Hacking how do i setup SD2VITA [zzBlank.img, etc] using a Mac (ØS 10.12)

[7he6rim0ne]

just got a SD2VITA and can only find instructions for WINDOWS. can someone help out this Mac-only user?
(what to do with the zzBlank.img, etc.)

also, i read exFat will cause all game files to take up 2x double the space on the microSD card... true? what is alternative format for a 200GB microSD for this use?

 

[Ryccardo]

zzblank is just an empty file, to wipe the partition table

You would need to:

fire up disk utility, figure out the device name of your SD card (/dev/disk3 for example),
unmount all partitions but not eject the card, open a terminal, become superuser ("sudo -s")
erase the partition table ("dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/rdisk3 bs=4M count=1" - yes, I added an R before "disk3" - be sure to not wipe the wrong one, and not using the zzblank file itself for the above reason),
once it finishes remove and reinsert the card, then format the whole card to exfat without a partition table ("newfs_exfat /dev/disk3" - note the number may have changed as you reinserted the card if you also connected or disconnected other disks in the meanwhile)

also, i read exFat will cause all game files to take up 2x double the space on the microSD card... true?

Bull, installing vpk files through vitashell does (vpk isn't recommended anymore for game backups, and the issue can be avoided anyway by extracting the vpk=zip on the computer to an empty folder, and using vitashell's "install folder" feature)

what is alternative format for a 200GB microSD for this use?

None!

(Well, I would take anything over exfat, but since we're talking Vita there are no alternatives )

 

[7he6rim0ne]

THANK YOU for explaining this!

i tried this before posting here:
sudo newfs_exfat -R /dev/diskn (where n is the number of the mounted sd card)

and the result in Terminal said "resource busy" (i had the correct disk number [2] which i found using Disk Utility)

then i found this and was going to try it out:
1. Go to Disk Utility > Select Card > Partition > Options > MBR > 1 partition > exFAT
2. Copy the Vita Memory card backup you made earlier to the SD Card
3. Put the SD Card into the SD2Vita adapter and reboot your Vita

but your post cleared up everything. thanks again for the instructions!

 

[kniffles]

Hey all,
I'm also a Mac only user and i've been struggling for days on end to properly setup my SD2VITA card so that my psTV can read it. So far i've had no luck whatsoever. I have reformatted my out-of-the-box microSD card as exFAT, but so far, it doesn't seem to work on my devices.
I've followed the terminal steps as they were posted in this thread, but the information is not verbose enough for me to successfully reproduce the steps.

Anyone here with the knowledge to get this done? I'm really at my wits end

 

[xerotyme]

You could always use Etcher (like I did) for flashing the zzBlank.img file to your micro SD card... It provides an excellent, simple alternative to Win32DiskImager (which isn't even available for Mac) and unnecessary terminal work.