SD Card Setup
This page is for preparing your SD card for your Nintendo DSi. In the process, we’ll format the SD card to a format suitable for the Nintendo DSi and check the card for errors.
Make sure to backup your SD card contents BEFORE following this. Your SD card will be WIPED in the process.
Section I - Formatting your SD card
- Download the latest version of GUIFormat
- Click on the picture on the website to download the app
- Run GUIFormat with Administrator permissions
- Select your drive letter
- Set your
Allocation size unit
it to32768
- If this is too large for your SD, set it to the highest one that works
- Make sure the
Quick Format
check box is checked - Start the format process
Section II - Checking for errors
- Go to the properties window of your SD card
Windows Explorer
->This PC
-> Right click your SD card ->Properties
- In the tools tab, Select
Check Now
- Check both
Automatically fix file system errors
andScan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors
- Start the checking process
This will scan the SD card and correct any errors it finds
Section III - Checking SD card read/write
- Download and extract the h2testw archive anywhere on your computer.
- It can also be extracted on an external device as long as that external device isn’t your SD card
- With your SD card inserted into your computer, run
h2testw.exe
- Select which language you’d like to see h2testw in
- Set your SD card’s drive letter as your target
- Ensure
all available space
is selected - Click
Write + Verify
- Wait until the process is completed
If the test shows the result Test finished without errors
, your SD card is good and you can delete all .h2w
files on your SD card
If the test shows any other results, your SD card may be corrupted or damaged and you may have to replace it!
Section I - Formatting your SD card
- Make sure your SD card is not inserted into your Linux machine
- Launch the Linux Terminal
- Type
watch "lsblk"
- Insert your SD card into your Linux machine
- Observe the output. It should match something like this:
NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT mmcblk0 179:0 0 3,8G 0 disk └─mmcblk0p1 179:1 0 3,7G 0 part /run/media/user/FFFF-FFFF
- Take note of the device mount point. In our example above, it was
mmcblk0p1
- If
RO
is set to 1, make sure the lock switch is not slid down
- If
- Hit CTRL + C to exit the menu
- Type in
sudo mkdosfs /dev/(device mount point from above) -s 64 -F 32
to create a single FAT32 partition with 32 KB cluster size on the SD card
Section II - Using F3
- Download and extract the F3 archive anywhere on your computer.
- Launch the terminal in the F3 directory
- Run
make
to compile F3 - With your SD card inserted and mounted, run
./f3write <your sd card mount point>
- Wait until the process is complete. See below for an example output:
$ ./f3write /media/michel/6135-3363/ Free space: 29.71 GB Creating file 1.h2w ... OK! ... Creating file 30.h2w ... OK! Free space: 0.00 Byte Average Writing speed: 4.90 MB/s
- Wait until the process is complete. See below for an example output:
- Run
./f3read <your sd card mount point>
- Wait until the process is complete. See below for an example output:
$ ./f3read /media/michel/6135-3363/ SECTORS ok/corrupted/changed/overwritten Validating file 1.h2w ... 2097152/ 0/ 0/ 0 ... Validating file 30.h2w ... 1491904/ 0/ 0/ 0 Data OK: 29.71 GB (62309312 sectors) Data LOST: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors) Corrupted: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors) Slightly changed: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors) Overwritten: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors) Average Reading speed: 9.42 MB/s
- Wait until the process is complete. See below for an example output:
If the test shows the result Data LOST: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors)
your SD card is good and you can delete all .h2w
files on your SD card
If the test shows any other results, your SD card may be corrupted or damaged and you may have to replace it!
Section I - Formatting your SD card
OS X El Capitan (10.11) and later
- Launch the Disk Utility application
- Select
Show All Devices
in the top-leftView
panel - Select your SD card from the sidebar
- Make sure you choose the correct device, otherwise you might accidentally erase the wrong drive!
- Click
Erase
at the top - Ensure that
Format
is set toMS-DOS (FAT32)
- On El Capitan (10.11) through Catalina (10.15) choose
MS-DOS (FAT)
- On El Capitan (10.11) through Catalina (10.15) choose
- Ensure that
Scheme
is set toMaster Boot Record
- If
Scheme
does not appear, clickCancel
and make sure to choose the device instead of a volume
- If
- Click
Erase
, then clickClose
OS X Yosemite (10.10) and earlier
- Launch the Disk Utility application
- Select your SD card from the sidebar
- Make sure you choose the correct device, otherwise you might accidentally erase the wrong drive!
- Click
Partition
at the top- If
Partition
does not appear, make sure to choose the device instead of a volume
- If
- Ensure that
Partition Layout
is set to1 Partition
- Ensure that
Format
is set toMS-DOS (FAT)
- From the Options button (below the partition table), select
Master Boot Record
. - Click
OK
->Apply
->Partition
Section II - Using F3
- Open Terminal
- Install F3 from brew by running
brew install f3
- If you don’t have brew, install it with the instructions on brew.sh
- With your SD card inserted and mounted, run
f3write <your sd card mount point>
- Wait until the process is complete. See below for an example output:
$ f3write /Volumes/SD\ CARD Free space: 29.71 GB Creating file 1.h2w ... OK! ... Creating file 30.h2w ... OK! Free space: 0.00 Byte Average Writing speed: 4.90 MB/s
- Wait until the process is complete. See below for an example output:
- Run
f3read <your sd card mount point>
- Wait until the process is complete. See below for an example output:
$ f3read /Volumes/SD\ CARD SECTORS ok/corrupted/changed/overwritten Validating file 1.h2w ... 2097152/ 0/ 0/ 0 ... Validating file 30.h2w ... 1491904/ 0/ 0/ 0 Data OK: 29.71 GB (62309312 sectors) Data LOST: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors) Corrupted: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors) Slightly changed: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors) Overwritten: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors) Average Reading speed: 9.42 MB/s
- Wait until the process is complete. See below for an example output:
If the test shows the result Data LOST: 0.00 Byte (0 sectors)
your SD card is good and you can delete all .h2w
files on your SD card
If the test shows any other results, your SD card may be corrupted or damaged and you may have to replace it!
You can now restore the contents of your SD card and continue.