Gaming Misc Turn on Wii U without turning on the Gamepad ?

[creedof69]

Hello, simple question.

Is It possible to turn on the Wii U without make the Gamepad turns on ? (without unsync it or wait the battery dies)
I haven't Pro controller yet to test to start the console with it but I would like to know if it's possible to save the GP battery. At least when I don't plan to use it.

 

[Blythe93]

As far as I know, there's no homebrew for it, only some sort of hardware mod (adding a physical switch in order to disconnect battery) or a... workaround like putting the gamepad in another room i.e. far enough so that console can not "see" it. I believe that you can even turn it off once you see the boot logo as Wii U can not be turned off during that time (not sure how precise you need to be with the timing). You can even put it in a box that's been wrapped around with tinfoil which will stop both Bluetooth and WiFi connections so the gamepad won't turn on.

To turn on your Wii U without gamepad, you can use the official Pro controller or the Wiimote. I'm not sure about the 3rd party controllers as I don't have any. You can probably turn it on by inserting (or at least, trying to) a game disc or by pressing the eject button (at least, that's what worked on the good old Wii).

 

[creedof69]

As far as I know, there's no homebrew for it, only some sort of hardware mod (adding a physical switch in order to disconnect battery) or a... workaround like putting the gamepad in another room i.e. far enough so that console can not "see" it. I believe that you can even turn it off once you see the boot logo as Wii U can not be turned off during that time (not sure how precise you need to be with the timing). You can even put it in a box that's been wrapped around with tinfoil which will stop both Bluetooth and WiFi connections so the gamepad won't turn on.

To turn on your Wii U without gamepad, you can use the official Pro controller or the Wiimote. I'm not sure about the 3rd party controllers as I don't have any. You can probably turn it on by inserting (or at least, trying to) a game disc or by pressing the eject button (at least, that's what worked on the good old Wii).

Yeah in the better case I wouldn't jail my Gamepad in a sealed box if I want to use it othen .

It's just that when I power the Wii U, through the power button, the disc button, or inserting a disc, the gamepad turn on whereas i didn't plan to use it.
When I will have a pro controller and will put the game pas in a drawer, I wouldn't want it turn on in the drawer that's it...

 

[Blythe93]

Yeah in the better case I wouldn't jail my Gamepad in a sealed box if I want to use it othen .

It doesn't have to be sealed completely. You can use the shoe box or something and wrap tinfoil around its base and cover. Small gaps shouldn't be a problem. Just put the gamepad in it when you don't intend to use it.

It's just that when I power the Wii U, through the power button, the disc button, or inserting a disc, the gamepad turn on whereas i didn't plan to use it.
When I will have a pro controller and will put the game pas in a drawer, I wouldn't want it turn on in the drawer that's it...

The only way to achieve that is to make a physical power off switch. You can find a few examples here: [1][2][3]. Provided your drawer is in the same room as your console i.e. relatively close to it.

 

[Lostbhoy]

Again with this lol (not you op! ) ... Take the battery out, pop it back in when you need/want it.

Why is that so hard for people to get? So simple, so easy!

 

[osaka35]

Hello, simple question.

Is It possible to turn on the Wii U without make the Gamepad turns on ? (without unsync it or wait the battery dies)
I haven't Pro controller yet to test to start the console with it but I would like to know if it's possible to save the GP battery. At least when I don't plan to use it.

I'm not aware of it being implemented, but it should be possible in theory. a coldboot could have a flag set or something. Your best bet is to look for the thread for the EnvironmentLoader, see if there are any plugins, or people working on the topic for that purpose.

Or, if that wouldn't work, I can see a plugin or option in one of the environments which disables the "turn wiiu gamepad" bit, or sends a "you can turnoff now" signal to the gamepad. I know nothing of writing homebrew for the wii u, though, so i'm not sure if this is easy or annoyingly difficult. Or creates issues somehow.

https://gbatemp.net/threads/release-environment-loader.605382/

 

[Blythe93]

Apparently, one of the Padcon's features is to completely shut down the gamepad. There's also GamePad Auto Standby which allows to set a custom time to turn off your gamepad. I'm not sure if either of these Aroma plugins 100% turn it off i.e. whether it still drains the battery while waiting for a console to turn it on.

I'll give them a try and see how do they work in the upcoming days.

 

[SDIO]

FailST, the exploit that launches Aroma launches too late, when the Gamepad is already turned on. The Already mentioned PadCon can turn it off again. It's properly off then, not just the screen.

To prevent IOSU from turning the Gamepad on, you need an earlier exploit. Currently there are two: ISFShax and defuse. There is then a stroopwafel plugin, which prevents IOSU from turning the Gamepad on.
The nice thing with that is: if you start the Wii U with another controller, the gamepad just stays off. If you start the console with the Gamepad, the gamepad is already on and will stay on and connect.

I also configured PadCon to turn the Tablet off if I press the TV button on it.

 

[Blythe93]

@SDIO Just to clarify a few things:
1) If I turn the gamepad off with Padcon, it'll remain turned off as long as the console's on? When I power cycle the console, the gamepad will turn on as usual?
2) If I set up ISFShax/defuse and stroopwafel plugin, the gamepad will remain off even if I power cycle Wii U console afterwards?

 

[SDIO]

Yes. But you can configure padcon to automatically turn it off again on boot. But that will also happen if you power on with the tablet

 

[creedof69]

Again with this lol (not you op! ) ... Take the battery out, pop it back in when you need/want it.

Why is that so hard for people to get? So simple, so easy!

I just never bought Nintendo Y screwdriver...

Thanks all of you, I didn't know Padcon but I assumed something like that existed with plugins mechanism. That will be helpfull sure. But I would be happy if in a near future update of CFW We can boot the Wii U, setting up that don't boot the Gamepad ^^

Post automatically merged: Feb 23, 2024

Yes. But you can configure padcon to automatically turn it off again on boot. But that will also happen if you power on with the tablet

What about if I set auto shutdown on Wii U boot, power the Wii U with the gamepad (then tablet shutdowns), and press the power on the tablet again. It can't shutdown the WiiU right ? Since the gamepad isn't connected to the console, does it simply turn on the gamepad ?

 

[Stan4d]

Hello, simple question.

Is It possible to turn on the Wii U without make the Gamepad turns on ? (without unsync it or wait the battery dies)
I haven't Pro controller yet to test to start the console with it but I would like to know if it's possible to save the GP battery. At least when I don't plan to use it.

Unplug the Gamepad battery by taking off the cover

 

[CrazySquid]

Hello, simple question.

Is It possible to turn on the Wii U without make the Gamepad turns on ? (without unsync it or wait the battery dies)
I haven't Pro controller yet to test to start the console with it but I would like to know if it's possible to save the GP battery. At least when I don't plan to use it.

You can use ISFSHax, it's the best exploit possible for Wii U since it offers a coldboot solution plus very good brick protection, even better than UDPIH (since it can work even if the IOSU is corrupted, think of it like a Wii with BootMii as boot2).
You must install a stropwafel plugin, it works perfectly fine, but the only issue it has is that standby features are broken with it, because since the console cuts communication with the GamePad for turning it on, the GamePad itself doesn't get the updated title list of standby features (for quick start) and standby gets in a infinite loop trying to connect to the GamePad, which in turn hangs standby mode and you need to unplug the console to exit that state.

So, it's recommended if you don't use standby features, the other alternative is to use the Wii U GamePad autostandby plugin which has an option to turn off the GamePad once the console has fully booted. (And it works with standby features)

 

[SDIO]

the only issue it has is that standby features are broken with it, because since the console cuts communication with the GamePad for turning it on, the GamePad itself doesn't get the updated title list of standby features (for quick start) and standby gets in a infinite loop trying to connect to the GamePad, which in turn hangs standby mode and you need to unplug the console to exit that state.

Interesting, didn't know that Problem. That should be a relatively easy fix, maybe I find time for that in the next few days

Post automatically merged: Mar 19, 2024

@CrazySquid can you give this a try?

 

[CrazySquid]

It's really impressive how committed you are to the Wii U, your works are awesome. Thanks a lot for making those exploits perfect!

 

[Stefanos664]

What I always did is to push the power button on the gamepad at the very first seconds that the wiiu console boots. The gamepad will turn off at this specific moment but the console will keep booting. Worked every time and I thought that many people know this...

 

[CrazySquid]

@CrazySquid can you give this a try?

Can confirm this issue is solved and the GamePad title list gets updated properly!

The only thing I noticed is that Quick Start will not work if you try to use it while the console is in standby (yellow LED). The GamePad will turn on with the menu, once you select the game or application, it will display the Nintendo logo as always, but then after a few seconds it will turn off (unexpected behavior), not sending the signal to the console to start the selected game in the GamePad. I tried to turn it on again before the Wii U boots but seems that it also doesn't work.

But other than that it seems to work fine!

Not sure what is happening behind the scenes nor if this will fix it, but maybe it can be programmed so the console doesn't turn off the GamePad when turned on by it (while booting from standby mode)?

 

[SDIO]

Thanks for testing. I updated the releases of stroopwafel and the plugin.
This fix was really straight forward.
The new problem on the other hand isn't yet clear to me how I could fix that (also thanks to your explaination). That would need more investigation and since it's much less severe I don't think I will do that in the forseeable future.
Normally if you leave eco mode IOSU would load the IOSU image fresh into memory, setup PRSH to point to that and then cause an reset while keeping the DRAM alive. But for ISFShax that doesn't work, because boot1 wouldn't access the isfs in that scenario. So stroopwafel has a patch that forces always a full reset, where boot1 would try to load iosu. For that PRSH might not be setup correctly to tell the system on the next boot to listen for the quickstart or it might tell the tablet to shut off when it is doing the reboot.
To stop it turning off the tablet would require some IOSU patch and to make that some additional RE would be required and I am not sure about the side effects, maybe it would then leave the gamepad in a higher power state after ecomode (when not beng interruped) and draining battery faster or it wouldn't turn the tablet off on a normal shutdown. And then I would need to find a good point to hook to fine out if it gets woken up in eco mode etc...

 

[CrazySquid]

Thanks for testing. I updated the releases of stroopwafel and the plugin.
This fix was really straight forward.
The new problem on the other hand isn't yet clear to me how I could fix that (also thanks to your explaination). That would need more investigation and since it's much less severe I don't think I will do that in the forseeable future.
Normally if you leave eco mode IOSU would load the IOSU image fresh into memory, setup PRSH to point to that and then cause an reset while keeping the DRAM alive. But for ISFShax that doesn't work, because boot1 wouldn't access the isfs in that scenario. So stroopwafel has a patch that forces always a full reset, where boot1 would try to load iosu. For that PRSH might not be setup correctly to tell the system on the next boot to listen for the quickstart or it might tell the tablet to shut off when it is doing the reboot.
To stop it turning off the tablet would require some IOSU patch and to make that some additional RE would be required and I am not sure about the side effects, maybe it would then leave the gamepad in a higher power state after ecomode (when not beng interruped) and draining battery faster or it wouldn't turn the tablet off on a normal shutdown. And then I would need to find a good point to hook to fine out if it gets woken up in eco mode etc...

I really appreciate your work and your clear explaination, I fully understand and I see now why it's not worth it.

Yes, it's a very minor issue really, it's very rare for me to boot up the console while in standby. Seeing how much has to be done in order to fix it, and the risks involved with the GamePad being left in a higher power-state makes it not very "cost-effective", lots of research just for a small issue.

Anyway, this is amazing and those added features really enhances the experiencie with the console, lots of QoL improvements.

So yes, yet again, thanks for all your explanations and your commitment, I think most (if not all) issues with the Wii U system are fixed, I don't think it has another flaw (maybe vWii with the chroma-bleed, but that's a whole other thing that has nothing to do here).

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Hello, simple question.

Is It possible to turn on the Wii U without make the Gamepad turns on ? (without unsync it or wait the battery dies)
I haven't Pro controller yet to test to start the console with it but I would like to know if it's possible to save the GP battery. At least when I don't plan to use it.

The gamepad is always on. The best thing to do is add a hardware power switch, as it will drain in a short amount of time even when the Wii U is not used. Which will damage the battery over time. Leaving it on the charger 24/7 will also damage the battery over time. Basically Nintendo designed this to have the battery self destruct no matter what you do. A hardware power switch is almost mandatory.