Hello guys, this is my first post here! I just got a MIG Switch card out of curiosity and I was tinkering with it. For those who don't know, it's used by placing XCI dumps as well as other game specific bin files in the sd card of the MIG Switch, and are obtained from the original cartridge by using an app like nxdumptool. Two of these bin files are mandatory to get the game to boot: Initial Data.bin and Certificate.bin. They stay the same for every cartridge of a specific game. Now, if you want to use an XCI dump from a shady website it's impossible to get it to work without those files. By using the Certificate.bin from another game it has no problem, but this does not count for the Initial Data.bin. So I looked for a way to obtain this Initial Data from an XCI file and read a bit of the XCI file documentation from switchbrew dot org. Here's what I understood so far: The Switch checks if the cartridge is valid by doing a challenge–response authentication on the Initial Data. The Package ID is contained both on the XCI and the Initial Data, on positions 0x110 and 0x0 respectively. The Initial Data hash is on the XCI at position 0x160. It is calculated by doing a SHA-256 hash on the full Initial Data content. So I was wondering, is there a way to to construct a functional Initial Data file starting from an XCI dump? I also tried a reverse approach by editing the Package ID in the Initial Data from another game, generating the Initial Data hash and putting it in the XCI file but is not enough to get the Switch believe it's a real game. Sorry if this may seem stupid but let me know what you think.

mig switch not working/updating??

stickybit · 2024-03-28T19:59:51+00:00

just got my mig switch and followed instructions to the T to update it and all im getting is a red light and then a message saying cart not recognised, all im trying to do is update it to the latest firmware, it says it should flash blue when...

Hacking Hardware Homebrew Tutorial Updated

Nintendo Switch, Windows Drivers Installation/Refresh

Hello there fellow Tempers.

A question popping out regularly on the site is "My Switch Console is not recognized by my PC, What can I do?".

The first things you should do are:

Use another cable, do not matter if the cable works fine with other console or in another PC, believe me try another cable first.
Use a different USB Port.
Use another PC just to be sure your console is OK.

If everything else fails, you could need to install or reinstall your drivers, first a little explanation about drivers:
Drivers are a small program which helps to Windows to understand the "language" a physical (or another software) device "speaks" and how to send commands to that device and then convert the response to a usable format.

The Switch console have at least 4 modes which can be used to "talk" to a computer, as far I know:

APX mode, AKA recovery or RCM mode.
HOS default mode
Homebrew mode
MTP mode

Windows needs drivers for each mode, for the modes APX and Homebrew you need to install customized drivers, normally that could not be done by user, luckily there is a excellent free tool allowing you to do that quick.

Zadig Drivers

First you need to download it, the tools is called Zadig, download latest version from the official site

Go to https://zadig.akeo.ie/ site.

Run as administrator, or allows to be run as administrator:

Select Options -> List All Devices

From the drop down list select the correspondent device, APX if you are on recovery mode; Goldleaf, DBI or console if you are inside a homebrew, then select the Diver "libusbK" and from the little arrow besides Install Driver and then tick to select "Install Driver".

After That Press the big button "Install Driver"

The process can take some minutes, at end the driver (and certificates) will be installed for you.

You can repeat this process for the other modes APX or Homebrew.

MTP Mode
Now for the MTP mode, normally Windows have the drivers preinstalled and with just a MTP Responder, by example DBI or "USB File Transfer" App of Atmosphère, windows should setup everything, but sometimes your drivers could be messed up, first you could diagnose your drivers.

Use Windows Device Manager to look what device is connected.

For me is easiest to setup the view sorting the devices for connection, and enabling "Show Hidden Devices" will help a lot.

Look for the MTP USB Device, if it have a error or warning you could reinstall manually the drivers:

Right click the device, and choose "Update Driver Software..." then select "Let me pick from a List of device drivers on your computer". The list will show installed driver software compatible with the device.

Remove the tick of "Show compatible hardware", then select Standard MTP Device and on the right, select MTP USB Device

RESTART your computer and try again, now your DBI MTP device should work fine:

In general, on a Windows computer you end with several installed drivers for the Switch.

"Zadik ones"

Using the Zadig program you can add two generic drivers for two states of the Switch:

RCM mode, is the mode of the switch on the RCM state, waiting for the payload to be injected:

When you run Homebrew like Goldleaf, AtmolXL Installer, DBI, etc. the "Homebrew Mode" is enabled:

"Windows Integrated Drivers"
When you full load the console, the HOS present to windows as:

If you Run DBI and then start the MTP Responder, Windows "see" a MTP device, the drivers should be installed by windows itself because MTP is a standard device/protocol definition.