Tutorial  Updated

Block Wii U System Updates (Without DNS Blocking!)

This method has been circulating around since yesterday. Presumably, it was discovered on a Chinese forum.

Using this method allows you to stay connected without DNS blocking, and therefore have complete access to Nintendo services.

There are some concerns floating around about this process. So here is a complete guide detailing the process.

Disclaimer:
The following guide tampers with your NAND. Use this with caution or there is a good chance you'll MESS UP your Wii U for good, or even BRICK!

Requirements:
  • A Wii U & SD: Firmware and SD size doesn't matter as long as you satisfy the other conditions
  • Mocha Or Haxchi
  • HBL on SD card
  • ftpiiu_everywhere (Haxchi) on SD card
  • Access to HBL: Browserhax, Haxchi/CBHC, or any other form of entry point, are all fine. As long as you access it.
  • A PC with FTP Client: Technically it doesn't have to be a PC. It can even be done on your phone with an FTP Client. I'm using the PC for the simplicity of it. FileZilla IS RECOMMENDED.
  • Optional: Use Nand Dumper to back up your nand with all it's contents, as well as dumping the OTP and SEEPRPOM. By having those, you can unbrick your system with a hardmod at any point. Dumping MLC will require a 64GB SD card if your Wii U is 32GB, or 16GB SD card if your Wii U is 8GB.

1A) Using Haxchi/CBHC:
  1. System Menu: Have Haxchi reboot to System menu.
  2. System Menu: Launch HBL via Haxchi or browser.
  3. HBL: Launch ftpiiu_everywhere.
  4. Proceed to section "2)" of the guide to block updates. Proceed to section "3)" if you want to unblock them again.
1B) Using Mocha:
  1. System Menu: Launch HBL via browser.
  2. HBL: Start Mocha (Using default values are fine)
  3. System Menu: Launch HBL via browser again.
  4. HBL: Launch ftpiiu_everywhere.
  5. Proceed to section "2)" of the guide to block updates. Proceed to section "3)" if you want to unblock them again.
2) Modifying your Nand, and blocking updates:
  1. PC: Use an FTP client to connect to your Wii U using the IP address and port on your Wii U screen.
  2. PC: Once connected, Navigate to: "storage_mlc/sys/"
  3. PC: Locate "update" folder, right-click it and Pick "File Permissions". Make sure it's the same as the screenshot below. If it's not the same, then make note of that. You will need it if you want to enable updates later. If it's the Same, then proceed to the next Step.
    384072-FTPiiU.PNG
  4. PC: Delete “update” folder.
  5. Wii U: Press "Home" button to get back to HBL, press it again to get back to Mii Maker.
  6. Wii U: Exit Mii Maker, and click on system settings.
  7. System Settings: Attempt to update your Wii U as Normal. A few seconds after it starts and the progress bar appears, it should give out this error code: 105-3012. If the progress bar actually continues to move, TURN OFF THE WII U IMMEDIATELY!! Recheck your steps, cause something went wrong.
3) Unblocking updates:

If for whatever reason, you would like to return the Wii U to it's original updating state, start by following "1A)" or "1B)" of the guide, then proceed to the next step of this section:
  1. PC: Use an FTP client to connect to your Wii U using the IP address and port on your Wii U screen.
  2. PC: Once connected, Navigate to: "storage_mlc/sys/"
  3. PC: Right-click, and select "Create Directory". Create “update” folder. Once created, right-click again, and select "File Permissions".
  4. PC: When you originally did section "2)", if your permissions were the same as the screenshot in that section, enter those same permissions here. If not, then you should have noted them down somewhere. Enter those values instead, then click ok.
  5. Wii U: Press "Home" button to get back to HBL, press it again to get back to Mii Maker.
  6. Wii U: Exit Mii Maker, and click on system settings.
  7. System Settings: Attempt to update your Wii U as Normal. It should proceed to update normally.
Credits:
@fejich for being the first to notify us about a Chinese website doing this method in this thread
@Shaoxudong for translating the process, and testing it.
 
Last edited by Madridi,
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Madridi

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leonmagnus99 said:
i have cbhc /haxchi installed on my wii u.
i followed this guide because i got a pop up of system update being ready for download.

i tried updating after finishing this guide and i got the error code meaning updates are blocked, but i cannot start most of the titles i have installed.

they all give me the message 'a system update is required before the software update can be downloaded. start the system update now?"
Click to expand...
That's a weird one..

This is just a guess, but it seems like your system has already downloaded the update and moved it somewhere from update folder before the folder was removed

Go to my hosting website, and run the update remover:
https://madridi7.github.io/WiiU

Once it's done, completely turn off your Wii U, turn it on again, and see if anything changes
 
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Madridi said:
That's a weird one..

This is just a guess, but it seems like your system has already downloaded the update and moved it somewhere from update folder before the folder was removed

Go to my hosting website, and run the update remover:
https://madridi7.github.io/WiiU

Once it's done, completely turn off your Wii U, turn it on again, and see if anything changes
Click to expand...
thanks, i'll try this now.

edit: alright i ran the update remover from your site, and it loaded up the mp4 thing and then kicked me out and i was in the quick settings menu.
now i rebooted and i still get the preparind update / 'a system update is required before the software update can be downloaded. start the system update now?"

and sorry i just loaded up a different title and it started fine, mario color splash.
so i guess that Yoshi's wolly world needs a software update, my bad.

all is fine now.
 
Last edited by leonmagnus99,
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It is a great trick that works for your actual update part but I did find out last night you still cannot update games through this method unless of course your officially on the latest firmware, instead you have to run NNU-Patcher and download your updates that way. How I know I tried to update Super Smash Bros U last night and it would not let me unless I did it the NNU-Patcher way.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

leonmagnus99 said:
thanks, i'll try this now.

edit: alright i ran the update remover from your site, and it loaded up the mp4 thing and then kicked me out and i was in the quick settings menu.
now i rebooted and i still get the preparind update / 'a system update is required before the software update can be downloaded. start the system update now?"
Click to expand...
Yes it does that I found this out last night.
 
Last edited by Reecey,
leonmagnus99

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Reecey said:
It is a great rick that works but I did find out last night you still cannot update games through this method unless of course your officially on the latest firmware, instead you have to run NNU-Patcher and download your updates that way.
Click to expand...

yeah, i can get them from nusgrabber or something.
then install through wup yes?
 
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leonmagnus99 said:
yeah, i can get them from nusgrabber or something.
then install through wup yes?
Click to expand...
Yes you can do it that way but even easier, like I say just run "NNU-Patcher" you know the e-shop patcher by fix and then run your game updates, it works fine that way. Just run the patcher and go to your game update, it will download instead of asking you to update before hand.
 
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Reecey said:
Yes you can do it that way but even easier, like I say just run "NNU-Patcher" you know the e-shop patcher by fix and then run your game updates, it works fine that way. Just run the patcher and go to your game update, it will download instead of asking you to update before hand.
Click to expand...

thanks i did not know of that nnu patcher app.
i will get that then.


Madridi said:
@leonmagnus99

So it's a software update? Yeah that can easily be solved by running NNU patcher from hbl then running the game. It would update the game just fine. No need to do anything else
Click to expand...
great thanks, will do!
 
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Hello, i been read comments that sigpatches, haxchi and cbhc are still working on 5.5.2 so i see no point in staying in 5.5.1, so im gona update but what do you thing guys.
NOTE: I have cbhc and haxchi installed of course.
 
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Madridi said:
DNS always has the chance of it being down at any point of time, even possibly years from now, leaving you completely vulnerable to imminent update
Click to expand...
Doesn't work that way... no DNS = no name resolution = no way for the console to know which servers are the update servers = no download

If anything you're blindly trusting the operator of the DNS

If you're paranoid why not add the 3rd option too - in systemconfigtool (which just edits the setting XMLs in slc nand) there's an option to disable online update checking too :)

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

mike087 said:
Hello, i been read comments that sigpatches, haxchi and cbhc are still working on 5.5.2 so i see no point in staying in 5.5.1, so im gona update but what do you thing guys.
NOTE: I have cbhc and haxchi installed of course.
Click to expand...
Your choice... you lose an exploit which you don't need for no real gain either
 
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Ryccardo said:
Doesn't work that way... no DNS = no name resolution = no way for the console to know which servers are the update servers = no download

If anything you're blindly trusting the operator of the DNS

If you're paranoid why not add the 3rd option too - in systemconfigtool (which just edits the setting XMLs in slc nand) there's an option to disable online update checking too :)

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------


Your choice... you lose an exploit which you don't need for no real gain either
Click to expand...

Well the advantage would be that a dont have to use nnupatcher to update my games, or to enter the eshop.
 
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Ryccardo said:
Doesn't work that way... no DNS = no name resolution = no way for the console to know which servers are the update servers = no download

If anything you're blindly trusting the operator of the DNS
Click to expand...
Oh? I read somewhere a few months back that the dns most people were using were down for a while (it was back up a few hours later). At that time, people who had the dns setting could receive update notifications and all. Obviously we were all on the latest firmware so no one was affected. But I agree with your last statement, yeah.

mike087 said:
Well the advantage would be that a dont have to use nnupatcher to update my games, or to enter the eshop.
Click to expand...
You make it sound like launching NNU patcher is a painful and long process. You make it sound like you'll want to access eshop everyday. You make it sound like the Wii U still has games developed for it, and therefore, has updates released.

Like @Ryccardo said, your choice. Just don't make it sound like there is no reason to stay on 5.5.1 .. for one thing, if you ever are in a position to delete haxchi for whatever reason (mistake, corruption, etc..) or format your console, you are left without an exploit
 
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Madridi said:
At that time, people who had the dns setting could receive update notifications and all.
Click to expand...
Well, it all depends on what did they use as the other DNS...

If you mean game update nags while launching them, they come from "kagaya" - a completely separate domain from the actual CDN/NUS and from the system update list server, it's reasonable for custom DNS to still allow kagaya
 
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I use OpenDNS since my internet is static. But this is very handy to those with dynamic IPs and don't want to risk relying on other DNS addresses since those can go down at anytime. Just nuke the update yourself and you won't have to worry about Nintendo shoving an update up your ass.
 
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Ryccardo said:
Well, it all depends on what did they use as the other DNS...

If you mean game update nags while launching them, they come from "kagaya" - a completely separate domain from the actual CDN/NUS and from the system update list server, it's reasonable for custom DNS to still allow kagaya
Click to expand...
Nope, firmware updates. It wasn't a nag. It was them somehow noticing that the dns was down, so when they went ahead to check the update console tab in the setting, it didn't give them an error as it should. I guess everyone was fine with checking it since they knew there wasn't a new firmware anyway

I think it was whatever was on loadiine.ovh at the time, but I can't really remember
 
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Madridi said:
Oh? I read somewhere a few months back that the dns most people were using were down for a while (it was back up a few hours later). At that time, people who had the dns setting could receive update notifications and all. Obviously we were all on the latest firmware so no one was affected. But I agree with your last statement, yeah.


You make it sound like launching NNU patcher is a painful and long process. You make it sound like you'll want to access eshop everyday. You make it sound like the Wii U still has games developed for it, and therefore, has updates released.

Like @Ryccardo said, your choice. Just don't make it sound like there is no reason to stay on 5.5.1 .. for one thing, if you ever are in a position to delete haxchi for whatever reason (mistake, corruption, etc..) or format your console, you are left without an exploit
Click to expand...

You right, is my choice.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
I'm going for it.
Thanks, :)

EDIT: Ok, updated to 5.5.2 and everything is working fine, just one thing: cbhc doesn't work after update but reinstalling it fix the problem.
 
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