Nand corruption, backup first?

[rull_bull]

Hi!

We see a lot of post about nand corruption so it got med thinking.

Can we somehow prevent this by backing up the nand first before modding.

(I have not had a nand corruption myself but shit happens)

So lets say that i have a switch that i was going to mod, can i connect that emmc to my unpatched switch and then dump boot0/1 and rawnand bin.
Is the keys stored on nand or on console?

(I know that you will need a emmc reader for lite/oled but the basics is the same, dump boot0/1 and rawnand bin)

And if i have a nand corruption for some reason when modding, just rewrite with my backup and have a fully working nand again 1:1?

 

[BigOnYa]

So lets say that i have a switch that i was going to mod, can i connect to my unpatched switch and then dump boot0/1 and rawnand bin. -Yes

Is the keys stored on nand or on console? -Both, Nand is on your console. But if you backup your Nand you can extract the keys from it. You can also use a tool called Lockpick/Picklock and it will copy your keys to sd card.

And if i have a nand corruption for some reason when modding, just rewrite with my backup and have a fully working nand again 1:1? -Yes, your backed up Nand

You can read more here: https://rentry.co/SwitchHackingIsEasy or here: https://switch.homebrew.guide/index.html

 

[rull_bull]

You can read more here: https://rentry.co/SwitchHackingIsEasy

Yes of course i use lockpick when normally backing up a modded console

The question is if i need to dump them when doing a backup of the emmc (from the console i am going to mod) mounted in my unpatched console.

I imagine that the keys will be mixed with my unpatched switch keys.

Or will it be enough to just mount the emmc from the other switch in my unpatched switch and dump boot0/1, rawnand bin?

 

[BigOnYa]

Oh you are talking about from one Switch console to another Switch console, No each console has unique keys and unique Nand, you can not swap them from one to the other. Sorry I misunderstood you.

 

[rull_bull]

I know you cant swap them but a unpatched switch can boot to hekate with a emmc from another console.

The unpatched switch was only going to be used to mount the other consoles emmc and backing up boot0/1 and rawnand.bin before modding the other console.

So if something where to happen when modding the other switch and there is some corruption i could just restore it by using the backup i did on beforehand.

So the question remains, would that work?

No keys needed because they are already in the rawnand dump? And i will have a 1:1 copy when restoring?

 

[BigOnYa]

I know you cant swap them but a unpatched switch can boot to hekate with a emmc from another console.

The unpatched switch was only going to be used to mount the other consoles emmc and backing up boot0/1 and rawnand.bin before modding the other console.

So if something where to happen when modding the other switch and there is some corruption i could just restore it by using the backup i did on beforehand.

So the question remains, would that work?

No keys needed because they are already in the rawnand dump? And i will have a 1:1 copy when restoring?

I've never heard of anyone trying this so I don't know, sorry. But did see this while ago :https://github.com/ignasurba/mmcblkNX

 

[rull_bull]

I've never heard of anyone trying this so I don't know, sorry. But did see this while ago :https://github.com/ignasurba/mmcblkNX

Exactly, thats what got me curious if that would work.

I mod a lot of friends switches and there is always a risk of something going wrong and you could end up with a corrupted nand.
Bad chip, inteference etc.

So before starting to solder/modding/reballing the switch you would do a backup of the emmc first with a unpatched switch or with a switch emmc reader.

Then if something goes wrong you already have a backup that you could restore.

Seems like a safe protection if it works that way?

I am going to order some blank emmc chips and try it out.

 

[l7777]

If you're going to to effort of removing the NAND daughterboard and plugging it into another Switch, it would be easier to get an EMMC adapter and simply connect it to a computer. Dumps made by Hekate are simply a raw read (bit by bit) of the EMMC and can be done in a number of ways once you have the EMMC connected to a computer.

 

[rull_bull]

Thats not a problem, i have a couple of unpatched switches and i could dedicate a switch to just be a emmc backup dumper.
Stripped down all the time so i can just plug in a emmc and dump it.

Same thing as if i where to buy a emmc reader.

 

[Hassal]

If you want to safeguard against NAND corruption you need an eMMC reader to dump your RAWANDND BEFORE you do ANYTHING.

 

[BigOnYa]

@rull_bull
https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256803432237323.html?gatewayAdapt=glo2usa4itemAdapt