Hacking Gateway, Installed NVRAM without backing up sysNAND

[peteruk]

Wow, I finally did it! I was able to successfully update to 9.5 emunand using 3DNUS and was able to play Fire Emblem IF. Thank you to everyone who helped me make my Gateway experience a good one! Quick question before I go, is it okay for me to update roms on emunand by going to eShop? Or is updating via .cia better? My games besides fire emblem if are in .3ds format.

What were the exact steps you took in the end to move from 9.0 emuNAND to 9.5 emuNAND ?

 

[steve1316]

What were the exact steps you took in the end to move from 9.0 emuNAND to 9.5 emuNAND ?

1. Formatted emunand so Im on 9.0 emunand.
2. Confirmed that I'm on emunand by checking settings.
3. Opened 3DNUS and downloaded 9.5.0-23 USA in cia format.
4. Powered down my n3dsxl and took out the internal sd card to put in my computer.
5. I put the folder containing all of the cia files for 9.5.0-23 USA on the card.
6. I also make sure that my sd card for my Gateway cart has devmenu.3ds, a game rom to test (like Fire Emblem IF or Xenoblade Chronicles), and big blue menu in case devmenu doesn't work out.
7. I put everything back together and booted to emunand mode. Don't go to settings.
8. Pressed select and booted up devmenu and imported all the cia files
9. If I did it right, I exit out of devmenu by closing out the app. I went to settings and I'm now on 9.5.0-23U.

(this failed for me the first time, so I reformatted my emunand and copied all the cia files to my internal sd card again. I then used Big Blue Menu to import the cia files. That worked for me. Might differ from yours.)

-steve1316

 

[peteruk]

@ Steve1316, thanks for posting your notes, i have been putting off doing this but after seeing your success am very tempted to give it a go

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Wow, I finally did it! I was able to successfully update to 9.5 emunand using 3DNUS and was able to play Fire Emblem IF. Thank you to everyone who helped me make my Gateway experience a good one! Quick question before I go, is it okay for me to update roms on emunand by going to eShop? Or is updating via .cia better? My games besides fire emblem if are in .3ds format.

eShop is the preferred way to update, as CIA updates are fakesigned, and if you use them once, then you'll never be able to download updates for that game from eShop because the fake ticket will be stored in the system instead of the eShop one.
You'll need this to use eShop though: https://gbatemp.net/threads/release-free-multi-patcher.391945/

 

[peteruk]

1. Formatted emunand so Im on 9.0 emunand.
2. Confirmed that I'm on emunand by checking settings.
3. Opened 3DNUS and downloaded 9.5.0-23 USA in cia format.
4. Powered down my n3dsxl and took out the internal sd card to put in my computer.
5. I put the folder containing all of the cia files for 9.5.0-23 USA on the card.
6. I also make sure that my sd card for my Gateway cart has devmenu.3ds, a game rom to test (like Fire Emblem IF or Xenoblade Chronicles), and big blue menu in case devmenu doesn't work out.
7. I put everything back together and booted to emunand mode. Don't go to settings.
8. Pressed select and booted up devmenu and imported all the cia files
9. If I did it right, I exit out of devmenu by closing out the app. I went to settings and I'm now on 9.5.0-23U.

(this failed for me the first time, so I reformatted my emunand and copied all the cia files to my internal sd card again. I then used Big Blue Menu to import the cia files. That worked for me. Might differ from yours.)

-steve1316

So for step 3... 3. Opened 3DNUS and downloaded 9.5.0-23 USA in cia format.

I have a Euro N3DS, would i enter EU or EURO in the box ?

 

[The Real Jdbye]

So for step 3... 3. Opened 3DNUS and downloaded 9.5.0-23 USA in cia format.

I have a Euro N3DS, would i enter EU or EURO in the box ?

EUR

Hello everyone. First time Gateway user here. I have a question.

I was following the instructions for Gateway 3.2 Ultra for my N3DSXL in order to allow booting to Gateway mode via the system settings without me using my cubic ninja all the time. But I forgot to backup my sysNAND and went ahead and followed step 5 which is to install NVRAM. I have stopped there after I read more and found out at the bottom of the instructions that I should backup my sysNAND and setup emuNAND before doing anything. How screwed am I?

N3DSXL 9.0.0-20U

-steve1316

It doesn't sound like you were bricked, so it's no big deal. It's just a good idea to make a NAND backup before messing with sysNAND in any way, in case something goes wrong (although I haven't heard of any bricks caused by just installing a downgraded mset yet), but as long as you make a NAND backup that you can restore if something goes wrong later on, it doesn't really matter whether it's before or after mset downgrade.

 

[Quantumcat]

Wow, I finally did it! I was able to successfully update to 9.5 emunand using 3DNUS and was able to play Fire Emblem IF. Thank you to everyone who helped me make my Gateway experience a good one! Quick question before I go, is it okay for me to update roms on emunand by going to eShop? Or is updating via .cia better? My games besides fire emblem if are in .3ds format.

You won't be able to use the eShop without the latest firmware on emuNAND. CIA updates will be the only option.

 

[Typhin]

Ima try Typhin's method first to see if that works for me. I didn't realize that N3dsXL is only up to 9.5 emunand which explains everything. Also, since I'm on 9.0 emunand, doesn't starting puzzle and dragons SMB edition via the Gateway menu by pressing Select prompt me to update? Or should I just simply hold up on the D Pad as the Gateway menu is booting up? Which icon should I be on when I do that? The "Format Emunand" icon? Thank you for your reponses everyone!

For future reference, Gateway usually spoofs the system version to game cards, so it would normally not prompt you to update. Holding Up on the D-Pad when selecting "Boot Gateway Mode" will disable that spoof, so the game will ask you to update to the version that comes with the game. I would personally recommend the 3DNUS route, as that will give you better control over which version you're updating to, as well as allow you to update the browser (since game card updates don't include internet components).

If you ask me, unlinking your NAND is totally unnecessary, since it's never caused issues for me. But a basic explanation is: Your 3DS generates a random "key" for its installed software, which you can see in the folder names in your "Nintendo 3DS" folder. When you create an emuNAND, it doesn't generate a new key; the emuNAND is a 100% clone of your system NAND. Because of this, software installed on the emuNAND is accessible on the system NAND, and vice versa (as long as a ticket is installed - just tell FBI to install it again; it won't, but it'll create the ticket). This can cause minor issues such as folders not behaving properly, and titles moving around (sysNAND can't see emuNAND's system titles and vice versa, so where they overlap on the home menu you have issues)

I ran into issues myself, mostly the "unwrap bug". Installed titles would be required to be "unwrapped" each time I booted, and would be taken out of folders and placed back on the main Home menu. In addition, they would share color settings, making it harder to keep the two visually distinct. Since I only use sysNand to get to emuNand, I didn't have any reason to keep them linked myself.

Wow, I finally did it! I was able to successfully update to 9.5 emunand using 3DNUS and was able to play Fire Emblem IF. Thank you to everyone who helped me make my Gateway experience a good one! Quick question before I go, is it okay for me to update roms on emunand by going to eShop? Or is updating via .cia better? My games besides fire emblem if are in .3ds format.

Accessing the eShop requires you to be on the latest System Version. I believe there are methods to spoof that and access it without updating, but I haven't actually looked into them myself. (I have an Old 3DS, so I just update emuNand.) Updates apply to both .3ds and .cia versions of games, since both have the same Title ID. As long as the update is installed to the system, it'll get loaded whenever a matching Title ID is run.

 

[weatMod]

eShop is the preferred way to update, as CIA updates are fakesigned, and if you use them once, then you'll never be able to download updates for that game from eShop because the fake ticket will be stored in the system instead of the eShop one.
You'll need this to use eShop though: https://gbatemp.net/threads/release-free-multi-patcher.391945/

i don't think so i tried to update majoras mask through eshop and it didn't work it gave me some error message that i had to go to memory managment or something after i downloaded it,i went to the manager in eshop and nothing was there , and then i forgot you couldn't go into system memory management , went there to check if it was in there ,it wasn't t and it erased everyhting all my installed CIA's gone
eshop updates do not work ,