Homebrew Arm9loaderhax, yay or nay?

[Ev1l0rd]

So at the moment I'm running a 9.2 o3ds SysNAND, with a 10.6 EmuNAND (rxtools is cfw of my choice). I now want to switch to Arm9loaderhax instead of the unreliable Themehax setup I have right now. (10% of the time it doesn't boot and setting ctrbootmanager to wait 0 seconds causes it to fail loading rxtools). But before I begin, I do have a few questions:

• Can I switch SD cards after installing Arm9loaderhax? I currently only have a 16gb SD card, and I want to switch to 64gb in the future.
  
• How much space do I need to have free on my 3DS/PC? Also, can I do it on Linux (Ubuntu) or do I need to use a Windows guest?
• Can anyone validate this guide (I plan on using that one)?
• What are the additional benefits of Arm9loaderhax over Themehax, aside from easy EmuNAND and brick prevention?

If anyone can answer these questions for me, I would be extremely happy.

 

[PaiiNSteven]

1. Yes, i'm assuming. I dont know why you shouldn't, just use this guide.
2. Not a lot. A9LH.3dsx is only like 2 MB.
3. Thats what I used.
4. 100% boot rate! You said themehax was unreliable.

 

[Viri]

I've found changing the payload to an older Themehax to give me near 100%.

 

[PaiiNSteven]

I've found changing the payload to an older Themehax to give me near 100%.

Yeah, my friend did that too. The thing is with a9lh is that it starts up clean looking. Like none of the debug colors or text. It makes it look nice.

 

[Viri]

You can give Themehax a start up theme. I'm not trying to stop anyone from arm9 haxing, just saying it's not so bad.

I'll probably arm9 hax my 3DS in due time anyway.

 

[Joom]

Yeah, my friend did that too. The thing is with a9lh is that it starts up clean looking. Like none of the debug colors or text. It makes it look nice.

You can use @ihaveamac's custom payloads which have the colors and debug text disabled.
https://gbatemp.net/threads/ninjhax-2-x-with-no-debug-colors-or-text.413407/unread

 

[Arseface_TM]

I don't think the speed of a9lh should be undervalued. It includes things like system settings reboots, exiting GBA injects, and for o3ds users stuff like smash and mh which need the ram reboot.

Another major advantage of a9lh is that it's going to be the focus going forward in homebrew development. Getting the OTP is a one time process per system no matter what and the rest is easy now that people no longer need to compile stuff themselves.

EDIT: fixed wording.

 

[jp.jones]

I had the same exact setup on o3ds - sysnand 9.2, emunand 10.6 and rxtools/themehax. I experienced the same thing, lockups on reboot. Downgraded, got otp and loaded a9lh/aureinand and everything's been peachy ever since. Fast loads, no annoying screen flash/lockup on a yellow screen. However, I can say that downgrade although it worked, made me very nervous, especially on the last step when I didn't get a 'completed' message after the downgrade - the system just shut off. I thought there was a problem, but not so much.

 

[Favna]

> reads title
> expects poll
> no poll

cri erry day

 

[Ev1l0rd]

> reads title
> expects poll
> no poll

cri erry day

If I add a poll, most people just vote and leave. If I ask it like this, I'm more likely to get answers to the additional questions I asked+wether I should do it or not. That and I don't like polls.

Also, I'm gonna do it. Currently I'm dumping Sys and Emu NAND to SD for the first step.

 

[Deleted User]

arm9loaderhax does take about an hour to setup correctly but it's pretty worth it in my opinion.

• 100% boot rate no matter what
• If you update your sysnand by accident, you can downgrade it using a backup of your sysnand
• May allow in the future for more advanced homebrews or even a full custom OS.

but if you're not comfortable with the whole setup, staying with a menuhax setup is totally fine for now.

 

[vlasp01]

I have also heard that since it gives really early Kernel access, you can install a Recovery once it has been developed, to modify SysNAND and EmuNAND without going into either one. I'm going to attempt this in a few hours. Is there anything I have to know about transferring everything from RxTools to AuReiNAND on my O3DS? Also how do I modify what button to press during boot to go into SysNAND?

 

[gudenau]

I timed it, instead of having it boot a few times slower, it is TWO SECONDS slower when using sysNAND with this. It is worth it.

 

[Ev1l0rd]

After reading all of your answers, I'm gonna do it. Wish me luck!

 

[Deleted User]

After reading all of your answers, I'm gonna do it. Wish me luck!

Just read everything carefully, make sure to keep backups of everything somewhere and everything should go alright, don't ever skip any steps or it could be fatal for your console.

 

[fr3quency]

So at the moment I'm running a 9.2 o3ds SysNAND, with a 10.6 EmuNAND (rxtools is cfw of my choice). I now want to switch to Arm9loaderhax instead of the unreliable Themehax setup I have right now. (10% of the time it doesn't boot and setting ctrbootmanager to wait 0 seconds causes it to fail loading rxtools). But before I begin, I do have a few questions:

• Can I switch SD cards after installing Arm9loaderhax? I currently only have a 16gb SD card, and I want to switch to 64gb in the future.
  
• How much space do I need to have free on my 3DS/PC? Also, can I do it on Linux (Ubuntu) or do I need to use a Windows guest?
• Can anyone validate this guide (I plan on using that one)?
• What are the additional benefits of Arm9loaderhax over Themehax, aside from easy EmuNAND and brick prevention?

If anyone can answer these questions for me, I would be extremely happy.

1) Yes. The only catch here is that you need to place a "arm9loaderhax.bin" file at the root of the SDcard, because the console turns off without this file.
2) You will backup your entire SDcard PLUS 3 NAND backups(1 for emuNAND, 1 for sysNAND and 1 for emuNAND_formatted)
3) This guide is THE guide. This is what I used and I am pretty impressed at how he explains the procedure. It's easy to understand.
4) 100% boot-rate as they told you. Plus, you can swap places with sysNAND and emuNAND so you can have sysNAND with a CFW(such as (Au)ReiNand, ReiNand etc) which protects your FIRM0&FIRM1 files from a possible newer update. Thus, you can install GB/GBA etc games once. (never cared about those games though)