A few days after the monumental reveal of a work-in-progress flashcart being made for the Nintendo Switch, more information has been made available. The previously unnamed flashcart is set to be called "Mig Switch", and the initial Twitter user that unveiled the Mig Switch's existence, After Time X, managed to get in contact with the team behind it all. According to them, they were offered a review unit of the Mig Switch, but turned it down, as the After Time X team fears legal repercussions from dealing with "backup loader" hardware.

Another interesting tidbit is that existing dumps of Switch games will NOT be compatible with the Mig Switch, and backups will need to be repacked to function with the flashcart. Games played with the flashcart can be played online, as well.

The Mig Switch currently has a website, where it is seeking distributors to work together with in order to sell initial limited quantities of the Mig Switch device, with the first units to be delivered sometime in January. The team claims that full availability is expected around March/April 2024. It'll come with the Mig Switch card, and the Mig Switch Dumper, with the latter of which allowing you to back up your games using NXdumpTool.

More Details Has Been Uncovered About the First Switch Flashcart

After some digging around by our @AfterTimeX journalists, it was discovered that the “Switch Flashcart” in fact has a name, “Mig Switch” and they agreed to answer a few of our questions about some points that… pic.twitter.com/kQtXdSNg7E

— After Time X (@AfterTimeX) December 27, 2023

Official Website

 

[impeeza]

Curious when it’s eventually all decrypted if we will know when it was created, I wonder if these have been made for years but they waited to release them.

Will be like the SX and the raspberries 2040 firmwares

 

[TheStonedModder]

With the way it’s currently designed, any circuit board and chip experts out there think that a button could be installed to simulate the reinsertion of the cart or we’ll need to wait for v2?

I’m working on it rn but I need to wait for a cart reader to come in from Aliexpress so I can measure the pitch of the pins

I found some normally closed switches as well so in theory those should work on their own if you split traces 1 and 2 with the button in between. But I don’t think many can or would be willing to do that…so I’m trying to make an external PCB also like a breakout board and 3d printed case with some cheap cart readers from Aliexpress

 

[BigOnYa]

I’m working on it rn but I need to wait for a cart reader to come in from Aliexpress so I can measure the pitch of the pins

I found some normally closed switches as well so in theory those should work on their own if you split traces 1 and 2 with the button in between. But I don’t think many can or would be willing to do that…so I’m trying to make an external PCB also like a breakout board and 3d printed case with some cheap cart readers from Aliexpress

I was thinking along the same lines as you, but using a dremel tool, sand down the copper pad on MIG card pins 1/2 till they not connected, and use tiny wire inside to a N/C switch on top. Be pain to do, but yea possibly ruin a $70+ Mig is a tough swallow. Good luck tho. I'll be interested to see it when done.

 

[impeeza]

I’m working on it rn but I need to wait for a cart reader to come in from Aliexpress so I can measure the pitch of the pins

I found some normally closed switches as well so in theory those should work on their own if you split traces 1 and 2 with the button in between. But I don’t think many can or would be willing to do that…so I’m trying to make an external PCB also like a breakout board and 3d printed case with some cheap cart readers from Aliexpress

The one who tells to console the cartridge is installed are the pis 1 & 2 of the cartridge when they are connected (and both connected to GND) the reader detects an insertion, if pin 2 is open to GND the cartridge is sensed as ejected:

https://switchbrew.org/wiki/Gamecard

a normal cartridge:

Note Pins 1 & 2 are an only trace

On the Switching/holder cartridge gadget from Aliexpress you can see the Pins 1 & 2 are separated so can be triggered by software, this is the cable of that device you insert on the console:

Pis 1 & 2 are separated.


On the MIG like original cartridges are shorted:

so without a lot of handwork the MIG will no be able to change games without ejecting/reinserting.

Post automatically merged: Jan 20, 2024

I was thinking along the same lines as you, but using a dremel tool, sand down the copper pad on MIG card pins 1/2 till they not connected, and use tiny wire inside to a N/C switch on top. Be pain to do, but yea possibly ruin a $70 Mig is a tough swallow. Good luck tho. I'll be interested to see it when done.

The easy way will be if that can be done with a wireless method, like the expensive cartridge holder of Aliexpress.

If the MIG have a ESP32 that micro includes BLE capabilities, so you can communicate with MIG vía a Webpage or an app or even a wireless button.

 

[BigOnYa]

The one who tells to console the cartridge is installed are the pis 1 & 2 of the cartridge when they are connected (and both connected to GND) the reader detects an insertion, if pin 2 is open to GND the cartridge is sensed as ejected:

Quick mock up so I appologize but was thinking something like this should work:

 

[impeeza]

Quick mock up so I appologize but:

View attachment 415216

;(

 

[BigOnYa]

I was editing my post sorry.

 

[impeeza]

ok, now I could see it:

And, yeah sort of that is needed

 

[mrdude]

Quick mock up so I appologize but was thinking something this should work:

View attachment 415217

Yep that should work just fine. Alghough one of those pins is a gnd so you could solder to any ground point (probably one of those test points) rather than the flat trace.

 

[impeeza]

not even you need to connect to pin 1 to any GND will do the magic.

 

[BigOnYa]

Just hard to believe they didn't design that in the first place. Makes me wonder if something else we are missing. Maybe the chips need power cycle to change the titles. Who knows.

 

[mrdude]

Just hard to believe they didn't design that in the first place. Makes me wonder if something else we are missing. Maybe the chips need power cycle to change the titles. Who knows.

There must be counter function in the software that counts how many xci's are on the card and then every time the card is inserted the counter checks if any games have been added or removed and then increases the count if the same or more games are added, but resest if some have been removed or it's at the end of the list. Maybe someone with a card can check by putting a bit of kapton take over the ground or pin 8 traces to check.

 

[impeeza]

ok, now I could see it:

View attachment 415221
And, yeah sort of that is needed

That will indicate to the console what the cartdrige has been ejected, but I don't know if that will let to know to the FPGA/controller/logic what it need to cycle the dump to the next ROM, may be the Voltage (3.1 and/or 1.8 v) will need to be commuted also.

 

[mrdude]

I was thinking along the same lines as you, but using a dremel tool.

Better to use a scalpel as that's much thinner.

 

[impeeza]

Better to use a scalpel as that's much thinner.

yes will be better:

https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/677894/how-do-i-cut-a-trace

 

[linuxares]

Wouldn't it be possible to do this using one of the vias instead? Make it more neat.

 

[mrdude]

yes will be better:

https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/677894/how-do-i-cut-a-trace

Yep, just do a few thin passes with the scalpel and use a ruler (metal one if you have it) as a guide (cut towards the outside so you are going opposite from the other traces). Also instead of soldering on to the traces, check with a multimeter where pin 1 is going and pin 2 is going - there's maybe a better place to solder to such as a test pin or something.

 

[Nincompoopdo]

Isn't that the reason why they appointed Doug Bowser as CEO of NA to counter that bad omen?

Nintendo in Japanese means 'God's will' - this company is over 100 years old, transforming from making playing cards to operating taxi and love hotel and making toys then video games. They let themselves be guided by 'God's will'.

I am sure they have been waiting for a 'Bowser' who will disrupt their business - a prophesy they have been expecting for decades. They must have mistaken Doug Bowser as the nemesis, so they hired him to keep him close.

"Keep your friends close; keep your enemies closer.”
Sun Tzu (also Michael Corleone)

 

[mrdude]

Here's some info I used for converting an NSP to XCi for testing for possible mig switch use.

I didn't use SAK or NSCB to convert the game as these don't include the tik or cert files during conversion, the tik is required for decrypting the nca files.

1: Obtain the nsp and install.

2: Dump the NSP (nxdumptool) to make a ticketless/decrypted nsp dump.
NCA - set content dist type to download - NO
TIK remove console specific data - yes
nacp disable linked account req - yes
nacp enable screenshots - yes
nacp disable hcdp - no
nsp gen authoring tool data - yes

3: Copy the tickeless dump to your computer and convert to xci using your favourite tool for converting.

4: I don't have a mig switch but I have SXOS so I mounted and tested the the xci game (Zhed) played without errors.

5: As the xci game was mounted I has able to use nxdumptool to dump the following:
card id set, certificate, header - only the certificate out of these is required for the mig switch (but any renamed game cert can be used).

6: I was unable to dump the initial data which apparently the mig switch needs - but it should be possible to create this file manually based on this information:

As we need initial data bin we can generate our own one and just alter the header of the xci with a hex editor so the sha256 value matches it, this way we should have all the files required for our converted nsp to work:

So can nsp be converted to play on the mig swtich? I would say yes they most probably can but I won't be buying one to test until a cheaper clone comes out.

 

[TheStonedModder]

Here's some info I used for converting an NSP to XCi for testing for possible mig switch use.

I didn't use SAK or NSCB to convert the game as these don't include the tik or cert files during conversion, the tik is required for decrypting the nca files.

1: Obtain the nsp and install.

2: Dump the NSP (nxdumptool) to make a ticketless/decrypted nsp dump.
NCA - set contend dist type to download - NO
TIK remove console specific data - yes
nacp disable linked account req - yes
nacp enable screenshots - yes
nacp disable hcdp - no
nsp gen authoring tool data - yes

3: Copy the tickeless dump to your computer and convert to xci using your favourite tool for converting.

4: I don't have a mig switch but I have SXOS so I mounted and tested the the xci game (Zhed) played without errors.

5: As the xci game was mounted I has able to use nxdumptool to dump the following:
card id set, certificate, header - only the certificate out of these is required for the mig switch.

6: I was unable to dump the initial data which apparently the mig switch needs - but it should be possible to create this file manually based on this information:

So can nsp be converted to play on the mig swtich, I would say yes they most probably can but I won't be buying one to test until a cheaper clone comes out.

I can test this when mine comes in. Can’t hurt