Hacking [Q] Linux or Windows running on Wii U?

[George35000vr]

We now have IOSU access isnt it possible to run linux or even windows on it natively? Its gpu is decent for some pc gaming. Not sure if ppc supports pc's (x86-x64) apps tho... enlight me

 

[FireEmblemGuy]

PowerPC is an entirely different architecture than x86 - Windows will never run on it.

I'm sure someone's worked on a port of Linux, though I have no idea if anyone actually released one. That doesn't mean things like Steam would work, or even that there'd be a working desktop environment - everything would need to be ported/compiled as a PPC binary, and there'd be a lot of work to do for full hardware support, video acceleration, etc.

 

[QuarkTheAwesome]

There's the now-abandoned Tri-Core Linux on the vWii side; though nothing in Wii U mode as far as I know. Linux would be doable, though it's a huge amount of work for anyone who's not experienced in that sort of thing. If it were a thing, it wouldn't actually be that barren in terms of programs - PowerPC was the architecture used in Macs until the mid 2000's. Since they're, y'know, Apple products, Debian supported the platform for quite a while (only dropping the 32-bit variants recently). Don't expect Steam, but you can expect most established, older open-source products to be written with PowerPC support somewhere, though you may have to compile them yourself.

Back to the main question - Linux is totally possible, but it won't happen anytime soon (if at all). You also wouldn't be running any x86 software outside of a virtual machine.

 

[Deleted User]

There's the now-abandoned Tri-Core Linux on the vWii side; though nothing in Wii U mode as far as I know. Linux would be doable, though it's a huge amount of work for anyone who's not experienced in that sort of thing. If it were a thing, it wouldn't actually be that barren in terms of programs - PowerPC was the architecture used in Macs until the mid 2000's. Since they're, y'know, Apple products, Debian supported the platform for quite a while (only dropping the 32-bit variants recently). Don't expect Steam, but you can expect most established, older open-source products to be written with PowerPC support somewhere, though you may have to compile them yourself.

Back to the main question - Linux is totally possible, but it won't happen anytime soon (if at all). You also wouldn't be running any x86 software outside of a virtual machine.

There are Linux for Macs. Especially those PPC ones, a complete rewrite would take alot of time but it would be good for some web browsing and multitasking.

 

[povlur.]

running a linux server off my wii u would be neat :^)

 

[knm]

I think somebody working on it (https://github.com/neuschaefer/wiiu-linux-launcher), but its not trinux for vwii wii u.

 

[Deleted User]

I think somebody working on it (https://github.com/neuschaefer/wiiu-linux-launcher), but its not trinux for vwii wii u.

Just took a quick look at the source code, and it looks pretty legit.
Very, very WIP, but legit.

(Note: requires Mocha, not currently compatible with Haxchi/CBHC)