Topic: Please help, 3DS won't turn on, about to lose a lifetime of Pokemon

So the only 3DS I have will just, not turn on. It charges. It's not the battery. When I push the power button the blue light comes on then back off and it doesn't turn on. I noticed there was no SD card in the slot so I got a new one and it's still the same issue. I mean I guess there's nothing on the SD card so that shouldn't surprise me but I have no idea what to do. I just want to download pokemon bank before the eshop goes down.

It's already likely I've lost the save data for my pokemon games because who knows what happened to this SD card. But if I can get to the pokemon that I uploaded in Bank a few years ago and just straight not lose them forever I'm fine with that. Maybe I'm already screwed.

Thanks in advance if anyone can help me.

That type of behavior is similar to what happened to my DS when I accidentally caused a short that damaged a certain part. I was able to fix it that time. In your case, it could also be that a drop loosened some ribbon cable. So it’s kinda like a way to let you know that the startup process can’t be finished due to a hardware problem.

Anyhow, if your Pokémon are in Pokémon bank, you can just get a replacement unit and ask nintendo to transfer your account. Your Pokémon will still be there in the cloud, I think.

Something similar happened to my switch I just held to power button for a minute and it reset

The 3DS system briefly powering on and powering back off when an SD card is not inserted, that sounds as though that 3DS system may have been hacked at some point to use an earlier version of arm9loaderhax.

Early versions of A9LH required that an SD card with a certain payload (a special file on the SD card) be inserted, or the 3DS system becomes unbootable. This might be the issue you're having?

@RupeeClock So, I left this out of my initial post because I didn't want to derail the original question - I currently am in possession of a total of three 3DSes. Two of them have been hacked (on purpose lol) but for sure, I left one unhacked specifically to go online with Pokemon/Animal Crossing. I know I got Pokemon Bank, I remember specifically putting pokemon in there. And I have physical copies of Pokemon and Animal crossing that I could only play on the unhacked. The two other systems turn on and are hacked. So the one that won't turn on HAS to be the unhacked one.

It is very possible that the SD card was removed in relation to hacking in the early days (and I can't confirm because the person who hacked all of them is no longer with us) I just have no idea what the order of operations was there, or what happened to it. At this point I have accepted that this system will likely never turn on, and I just an hour or so ago called around and found a used 2DS as a local shop that I'm trying to pick up later today. Since the timing constraint is for Bank I really only care about that, not even save files at this point.

I'm not saying you're wrong, it's just weird, that what you said sounds probably right, but then for sure I have an unhacked one, and I don't have any other systems soooooo who knows lol but thank you

You have to Google search some game retail stores that repair game systems, and tell them what’s wrong with the Nintendo 3DS.

@Breepops did it work out in the end?

@Eel so, I'll try to not make this too long, but I did end up getting a new system as you suggested (I found a 2DS at a local used retail shop for like 85 bucks) and tried to transfer my account, which I had to track down through email addresses cause it's been so long since I used it especially now that my original system is dead. When I went to transfer it, IT TOLD ME THE ACCOUNT WAS LINKED TO A DIFFERENT REGION. And that I could not move it (and I spent a long time with a rep on the phone out of desperation.) I found evidence in an old email of the same account (????) which had the same user ID (plus another one), different password, different email, not region locked (makes no sense but OK whatever) and since that one was not region locked they were able to put in a request to transfer the data but it took a couple days and this was all on Friday.

So, I have the ticket back, which is great, but honestly there is so much bad ***** going on in my life unrelated to this that I just haven't been able to bring myself to even try to go back in. In order to download Bank on a new system you need a NNID either way so I didn't want to make a new one to make FURTHER ISSUES transferring. I am 99% sure I had everything downloaded before, and the transfer looks like it worked, so at this point, it's either there with my pokemon that I threw into Bank, and I can re-download it since it's just an account recovery, or it's not, and I'm screwed. I was going to be screwed either way, but I'm hoping that at the very least I will have an open channel between pokemon generations that will be open. I know I have some save games backed up, which will be probably annoying to try to recover still but at least I would be able to do it when I'm ready. I will be really sad if I've lost that link because of this insane debacle, which is why I haven't brought myself to officially check, the last 2 days I cannot handle another L, you know what I mean?

If I am able, I will check tonight, if not tomorrow night. I will update this (this has been such a saga in my life lol I appreciate anyone reading)

@Breepops Creating a new NNID will not help you, you need access to your original account.

As long as nintendo did the transfer themselves and you’re able to redownload all your software, it should be fine.

Good luck!