Hacking Luma3DS - Noob-proof 3DS Custom Firmware

[SRKTiberious]

Well, part of the reason for the question is because the emunand isn't new, and I'd kinda like to keep it as it is currently when all's said and done.

('It', of course, being the emunand and its relevant menu setup/save files)

See, I was initially pushed into going the emunand route in the first place back when... 10.4, I think it was, dropped. I wanted to keep access to homebrew, and so I bit the bullet and downgraded, then did all my actual gaming on emunand like it was a regular system (but now with a few extra perks).

I was rather annoyed to find out I ended up with a new FC from the whole thing, and I'd rather not go through that irritation a second time to get AL9H done.

 

[Bullseye]

So I just updated my EmuNAND to 11.0 and thought about changing the HBL payload to 11.0 but I just realized that I only start HBL through sysNAND which in my case i have it in 9.2 FW therefore that's not needed.

Should I access HBL through another FW or there is no point in that? I don't access it much, having payloads on A9LH (or K9LH XD) I don't need to acces it frequently.

 

[Townsperson]

Well, part of the reason for the question is because the emunand isn't new, and I'd kinda like to keep it as it is currently when all's said and done.

('It', of course, being the emunand and its relevant menu setup/save files)

See, I was initially pushed into going the emunand route in the first place back when... 10.4, I think it was, dropped. I wanted to keep access to homebrew, and so I bit the bullet and downgraded, then did all my actual gaming on emunand like it was a regular system (but now with a few extra perks).

I was rather annoyed to find out I ended up with a new FC from the whole thing, and I'd rather not go through that irritation a second time to get AL9H done.

You won't lose anything setting up A9LH. You backup your original emunand, and by the end of the process, you'll flash that to your SysNand (Or EmuNand if you don't want to go SysNand only). You don't lose anything, so long as you can follow the guide and avoid doing something stupid.

 

[GamingAori]

@TuxSH this still doesn't work just a white screen after the intro cut scene. (in OR) @Aurora Wright pls add the feature

 

[TuxSH]

I'll fix it.

 

[Kazuma77]

Well, part of the reason for the question is because the emunand isn't new, and I'd kinda like to keep it as it is currently when all's said and done.

('It', of course, being the emunand and its relevant menu setup/save files)

See, I was initially pushed into going the emunand route in the first place back when... 10.4, I think it was, dropped. I wanted to keep access to homebrew, and so I bit the bullet and downgraded, then did all my actual gaming on emunand like it was a regular system (but now with a few extra perks).

I was rather annoyed to find out I ended up with a new FC from the whole thing, and I'd rather not go through that irritation a second time to get AL9H done.

Once you have A9LH installed, you CAN restore your EmuNAND_original.bin to SysNAND using the "Keep A9LH" option. The word "can" being the important one here. You can also restore it right back to EmuNAND if you prefer. If you do restore it to SysNAND, everything on your EmuNAND will be back on your SysNAND like when you started. Moving it like this shouldn't change anything, not even your FC. If you want to be cautious, or just want to keep 9.2 around in case you ever need it (not much use for it now, but you never know), you can restore SysNAND_original.bin to EmuNAND instead of deleting it as well. If you do it that way, there's no risk of losing anything, and you don't have to format your card. Your NANDs simply swap places. Nothing should change on them. Everything, including the FC, should remain intact.

Again, switching NANDs IS completely optional though. You want to leave your NANDs right where they are, that works too.

Your FC probably changed before because your NNID got wiped or something. If you performed a System Format to unlink, that's what probably did it. I'd recommend using TinyFormat whenever a guide calls for a system format. Leaves your NNID intact (and any DSiWare you might have).

The process does have you make backups of both NANDs. You can put everything back the way it was if you're not satisfied with the results. This also means you can undo the NAND swap if something weird happens. You could try swapping NANDs first. If something happens to your FC, just restore the SysNAND_original.bin using "Keep A9LH" and restore your EmuNAND_original.bin to EmuNAND. That should fix it.

Oh yeah, you can ignore all that mention of RedNAND as well. There's no need to redo your EmuNAND. Your existing EmuNAND will work just fine (the guide even says as much).

 

[SRKTiberious]

Right, right. The guide mentions using Luma3DS instead of rxTools, though, and that's why I'm interested in switching, so that I can follow the guide the rest of the way.

Well, that and my rxTools version is just so out of date I pretty much need to upgrade no matter what.

 

[Kazuma77]

Right, right. The guide mentions using Luma3DS instead of rxTools, though, and that's why I'm interested in switching, so that I can follow the guide the rest of the way.

Well, that and my rxTools version is just so out of date I pretty much need to upgrade no matter what.

OK, well, the installation part of the guide linked to on page 1 should work for getting it installed. The two CFWs use different files, so there's no need to remove anything for now. You can delete the "rxTools" folder once you get it working. The main things you need on the card are "Luma3DS.dat" and the "luma" folder (for now, though you can go ahead and copy arm9loaderhax.bin over if you want, the guide will have you do it eventually). The rest is more or less optional, depending on how you want to run it. If you're using a boot manager, and need help configuring it, I can help with that (if you're using BootCTR, I even have a file with OTP Helper on left and Safe A9LH Installer on right, it's made for installing A9LH).

 

[TuxSH]

I've fixed the RO patch, it's working now (tested by @Apache Thunder).
http://astronautlevel2.github.io/Luma3DS/builds/Luma-afc6f51.zip

@GamingAori

 

[20mark]

excuse me @TuxSH, what does it do RO patch? even reading changes in github I cant figure out what it does..

 

[TuxSH]

It's needed to load custom CROs (which are the equivalent of DLL files).

In practise this lead to better Pokémon (among other games which use CROs) rom-hacking.

 

[20mark]

thank you.

 

[Stoned]

It's needed to load custom CROs (which are the equivalent of DLL files).

In practise this lead to better Pokémon (among other games which use CROs) rom-hacking.

Works Great Thanks *-*

 

[SRKTiberious]

Welp, it was simpler than I thought it would be, and another 3DS has joined the AL9H master race. Paws off, Nintendo, this one's outta yer grasp.

 

[Jayro]

Quick question...

I have A9LH+Luma3DS setup on a 2DS with 10.7U sysNAND, and a 9.2U emuNAND, autobooting sysNAND.

Now... If I were to backup and swap the sysNAND and emuNAND, and set Luma3DS to autoboot emuNAND, it will appear as if nothing had changed, correct? And I'd just hold L at boot to get into the sysNAND?

 

[Kazuma77]

Welp, it was simpler than I thought it would be, and another 3DS has joined the AL9H master race. Paws off, Nintendo, this one's outta yer grasp.

Good to hear all went well. It's really not so much complicated as it is time-consuming.

Quick question...

I have A9LH+Luma3DS setup on a 2DS with 10.7U sysNAND, and a 9.2U emuNAND, autobooting sysNAND.

Now... If I were to backup and swap the sysNAND and emuNAND, and set Luma3DS to autoboot emuNAND, it will appear as if nothing had changed, correct? And I'd just hold L at boot to get into the sysNAND?

That's correct. Just make sure you use "Keep A9LH" when restoring to SysNAND. Otherwise you'll actually revert to your pre-A9LH state (shouldn't brick even if you do though, as long as you haven't updated or downgraded the EmuNAND in the meantime, it should still be a valid NAND dump).

BTW, I just want to say, Medicat is great. Thanks for providing the PC tech community with such a useful tool. I love my YUMI "boot sticks from Hell" but I'm always encountering PCs that don't even like them.

 

[Jayro]

That's correct. Just make sure you use "Keep A9LH" when restoring to SysNAND. Otherwise you'll actually revert to your pre-A9LH state (shouldn't brick even if you did though, as long as you haven't updated or downgraded the EmuNAND in the meantime, it should still be a valid NAND dump).

BTW, I just want to say, Medicat is great. Thanks for providing the PC tech community with such a useful tool. I love my YUMI "boot sticks from Hell" but I'm always encountering PCs that don't want to work with them.

Alright, awesome. Are there any advantages or disadvantages of having them switched around, since I can easily restore either one? And thanks for the kind words about MediCat, I put a lot of blood into it.

 

[Kazuma77]

Alright, awesome. Are there any advantages or disadvantages of having them switched around, since I can easily restore either one? And thanks for the kind words about MediCat, I put a lot of blood into it.

Well, DSiWare and GBA games usually have to be installed on SysNAND. You can install them on EmuNAND too, but it's going to run the copy from SysNAND. So, If you want to have everything together, it's probably best to leave EmuNAND on 9.2. The only advantage to putting 9.2 to SysNAND would be GW might load slightly faster (probably not noticeably). Then again, if it seems too cluttered having everything on SysNAND, you might want to swap them to break things up. It's all a matter of preference.

EDIT: I guess the EmuNAND being on the SD card does cause it to eat a bit more battery. So if you find yourself cutting it close, or you have issues with black screens because the power saving feature shut off the card reader, using SysNAND should solve it.

 

[Jayro]

Well, DSiWare and GBA games usually have to be installed on SysNAND. You can install them on EmuNAND too, but it's going to run the copy from SysNAND. So, If you want to have everything together, it's probably best to leave EmuNAND on 9.2. The only advantage to putting 9.2 to SysNAND would be GW might load slightly faster (probably not noticeably). Then again, if it seems too cluttered having everything on SysNAND, you might want to swap them to break things up. It's all a matter of preference.

I only have 9.2U around to install the 9.2U OoT payload, otherwise I don't really need it. It's empty except for FBI, homebrew launcher, and testing themes.

 

[LegendaryOutcast]

First 2 CIAs installed fine but the 3rd one is just stuck and im sure the console is

BBM is just DevMenu 6.2 with a different banner. It should work as readily as DevMenu 2x (plus it's a newer version, can delete CIAs, etc.). It's working for me. So you might just need to reinstall it. If it still won't work after that, it could be a sign of corruption.

If you have an extra SD card laying around, you could try installing BBM on that. First I would install NAND DevMenu (you need an installer that will still be there when you switch cards), put Luma and the BBM CIA on the card, and let it create a new "Nintendo 3DS" folder. Then install BBM. If it works, backup, format, and restore your primary card.

It would probably be easier just to tell you to format the card, but it's a time-consuming process, so I thought you might want to be certain it actually is the card first.

Actually, if NAND DevMenu 6.2 works alright, you might just keep that and delete BBM. It's the same thing, only more permanent, being in NAND. Useful for if you ever want to use multiple cards. It's also one of my favorite shortcuts, being a GW owner (whenever a guide says to inject FBI, I just install that using the BBM ROM).

So i already installed about 120 CIAs I use FBI's latest version, HOWEVER! There is a single CIA that i installed but i am UNABLE to delete the CIA file. it gives me an error message, something like "interrupted" and it wont delete

haven't tried to remove it from a PC because i'm afraid to try it as it may corrupt the entire SD card if I try to. I only believe this because i had this error happened to me once before and my SD became corrupted and everything would load but as soon as i loaded a game the "power off the system" message would pop up.