This scene can be confusing and elitist for newcomers, so I wrote an overview of various sources to provide a better orientation.
This guide was created for education. I disagree with the abuse and piracy of games on any platform.
I soldered PICOFLY modchip with a cheap soldering iron, without a microscope and experience with micro soldering, but it was a long and demanding task. I hope it will encourage someone to take up this fun journey.
Needed components
- Nintendo Switch
- Modchip (4$); I used this one, but it was overpriced.
- Soldering iron (15$), something like this
- SD card, at least 16GB, recommended 64GB and more. (10$)
- USB C to USB 2.0 cable.
- Soldering flux is recommended but not required.
- Electrical tape
- Heat sink paste
Hack - hardest part
If you have a Nintendo Switch V1 and belong to the lucky 12% (see hackable serial numbers[1]) who have an unpatched switch, you can get by with tinfoil and an SD card. There are plenty of jailbreak tutorials[2].
The hack is more complicated if you have a patched Switch, Switch Lite, or OLED version.
You have to solder a modchip, often PICOFLY or HWFLY, which are very cheap on Aliexpress, to a Nintendo motherboard. They work on the principle of voltage changes on the processor, which skips the integrity check mechanism to check unauthorized software.
The easiest is the V1 version, then Switch Lite, then OLED.
The USB C connector is often included with the modchip, through which the chip's firmware must be uploaded. This consists of dragging only a few files to the modchip. The firmware can be found on GitHub.
What to do after the hack
You must load the software that starts after boot and must be on the SD card.
You can use HATS, which is a package of different tools. The community will tell you that you must install individual tools to understand how they work. The reality is that copy-pasting different tools to the SD card will not help you understand the tools, so don't be afraid to take the easy way out. This is very common in the linux arch community, where people claim the only correct way is without using the archinstall script. Of course, this is wrong.
The HATS source code has been taken down but can be found in various mirrors; use Google.
See this video for info about HATS: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfJIVzeJSyE
The following section describes some tools used in HATS, and you would probably set up these tools even if you went the manual route.
The recommended starting point is this guide:
https://nh-server.github.io/switch-guide/?embedable=true
Toolset
Hekate - The most used bootloader that allows you to boot custom firmware (CFW).
Tinfoil - Tinfoil allows you to access the SD card via USB C. You can install all switch ROM formats like XCI, XCZ, NSP, and NSZ.
nx-hbmenu - Menu for launching homebrew applications. This menu will be available via the album icon on Switch.
RetroArch - is an industry-standard tool for managing various emulators.
Atmosphere - OS for the switch. You will probably be using this one. Otherwise, you can use various linux distributions. RetroPie also works on Switch.
What is X?
-
Switch NAND- This is a memory chip with the original firmware on the Switch motherboard. -
emuMMC- emulated NAND saved on SD card. -
cfw- custom firmware -
homebrew- custom console software not provided with original -
payload- a program that gets executed after exploiting a vulnerability -
.nro- a format of programs that can be run with CFW
Links
[1]: https://suchmememanyskill.github.io/guides/switchserials/