I have an unpatched HAC 20 CPU switch, got it as broken because its stuck at the second Nintendo Switch Logo Screen.
It happily accepts payloads so I booted into Hekate and installed Ubuntu for Switch which boots just fine but no BT / WiFi. PCB looks like it hat some water damage, I cleaned everything up, couldn’t measure any shorts. Reflowed the WiFi IC, same behaviour, still no WiFi / BT in Linux. Removed WiFi IC, still the same, stuck at 2nd boot logo. SOC / Ram seems fine as Linux is working.
I was thinking maybe a NAND issue? I got the keys and made a backup, next thing I’ll try is to rebuild a new firmware like explained in this how-to:
I have read reports of some people claiming the Switch will still boot into HOS even with the WIFI IC removed… but… I’ve never tested this myself (afaiar) so I can’t comment on this, also, the people who mention this never mention what OS version the switch is on nor the board revision, both of which could alter this behaviour.
So, regardless of the above, I’d still go ahead and put another WIFI IC on your board (prefereably one you’ve pulled and reballed from a donor) and see if you atleast regain BT/WIFI within Linux, if after this if your still getting stuck at the second logo then it would most likely be pointing to the SoC…maybe ram (though less likely) . If putting the new wifi IC on the board doesn’t change anything then it’s possibly SoC lines relating specifically to the wifi IC which are at fault and probably other lines which could (or are) halting boot.
I recall a few cases such as this and I’ll always swap out the wifi IC first and failing that, I’ll just pull the SoC and transfer it over to another known good donor board together with it’s EMMC, it’s often joint related issues it seems
Share emmc issue case just had today here.
Most case, emmc dead=no logo, no backlight, simply 200mA-ish current draw(from battery connector,measured from DC supply). or 15v@0.08A charge port drawing(no battery; normally 0.1A draw,then drop down to 0.004A ).
Back to OP case, stuck on 2nd boot logo in most case need to REBALL or replace WIFI chip. Reflow in my exp is like 30% chance work in short period(month maybe). Imaging handheld console hard drop rate/times compares to Xbox,laptop or PS, the BGAchips on Nintendo Switch suffer more ball joint broken thanks to users behaivor, not to mention BSOD or water damage.
Thanks for your thoughts on this matter. I’ll try to get a new WiFi IC as I’m not (yet) comfortable reballing sich a tiny IC / nor do I have the stencil. Are there known reliable suppliers on AliExpress?
For future reference, HOS is 11.0.0- 12.0.1 witch 14 burnt fuses, board Version is a HAC 20 CPU
So I recently purchased some WiFi ICs from an AliExpress seller with good buyer feedback of working ICs and replaced the chip ( twice) but unfortunately it’s still the same error. Installed Android on the switch but WiFi won’t turn on. Checked for shorts around the WiFi IC but everything seems fine.
Does anybody have some suggestions where to go from here?
Looks like the water entered at the cartridge slot, so quite close to the WiFi/BT section. I thought maybe the issue is caused by a faulty power supply to the WiFi/BT IC as a faulty IC should result in a orange screen of death and the original firmware refuses to boot, probably because some kind of startup check fails?
The two caps close too the APU are fine, already checked them. Wouldn’t there be more issues with the Switch (runs fine on Linux) if the APU had contact issues?
If only one solder ball / contact point under the apu isn’t making a connection and that one pad happens to be the one connected to the wifi module then everything would work other than the wifi