Tutorial  Updated

Nintendo DSi : Create 2 GB SD Card from 4 GB or Larger (Windows Only)

Hello, here i just want to share a simple tutorial about how to "CROP" any SD Card larger than 2 GB to only 2 GB, so it will be readable on Nintendo DSi system with HiyaCFW, Unlaunch or any DSi exploits that made system showing "An error occured" when turning the DSi ON

edited, thanks to @ScarletDreamz and @KleinesSinchen :blush:


{Requirement}

  1. Windows PC (at least Windows XP)
  2. A unused "SD Card (SDHC or SDXC)" (you can use "Micro SD (Micro SDHC or Micro SDXC) with SD Card Adaptor" too)
    • What the difference between SDHC and SDXC ?
      A SDHC or SD High Capacity is a SD Card that has capacity between 4 GB and 32 GB.
      A SDXC or SD Extended Capacity is a SD Card that has capacity between 32 GB and 2 TB (or even more).
{Tutorial}
  1. Make sure the SD Card you'll use is UNUSED or no any important data inside of it, because we'll format this SD Card (obviously)
  2. Insert your SD Card or on your PC (i'm here using Micro SDHC with Adapter :P)
    upload_2019-12-9_18-58-39.png

  3. Open RUN (on keyboard, Press "Windows Logo"-key and "R"-key)
  4. Type "diskmgmt.msc" (without quotes) and press "ENTER"-key
    upload_2019-12-9_18-14-29.png

  5. Your SD Card is the "Removable" one, and if you attached more than one "Removable" device, for safety reason, you can remove them first and leave your SD Card attached to make sure you don't make an accident by working with wrong Removable device
    upload_2019-12-9_18-22-32.png

  6. Right click on the shaded area and click delete volume, click Yes on confirmation window, and the blue-bar will changed into black which is indicated that the selected partition is unallocated like this
    upload_2019-12-9_18-28-4.png

  7. Right click on the same area again, and click "New Simple Volume"
  8. Click Next and fill "Simple volume size in MB" with 2048 (because, 2048 MB is equal to 2 GB)
    upload_2019-12-9_18-30-33.png
  9. Click Next, you can choose what drive you want to assign to this volume
  10. Click Next and fill the settings with :
    1. File System : FAT32 (because, we're using only 2 GB space, and using it to store tiny files)
    2. Allocation Unit Size : 4096
    3. Volume label : (name it whathever you like :D)
    4. Check the "Perform a quick format"
      upload_2019-12-9_18-45-0.png

  11. Click Next, and Next again, wait for the partition tobe formatted
    Congratulations!, Your new 2 GB SD Card has been created !
    upload_2019-12-9_18-37-55.png

  12. Yes, the remaining space is unused, as you thought :wink:, thats why, i want you to make sure that the SD Card is unused

{Note}
  • If the SD Card not working, you just re-format it using Panasonic SD Card Formatter, like recommended by many Nintendo homebrew masters
  • Please notice me and tell moderator to delete this (if necessary), if the identical topics is already exist (as long as i have checked by title before, there's none post about this) :D
  • Sorry if my english is confuse you, i always do my best on each of my post to make sure you understand what i mean :sad:
 
Last edited by cimo95,

KleinesSinchen

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It actually should support any SD card available today. (Tried up to 128GB) Most devices claiming to be able to use "up to 32GB" are able to use SDXC after reformating to FAT32. Technically SDXC is the same as SDHC but with the exFAT file system being the mandatory default.
Don't know if the upcoming/planned SDUC will work on older devices because the 2TB limit cannot easily surpassed in every case (MBR, FAT32, requiring larger sectors). Not that >2TB would make any sense on a DSi, an old camera, a cheap MP3 player or similar…

I guess this tutorial targets the "An error has occurred" message that can pop up if more than 2GB of free space are available on the SD when booting to HiyaCFW/SDNAND. dsi.cfw.guide now suggests (18.) creating dummy files to fill larger SDs to a point where less than 2GB are free. A smaller partition has pretty much the same effect.
 

cimo95

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I guess this tutorial targets the "An error has occurred" message that can pop up if more than 2GB of free space are available on the SD when booting to HiyaCFW/SDNAND.
at least my tutorial is not totally useless :(
my friend told me that he usually cant run his DSi on 8gb SD Card with unlaunch, idk if DSi be able to read over 32gb which is not good for fat32 (unless it formatted to NTFS i think :unsure:), i never used exFAT so idk what would be happen after that :mellow:
 

cimo95

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MiniTool partition Wizard Free also works on windows, and its very easy to use, you can also use diskpart on cmd if you feel techy :)
yeah, those are free third party tools, but i just want to tell them that windows has its own tool to made it (without third party :(), diskpart is best, since we just pass some parameter without confuse with many options, but im a little bit afraid using it, you know :unsure:
 

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I just copied a bunch of music and problem solved. better use that excess space than waste it.
if the sd card has less than 2gb of free space hiyacfw will boot no problem.

EDIT: another good idea is to use 32kb clusters (allocation size), that makes reading data from the card way faster and the dsi menu boots right away.
if you do have a card with less than 2gb (or creating a partition like this tutorial does) you have to use fat16 (or simply fat) to be able to select 32kb cluster size.
 
Last edited by Sakitoshi,

whywhy2

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this is a stupid question i have, can i add files more than 2gb after doing this? because i have an 8gb microsd and i want to put a bunch of dsiwares on twilight menu and some on sdnand if the game doesn't work properly on twilight menu
 

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this is a stupid question i have, can i add files more than 2gb after doing this? because i have an 8gb microsd and i want to put a bunch of dsiwares on twilight menu and some on sdnand if the game doesn't work properly on twilight menu
you are better off not following this tutorial and just filling the sd card until you have less than 2gb of free space.
the dsi menu can't handle more than 2gb of free space, so you just need to have less than 2gb of free space and everything will work like a charm.
 
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cimo95

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HiyaCFW is able reading SD Card bigger than 32Gb. The only requierment is the free space must be less than 2Gb, so a SD Card 4Gb with 2,5Gb used or a 32Gb with 31Gb used will work.
yeah, i know, my bad i dont make a deep reading first before making this thread :rofl:, you can report this post if felt useless, that's fair to me... :(
but i hope this tutorial is at least usable for anoter usage :(
 
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Reshiban

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yeah, i know, my bad i dont make a deep reading first before making this thread :rofl:, you can report this post if felt useless, that's fair to me... :(
but i hope this tutorial is at least usable for anoter usage :(
Np, I just mention this possibility but your tutorial is very good, keep this online ;)
 
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Shadow_The_Hedgehog82

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HiyaCFW is able reading SD Card bigger than 32Gb. The only requierment is the free space must be less than 2Gb, so a SD Card 4Gb with 2,5Gb used or a 32Gb with 31Gb used will work.
Hiya is working fine on my system and i'm using a 32gb card and only about 1gb is full. The card is sandisk ultra a1. I'm not booting into twilight either
 
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whywhy2

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you are better off not following this tutorial and just filling the sd card until you have less than 2gb of free space.
the dsi menu can't handle more than 2gb of free space, so you just need to have less than 2gb of free space and everything will work like a charm.
oh well, i think i'll have to use my old 2gb sdcard for this because i still want to access the sdnand for some games that doesn't work properly on twilight menu like brain age math. thanks for the reply!
 

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