Hacking Hardware Picofly - a HWFLY switch modchip

[lightautodark]

I found this, do you think it's okay ?

What is that price. It only cost 1 USD on AliExpress for 100 pcs..

 

[thesjaakspoiler]

What is that price. It only cost 1 USD on AliExpress for 100 pcs..

That is a well known scam going on on eBay and Amazon.
In Asia they sell them for 1000x times the price and when Amazon complains they just say that they made a mistake with the exchange rate calculations and create a new account to continue their scam.

 

[lightautodark]

That is a well known scam going on on eBay and Amazon.
In Asia they sell them for 1000x times the price and when Amazon complains they just say that they made a mistake with the exchange rate calculations and create a new account to continue their scam.

Sorry what scam is this? I bought from Amazon before for relatively cheap price and they were fine...?

 

[QuiTim]

while they are still expensive, the listing is for 170values 5pcs each

 

[lightautodark]

while they are still expensive, the listing is for 170values 5pcs each

I think he's looking at 100 ohm. 5 pcs for around €2

 

[thesjaakspoiler]

Sorry what scam is this? I bought from Amazon before for relatively cheap price and they were fine...?

Here in Asia Amazon allows malicious sellers to set ridiculous prices in the hopes that someone will just buy their product.
So 100 resistors are offered for $150 instead of $5.
Another scam is selling the product for a price that is few cents less than regular sellers but only selling 1 or 10 pieces instead of a 100 pieces.
Amazon doesn't give a crap here in Asia about their customers and since they are also profiting off these scams, they just allow them on their platform.
You really have to be careful here and read every product description.

 

[JonJaded]

Hey guys, I'm running into a problem with my modchip I got installed. It's a picofly and on every boot I get =*, which I believe means dat0 not connected. Everytime I've gone back for him to fix it (gone twice now in 3 weeks) it works for like about a week, then I restart to update something and then locked into =* and booting straight to OFW. (OFW functions fine though.)

He told me today that it's probably heat thats making the dat0 adapter move, and that I shouldn't use certain chargers, because they heat up the switch too much... but I've only been playing docked with no OC and using a standard PD charger in handheld. Could this be true? Does anyone have any thoughts? I really feel like Echoes of Wisdom shouldn't be burning my switch so hot that I have dat0 problems so soon already, with ~2 hours of gameplay per day.

 

[lightautodark]

Hey guys, I'm running into a problem with my modchip I got installed. It's a picofly and on every boot I get =*, which I believe means dat0 not connected. Everytime I've gone back for him to fix it (gone twice now in 3 weeks) it works for like about a week, then I restart to update something and then locked into =* and booting straight to OFW. (OFW functions fine though.)

He told me today that it's probably heat thats making the dat0 adapter move, and that I shouldn't use certain chargers, because they heat up the switch too much... but I've only been playing docked with no OC and using a standard PD charger in handheld. Could this be true? Does anyone have any thoughts? I really feel like Echoes of Wisdom shouldn't be burning my switch so hot that I have dat0 problems so soon already, with ~2 hours of gameplay per day.

Unfortunately you'll have to send it back to him to get the dat0 adapter reseated, or ask for refund/partial refund and find someone else to do it for you. dat0 adapter is unreliable, best to find installer that do emmc dapter or kamikaze.

But there is a legendary installer here who claimed to have done 300 units using adapter without fail. Maybe you should get in touch with him

 

[snaker]

Unfortunately you'll have to send it back to him to get the dat0 adapter reseated, or ask for refund/partial refund and find someone else to do it for you. dat0 adapter is unreliable, best to find installer that do emmc dapter or kamikaze.

But there is a legendary installer here who claimed to have done 300 units using adapter without fail. Maybe you should get in touch with him

Ohh that would be really nice in order to prove what i state. The best example.

And for those who want the correct ones here is a link :
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/100....order_list.order_list_main.11.21ef1802vzJSxm

just got some and all are the correct ones. Inform whoever search for the correct ones.

You dont need to be legendary to install an adapter . You just keep drilling you will be fine.

 

[Tom8823]

Anybody had this before?

I installed my chip with mosfet more than a year ago.

Everything was working fine for months except that twice already I had a situation where after I upgraded switch firmware my chip failed to boot up. I updated to 18.1.0 yesterday and I shut down console and pressing power button does nothing. No LED light on chip, nothing, dead. I managed to start console by holding power button for 30 seconds and hekate started. I opened picobox and reset switch and after shutting down console it booted up but on another shutdown again black screen and I have to hold power button long to fix it. Then on another boot up hekate starts but starting CFW ends up with "failed to init emmc" error. The only way to permanently fix it is to open console and disconnect battery and reconnect. Then it will act fine and until next time it happens which can take months. I am not 100% sure it's related to firmware update but that's what I did yesterday.

My soldering is good becaue like I say it will work fine for months until this happens. Then I have to open console to reconnect battery. It's so annoying

Also my console crashed after echoes of wisdom so maybe it's emmc error.

try changing the cmd resistance, you have to do some cross tests to find the problem.

Took me some time but I experienced it again. Suddenly console wouldn't turn on at all. I opened it and as expected pressing power button did nothing, there was no LED light on chip. As you suggested I experimented with resistors, I googled that some by default install 100 ohm resistors on DAT0 and CMD so I did that. This made things worse. Now the problem was more frequent. Console would turn on once (glitch was very fast) but would not turn on second time until I reconnected battery. Again console would turn on once and would not turn on again and so on... So looks like in my case changing resistors to 100ohm made things worse. I put back CMD to 47 ohm leaving 100 ohm on DAT0 (no idea if that would fix anything but let's experiment).

Right now glitching is instant on each try, everything is working as expected. EMMC benchmark shows 325 MB/s however based on my previous experience I know it's just a question of time. Like I mentioned the problem of not booting up happened months apart so sooner or later problem might come back.

So my question is do you know if I should increase or decrease resistance of CMD? 100 ohm made things worse, putting back 47 ohm "fixed" it but if this happens again which direction should I go? Below 47 or more than 47 but less than 100?

Thanks

 

[Nephiel]

Also my console crashed after echoes of wisdom so maybe it's emmc error

That's because of SaltyNX, need to add EoW titleID to exclusions or wait for a fix (edit: there it is)

So my question is do you know if I should increase or decrease resistance of CMD? 100 ohm made things worse, putting back 47 ohm "fixed" it but if this happens again which direction should I go? Below 47 or more than 47 but less than 100?

Mostly depends on the chip. Which value resistors does it have on board? I'd aim for a total of 100 ohm on DAT0, same on CMD, and 47 ohm on CLK.

 

[Tom8823]

That's because of SaltyNX, need to add EoW titleID to exclusions or wait for a fix (edit: there it is)


Mostly depends on the chip. Which value resistors does it have on board? I'd aim for a total of 100 ohm on DAT0, same on CMD, and 47 ohm on CLK.

My chip is rp2040 zero not tiny. It does not have any resistors on board. So the problem with console not starting (including no led light on chip) from time to time occured with 47/47/47 installed by me. 100/100/47 made it worse as now it would boot only once and I had to reconnect battery. I'm really puzzled.

Its like in my case increasing resistance on cmd made issue more frequent so my logical approach would be to decrease it more.

Please note I have mariko v2 not oled

 

[twins333]

My chip is rp2040 zero not tiny. It does not have any resistors on board. So the problem with console not starting (including no led light on chip) from time to time occured with 47/47/47 installed by me. 100/100/47 made it worse as now it would boot only once and I had to reconnect battery. I'm really puzzled.

Its like in my case increasing resistance on cmd made issue more frequent so my logical approach would be to decrease it more.

Please note I have mariko v2 not oled

hello.
post pictures of your install. where did you source the 3v from?
try to clean and redo all your solder joints, then clean everything well again with IPA. 100/100/47 ohms should work if everything is well soldered.
maybe the rp2040 chip is faulty? try to also replace that.
what firmware version are you using? 2.75 is the minimum version you should use.

 

[Tom8823]

hello.
post pictures of your install. where did you source the 3v from?
try to clean and redo all your solder joints, then clean everything well again with IPA. 100/100/47 ohms should work if everything is well soldered.
maybe the rp2040 chip is faulty? try to also replace that.
what firmware version are you using? 2.75 is the minimum version you should use.

I will post pictures later
Everything is clean, always cleaning with 99 IPA after soldering.

I took 3V from EMMC this one:
https://gbatemp.net/attachments/1683439705035-png.369534/

Interesting about firmware, I am using 2.73. I will upgrade. Is there a changelog showing what was fixed between 2.73 and 2.75?

Edit: Anyway, I just updated to 2.80, will so how it goes.

Edit2: Actually something else just occurred to me. I bought my RP2040-zero from Aliexpress. It was working fine for couple of months and then the problems started. Now I am wondering if it's not a problem with chinese clone. Does waveshare sell original chips? I think since I have those problems I will replace it with rp2040-tiny, I've been actually planning this for quite some time now since I did not cut the shield and it creates pressure on chip.

 

[lightautodark]

I will post pictures later
Everything is clean, always cleaning with 99 IPA after soldering.

I took 3V from EMMC this one:
https://gbatemp.net/attachments/1683439705035-png.369534/

Interesting about firmware, I am using 2.73. I will upgrade. Is there a changelog showing what was fixed between 2.73 and 2.75?

Edit: Anyway, I just updated to 2.80, will so how it goes.

Edit2: Actually something else just occurred to me. I bought my RP2040-zero from Aliexpress. It was working fine for couple of months and then the problems started. Now I am wondering if it's not a problem with chinese clone. Does waveshare sell original chips? I think since I have those problems I will replace it with rp2040-tiny, I've been actually planning this for quite some time now since I did not cut the shield and it creates pressure on chip.

They have authorised reseller for the "waveshare" brand. Waveshare is a Chinese company anyway. My genuine waveshare rp2040-tiny packaging says it is from Shenzhen. But the clone works just fine for me.

Post automatically merged: Oct 5, 2024

I just ordered some clone zero, wondering if they'll fit under the shield without cutting it I remove the usb port and the buttons?

I will post pictures later
Everything is clean, always cleaning with 99 IPA after soldering.

I took 3V from EMMC this one:
https://gbatemp.net/attachments/1683439705035-png.369534/

Interesting about firmware, I am using 2.73. I will upgrade. Is there a changelog showing what was fixed between 2.73 and 2.75?

Edit: Anyway, I just updated to 2.80, will so how it goes.

Edit2: Actually something else just occurred to me. I bought my RP2040-zero from Aliexpress. It was working fine for couple of months and then the problems started. Now I am wondering if it's not a problem with chinese clone. Does waveshare sell original chips? I think since I have those problems I will replace it with rp2040-tiny, I've been actually planning this for quite some time now since I did not cut the shield and it creates pressure on chip.

 

[Tom8823]

I just ordered some clone zero, wondering if they'll fit under the shield without cutting it I remove the usb port and the buttons?

It does for me but the shield and plastic cover is slightly bulged. You really have to look closely to see this but still I am not happy about it. I will change it to tiny soon

 

[noyes173]

 

[lightautodark]

It does for me but the shield and plastic cover is slightly bulged. You really have to look closely to see this but still I am not happy about it. I will change it to tiny soon

Ah okay. Will have to cut the shield then.

 

[linkref]

its been proved many times from many people. 3x 47 ohm in some case would not be enough, and people recommend 100(DAT0), 100(CMD) and 47(CLK) resistor setup.


You could put extra 47 ohm or up resistor on the pot29(dat0) to increase the resistance like old days if you dont have/confident to replace to on-board 47 ohm resistor

Hello, replaced d0 and CMD with 100ohm resistors, still have *== error sometimes....
I do not know what to do really

I have this on a lot of switch recently, maybe chips that i've buy(rp2040 hwfly from ali) are from a faulty parcel... ?

What make me think it's weir, it's like with an original rp2040 1.1 from waveshare i have the same error....

EDIT : The unit whith that issue is an OLED samsung 2021 emmc, i was several issues like that in the board... :'(

 

[twins333]

Hello, replaced d0 and CMD with 100ohm resistors, still have *== error sometimes....
I do not know what to do really

I have this on a lot of switch recently, maybe chips that i've buy(rp2040 hwfly from ali) are from a faulty parcel... ?

What make me think it's weir, it's like with an original rp2040 1.1 from waveshare i have the same error....

EDIT : The unit whith that issue is an OLED samsung 2021 emmc, i was several issues like that in the board... :'(

Hi, mosfet issues? try replacing the mosfet(s). If you're using a ribbon, try to replace that, since some of them are of poor quality.