Hacking My First Switch Project

[shorter20000]

Hello,
I'm going to attempt the the hwfly v4 install on a oled switch (HEG-001).

I've had some experience with soldering before with a 360 so I'm looking forward to this project.

Just a few questions:

• I know other switch models can be soft modded but the HEG-001 can only be hard modded, correct?
• The oled switch I have (HEG-001) is boxed and sealed... would I face any limitations if I had a oled switch that was recently released (different motherboard layout/design or anything else)?
• Whats best practice with the unboxed switch? just don't even turn it on and go straight to the hwfly v4 install? Does it need to go through its initial set up / introduction process?
• the hwfly v4 mod chip seems to be the obvious and most recommended option. Is that the only option here I know tx products are tricky to find but is there anything else I should explore?
• Any harm in updating to 0.7.1 firmware for the hwfly?

That dat0 solder point:

From what I seen, people are using the orange ribbon or adapter that comes with the kit?

They then prep the solder point on the adapter then set it in place then heat up the eMMC chip with a heat gun(?) in stages (increasing the temperature each minute) to reflow the eMMC chip and joining the adapter to the dat0 point.

• Using this method is there any cons?
• Is the quality of the solder join to the dat0 point with the adapter not as good verses a direct join with a wire?
  • If so will it effect boot time/performance?

Which guide is best to follow for an oled switch?
I've seen the NH Switch Guide and the Switch Hacking is Easy guide. Is there one better to follow for an oled module or shoul dI just follow some yt turorial?


Thats all questions for now. Any thing else I need to keep in mind whilst doing this project please let me know.
If I've missed anything major let me know. My next post will be after I've installed and got to the software and sd card stage

 

[randy_w]

Usually I'd update the chip firmware to 0.7.1 before installing. Make sure you keep the original bootloader backup (iirc the flash.bat will create it in the same directory), in case you have a sk hynix emmc or toshiba emmc that doesn't work well with hwfly-nx firmware.

From my experience samsung emmc has the best boot time and stability, then sk hynix and toshiba emmc. Some consoles with sk hynix emmc would constantly fail to glitch and boot to ofw and I had to use original stock firmware instead (only one console out of like 20 so far, even if you have a sk hynix it's not the end of the day, just the boot time would be 2-5 seconds slower than samsung emmc). If you buy a new switch now you'd probably get sk hynix or toshiba emmc, samsung emmc consoles are becoming rare compared to earlier this year.

Technically you can solder an original team xecuter sx core/lite chip on oled but it's not recommended anyway, the soldering process is more complicated and iirc the latest hwfly-nx firmware doesn't play well with original sx chips. Also you can't use the original sx firmware obviously.

I'd recommend you to go through the initial set up process on ofw, skip the wifi connection part and sync all your controllers, before creating emunand. Otherwise you'll de-sync controllers between emunand and sysnand. There's a fix in case this happens but just sync all controllers before creating emunand to avoid the problem.

About DAT0 adapter:
I've used both, they shipped the yellow one earlier this year but then switched to the corner adapter. Tbh not much difference.

If you have never worked on bga reballing before or don't have the tools for it, I won't recommend you to reflow the emmc. You can follow sthetix's guide but when I repeat the same steps I usually find the dat0 adapter is still unsoldered to the bga ball because the temperature is too low. I've already applied low temperature solder to the adapter as the video suggests. What I do is applying a generous amount of flux and reflow the emmc at 380C so the lead free solder under it melts and sticks to the emmc adapter. Be careful not to push the emmc chip around too much when checking whether the solder has melted, or you'll have to do a reball.

About guide:
Do NOT use NH switch guide. They don't tell you about sigpatches which only leads to more confusion in the future when you find stuffs don't work. Just use rentry's guide, it's more straight forward anyway.