb and the card im having issues with is 256gb.

To answer your question about the ID0/ID1 folders,
there is only one of each.

again,
i noticed that retroarch's links to the windows and 3ds versions are down,
i got a 404, and i had just downloaded from there an hour before that...the one that did all this..

I'm thinking something in that latest nightly build was screwy, and they knew it..

Pattern recognition or confirmation bias? you decide.

its the only thing i can think of.

 

[TurdPooCharger]

@AikoT_T, your mishap installation of Retroarch must have corrupted the title.db and import.db found within the Nintendo 3DS folder.

You will need to resort to doing this guide in order to rebuild the database.

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

If you don't see signs of missing tickets at:

• System Settings → Data Management → Nintendo 3DS → Software

continue with that guide anyway.

***

I'm currently working on a gm9 script that'll tackle this problem, but the feature won't be ready for some time.

 

[AikoT_T]

@AikoT_T, your mishap installation of Retroarch must have corrupted the title.db and import.db found within the Nintendo 3DS folder.

tHIS REPLY IS LONG, IM SORRY, BUT I THOUGHT YOU SHOULD KNOW WHAT I KNOW/THINK IS IMPORTANT FOR YOU TO KNOW ABOUT MY SITUATION


...if ticketDB is 'corrupted', it would need a different approach then what you linked to no?

This was my initial thought, but slightly different,
before you posted this reply, i had already downloaded faketik (.3dsx)
I was thinking i could download FBI, inject it into health and safety via GM9, install the homebrew launcher (WARNING, DUMBA$$ ALERT: maybe having to first delete its data in gm9 somewhere in \titles?)
then run faketik and everything would be kool.

BUT

My current predicament, lul, is i ran chkdsk on it, yes i know, a big no-no for SD cards, probably because the way it changes the filesystem structure when running it with any arguments that tells it to do anything other than scan an log.



But this may all be moot,
(although i still want to finish chkdsk on this and try to inject health fbi into health and safety and get hbl then run faktik.(maybe an older version of FBI? i heard 2.6.0 was too big?)



my only hesitation right now, is that i forgot i had my old SD card, as stated in the comment above,

i planned on just doing what i did last time when i transferred to this bigger SD card that is giving me problems now.
and that is to use 'USB-image Tool' and 'USease partition manager' to copy over this working SD card to the 256gb, then extend the partition out all the way, or else ill just effectively have a 128gb SD card.

And actually, i had installed about 250 games on this SD card i barely use, (the one i originally transferred from that is in my 3ds now till i figure out what to do)
mostly all eshop titles,
But when i was using my 256GB, i encountered some problems, (most likely the same issue ere as well, title/ticket db corruption)
And i went into fbi/tickets and deleted all unused tickets. (dont ask why T_T )

i was about to delete everything off this old card anyways, im glad i didnt..

so now i need to use the faketik .3dsx on this card as well to restore those missing titles' icons back to the home menu, so i can delete everything in FBI, because the data in it's current state is in godmode9, & windows explorer, but not in fbi, or the home menu, because im dumb and make the simplest stupid mistakes after being up for 20 give or take hours a day. T_T

If you don't see signs of missing tickets at:

• System Settings → Data Management → Nintendo 3DS → Software

continue with that guide anyway.

Well, as stated in one of my comments above, i cant even access that software page in settings.
i get the message "the microSD card software management information is corrupt, reset now? this will delete all software and save data..."

I'm currently working on a gm9 script that'll tackle this problem, but the feature won't be ready for some time.

Thank you for your help really, 2 brains are better than one sometimes,
especially when one has autism
i kid.

I hate to sound cynical, so i wont, its just a thought,
i would of thought that, at almost a decade after the 3DS's release, that everything like this would have been encountered already and would have an available hotfix/script in GM9.

Although the one you say you are working on is kind of special,
but im sure ticketdb corruptions isn't anything new..

(i'm only saying this because i don't have much time these days to attend to bologna like this.
retroarch... more like retroFART...
well, that didn't rhyme :/ )

 

[TurdPooCharger]

...if ticketDB is 'corrupted', it would need a different approach then what you linked to no?

This was my initial thought, but slightly different,
before you posted this reply, i had already downloaded faketik (.3dsx)
I was thinking i could download FBI, inject it into health and safety via GM9, install the homebrew launcher (WARNING, DUMBA$$ ALERT: maybe having to first delete its data in gm9 somewhere in \titles?)
then run faketik and everything would be kool.

BUT

My current predicament, lul, is i ran chkdsk on it, yes i know, a big no-no for SD cards, probably because the way it changes the filesystem structure when running it with any arguments that tells it to do anything other than scan an log.

But this may all be moot,
(although i still want to finish chkdsk on this and try to inject health fbi into health and safety and get hbl then run faktik.(maybe an older version of FBI? i heard 2.6.0 was too big?)

my only hesitation right now, is that i forgot i had my old SD card, as stated in the comment above,

i planned on just doing what i did last time when i transferred to this bigger SD card that is giving me problems now.
and that is to use 'USB-image Tool' and 'USease partition manager' to copy over this working SD card to the 256gb, then extend the partition out all the way, or else ill just effectively have a 128gb SD card.

And actually, i had installed about 250 games on this SD card i barely use, (the one i originally transferred from that is in my 3ds now till i figure out what to do)
mostly all eshop titles,
But when i was using my 256GB, i encountered some problems, (most likely the same issue ere as well, title/ticket db corruption)
And i went into fbi/tickets and deleted all unused tickets. (dont ask why T_T )

i was about to delete everything off this old card anyways, im glad i didnt..

so now i need to use the faketik .3dsx on this card as well to restore those missing titles' icons back to the home menu, so i can delete everything in FBI, because the data in it's current state is in godmode9, & windows explorer, but not in fbi, or the home menu, because im dumb and make the simplest stupid mistakes after being up for 20 give or take hours a day. T_T

Well, as stated in one of my comments above, i cant even access that software page in settings.
i get the message "the microSD card software management information is corrupt, reset now? this will delete all software and save data..."

Thank you for your help really, 2 brains are better than one sometimes,
especially when one has autism
i kid.

I hate to sound cynical, so i wont, its just a thought,
i would of thought that, at almost a decade after the 3DS's release, that everything like this would have been encountered already and would have an available hotfix/script in GM9.

Although the one you say you are working on is kind of special,
but im sure ticketdb corruptions isn't anything new..

(i'm only saying this because i don't have much time these days to attend to bologna like this.
retroarch... more like retroFART...
well, that didn't rhyme :/ )

I instructed to check for missing tickets in System Systems. If you saw greyed out X's for your titles, then yes you would use faketik to restore or relist them again on HOME Menu.
However, I mentioned if you're not seeing missing tickets or the presence of those titles in System Settings → ... → Software , that means the title.db and import.db found in the Nintendo 3DS folder are the ones that are damaged.

Those two are a set of different database files. In order words, your ticket.db is fine, but your 3DS no longer has intact record of games, DLCs, and updates installed on that SD card. The only way around this issue is to perform that round about way of backing up the CIAs and reinstalling everything with special care with extracting and adding back the saves + extdata in the correct order.

If that (emptied out) card was tested as fine with H2testw (do not substitute good results of chkdsk as the same thing as H2testw), you can...

1. Try reviving the card with quadruple reformatting.
2. Use this CFW starter kit to make a clean slate setup.
   • Make sure you use the correct Luma3DS v9.1 configuration settings
   • The CFW should be updated with the latest B9S v1.3, Luma v9.1, and GM9 v1.7.1 (or newer) on both SD card and CTRNAND: Updating B9S
   • 3DS firmware should be on the latest version 11.9.0-42.
3. Add back a copy of your Nintendo 3DS folder onto the card.
4. Check the System Settings and continue onward with that tutorial in post #9.

***

Edit - And no, gm9 script has not solved every conceivable issue. There is at least this import & title DB problem that hasn't had an easy or user friendly way to overcome.

 

[AikoT_T]

If that (emptied out) card was tested as fine with H2testw (do not substitute good results of chkdsk as the same thing as H2testw), you can...

I understand this.
I formatted to FAT32 64kb with GUIformat first, then did a test with H2testw, when there were no errors, i did like you said and copied everything back over, it still didnt work, so i tried chkdsk. because, reasons..

I instructed to check for missing tickets in System Systems. If you saw greyed out X's for your titles, then yes you would use faketik to restore or relist them again on HOME Menu.
However, I mentioned if you're not seeing missing tickets or the presence of those titles in System Settings → ... → Software

I don't mean to be rude when i say this,
but I have said twice now that i cant even access System Settings → ... → Software.

Also, like i said before,
i am thinking of just deleting everything off the problematic SD card, then transferring a backup img from this other SD card that is working, this Current problematic SD card was made anyways from this backup SD card..

edit: removed unnecessary info.
edit 2: thanks for sharing your knowledge with me.

 

[TurdPooCharger]

I understand this.
I formatted to FAT32 64kb with GUIformat first, then did a test with H2testw, when there were no errors, i did like you said and copied everything back over, it still didnt work, so i tried chkdsk. because, reasons..

I don't mean to be rude when i say this,
but I have said twice now that i cant even access System Settings → ... → Software.

Also, making back ups of everything in gm9 would be pretty helpful in this case. i will ponder my options..

Unless im misunderstanding you? im sorry, ive been up for almost a day working on other projects as well as this ..

Also, like i said before,
i am thinking of just deleting everything off the problematic SD card, then transferring a backup img from this other SD card that is working, this Current problematic SD card was made anyways from this backup SD card..

Others may not be so lucky. to have this option,
Why will this work for me and maybe not others?
well, i dont care about any of the games i have installed because i have the whole CDN n my HDD..
also, believe it or not, i dont even play 3ds games, i just use this for the emulators. (20k roms and counting )
and the 3ds games i do play, i have recently backed up their saves before all this happened, so i can restore them on this source SD card

BUT

your solution/tutorials in the links provided are very helpful for me and i will be saving it for offline use,

Finally, am i wrong for ignoring your instructions and doing this in this way?
since i dont care about installed titles or saves? and doing it this way wont change my keys because im making an exact copy..

I think, for me,
it would be easier to just delete the whole SD card, and restore the backup image i made with usb image tool.

This would probably not work for others.

I would appreciate your feedback once more.

That approach where you copy the entire SD card as a single BIN or IMG archive file and then reflash the raw image back onto the card would not be the method I would personally employ. Use CTRL+C and CTRL+V to copy & paste all the individual files and folders over to your computer at a collection folder.

Your first order of business is formatting the card in [ FAT32 | 32 KB cluster size (or 64 KB since you're using a 256 GB card which can get away with that size) | MBR disk | Primary partition] and getting it to be readable & writeable with the 3DS system. Once that's established, you forge ahead with creating a reference CFW setup on the card followed by adding back that copy of the Nintendo 3DS folder. Since you can't look in the System Settings → ... → Software, skip that part and continue with looking for the [A:] SYSNAND SD drive in GodMode9.

If the Search for titles brings up a list of all those titles, you should be good to go in recreating everything as CIAs. If you already have all your games/dlcs/updates as CIAs beforehand, adjust the steps of extracting SAV files. Reinstalling a game *.cia will overwrite or delete whatever save that was previously on there.

Worst case scenario: You'll also have to be on the lookout whether or not any other files had their data corrupt (ie, titles won't dump as CIAs, saves can't be restored, emulator won't launch roms).

 

[AikoT_T]

That approach where you copy the entire SD card as a single BIN or IMG archive file and then reflash the raw image back onto the card would not be the method I would personally employ. Use CTRL+C and CTRL+V to copy & paste all the individual files and folders over to your computer at a collection folder.

When i had first tried moving this 128gb to a new 256gb, simply copying and pasting everything over after the new card is properly formatted, mbr, everything, would not work.
The 3ds would not recognize the SD card, it would just boot using ctrnand luma, not SD card, so,
i looked around and found the method i described above, using USB-Image Tool and USease partition manager to create and restore the .img back up, then extending the partition back to 256gb.

So, yes, i have tried doing it your way before, i dont know why it didnt work for me, but the usb image tool method did.

Your first order of business is formatting the card in [ FAT32 | 32 KB cluster size (or 64 KB since you're using a 256 GB card which can get away with that size) | MBR disk | Primary partition] and getting it to be readable & writeable with the 3DS system.

I think that was my problem the first time described above,
How do you get it to be readable/writeable on the 3ds?
I didnt have to do this the first time i transffered from the stock 4GB SD card to the 128GB one.
(and using your method of copying and pasting over the sd card worked with this transfer, i dont know why it didnt with the transfer from the 128 to 256..

Once that's established, you forge ahead with creating a reference CFW setup on the card followed by adding back that copy of the Nintendo 3DS folder. Since you can't look in the System Settings → ... → Software, skip that part and continue with looking for the [A:] SYSNAND SD drive in GodMode9.

Ok, im confused here, it seems to me you are combining the 2 different scenarios here, because, i have already deleted my nintendo 3ds folder from the 256, and i will be transferring over my nintendo 3ds folder from this older 128gb source sd card.
On this 128GB, i can view the System Settings/..../Software with no issue.
And nothing on this SD 128GB card is corrupt.

..... If you already have all your games/dlcs/updates as CIAs beforehand, adjust the steps of extracting SAV files. Reinstalling a game *.cia will overwrite or delete whatever save that was previously on there.

I already said i had backed up any pertinent saves with JKSV before this even happened,
I rarely play 3ds games, the last tim i played one was a couple weeks ago, and i have backed up all saves with jksv,
(this, i had saved this folder from the corrupted 256gb, i looked through its sub-folders and all files seem to ok, and not corrupt. so i will just copy it over to the 128.

Worst case scenario:

You'll also have to be on the lookout whether or not any other files had their data corrupt (ie, titles won't dump as CIAs, saves can't be restored, emulator won't launch roms).

Ahh yes, this is what i was overlooking. although i was looking, i didnt find much till this morning when i gave it another look,

Yes,
BOOT.nds,
frogcert.bin (i think its unneeded, but i never cleaned my sd card after cfw installation )
and some other files i had noticed their file size was 64kb, and i know that's a corrupted file. as those files sizes are larger than 64 kb,

i noticed in picodrives folder, one of my sega CD bios had been corrupted, although it's size was the same as the un-corrupted ones, its name was weird, 'Bios_CD_U.BIO' instead of BIOS_CD_U.bin.

So, god knows how many other files are corrupt inside the nintendo 3ds folder...../titles....

SO, my 128gb card is fully functioning, and has no corruption issues, i will just make another back up, unless you can tell me how to get the card to be read by the 3ds, then i will use copy+paste instead of USB-Image Tool/USease

Thanks!!