Hacking USB Loader GX

[Cyan]

The only thing I'm thinking is that the installed wads are not a proper dump, it's using the Korean bit incorrectly.
It's the only thing I changed regarding channels (added in 1203 and semi-fixed in 1211 by adding two check (Korean bit + Game region "K", "Q" or "T")

You said that using Wiiflow fix it, so I guess it's reading the cached .bnr correctly, the only problem is extracting the .bnr from the channel.
It happens only for newly installed channels, or even old ones?
Always the same one or randomly different ones?
It happens only on channels installed with the internal wad installer, or even with ShowMiiWads?
Are they working when you launch them?
What are the GameID of non working channels? maybe you both have the same games with this problem.

 

[pdanpdan]

For the same emunand, wiiflow can extract the banners, gx cannot.
It happens for all channels not already extracted (even for nintendo channels), all the time - can reproduce the problem every time.
All the channels are installed with ShowMiiWads.
The games work if I launch them, and savegame emulation works for iso games also.

 

[CheatFreak47]

I've experienced this issue with emunands created before the update that fixed the wad installer.

 

[Shiranui-san]

You said that using Wiiflow fix it, so I guess it's reading the cached .bnr correctly, the only problem is extracting the .bnr from the channel.

He means he extracts the banners with Wiiflow since GX can't extract them. The banner folder is hared by both loaders, so GX will read the banner once it is extracted by Wiiflow.

It happens only for newly installed channels, or even old ones?

New ones and even the old ones when the banner previously stored in the sd is deleted, it won't be extracted again. And I don't remember which revision I used to create my emunand and extract the banners, so I can use that version again just for this purpose.

Always the same one or randomly different ones?

Always, all of them.

It happens only on channels installed with the internal wad installer, or even with ShowMiiWads?

It doesn't matter if the wad is installed with the internal installer or ShowMiiWads.

Are they working when you launch them?

Yes.

What are the GameID of non working channels? maybe you both have the same games with this problem.

The new games I installed a few days back were Excitebike (FBCP) and Ice Climbers (FBEP). Tried both installations, internal wad installer and ShowMiiWads. Since the banners were missing, I deleted the banner folder. GX r1217 and r1215 (I tried both revisions) created the folder again but only Wii banners are extracted and stored in the new folder. The last thing I tried was changing the path of the banner folder from my sd to my usb, but still VC and Wiiware banners were missing.

I've experienced this issue with emunands created before the update that fixed the wad installer.

I'll try later creating a new emunand with r1217. Let's see if that solves the problem.

 

[pdanpdan]

I was using emunands created with modmii (as new ones or by modifying my initial bootmii dump), fully working in neek2o and wiiflow (and in gx except banner extraction).
I haven't tried with an emumand dumped with gx

 

[Cyan]

I don't think the NAND extraction/creation matter.
I thought it might be affected only by channels installed using the revision with installation bug, but you said it happens to channels installed using ShowMiiWads too.

It affects only emuNAND? not the Real NAND?

I don't know what the problem is. It would require analysis to check what happens and where it stop : mounting the SD/USB (should be fine), accessing the folder (where do you store the nand? default path or another path?), finding the channel (should work as it display the game and you can launch it), finding the banner in the folder, reading it, extracting it (raw and bnr are two different format), copying to cache folder (I don't think, it should display it even without doing a cache).

 

[Shiranui-san]

I don't think the NAND extraction/creation matter.
I thought it might be affected only by channels installed using the revision with installation bug, but you said it happens to channels installed using ShowMiiWads too.

I confirm that creating/extracting new NAND dumps does not solve the problem. I re-extracted my clean nand.bin with ShowMiiWads and installed some VC wads (this time were Yoshi's Story and Ocarina of Time, both are N64 titles) but the banners are not read. I also tried extracting my Wii's NAND with GX r1217, but still no banners.

It affects only emuNAND? not the Real NAND?

Well, the banners of Homebrew Channel, Weather, News, Shop and Mii Channels in the real NAND are read and stored properly in my sd (or whatever folder is specified). I do not like to install VC/Wiiware wads in the real NAND to prevent bricks, so cannot tell if their banners are read from there. Still, if it is necessary to test it, I will install some VC wads in the real NAND.

 

[CheatFreak47]

Ok, well for now a workaround I use is to use WadMii to unpack the wad and get the banner out of it yourself. 00000000.app is always the banner. If you rename it to the game ID of your wad followed by extension .bnr and stick it in your banner cache folder, the banner loads up fine. It's inconvenient, but it works.

00000000.app and GAMEID.bnr are the same format, right Cyan?
Although you said raw and bnr are different formats-- I'm not too clear on what you meant by raw though.

 

[Cyan]

They are not the exactly same data, the .app has an additional header, but USBLoaderGX supports both format with/without header.
I called "raw" the .app file, without extracting the .bnr from it.

So, manually copying the .app file to the cached folder is working? then it's not the file's format which is wrong.

It's probably something with detecting the .app correctly, as the channel is detected/working, only the banner isn't.

CheatFreak : which gameID have this problem?
Shiranui said : Excitebike (FBCP) and Ice Climbers (FBEP)
maybe you have this problem with the same games?

 

[CheatFreak47]

I have the problem with all games. And my collection of Wiiware is huge. I have to manually cache the banners on any new wad thats introduced. Doesn't matter what one. I figured it was an issue with my EmuNAND though, thats why I never brought it up.

 

[Shiranui-san]

So, manually copying the .app file to the cached folder is working? then it's not the file's format which is wrong.

It's probably something with detecting the .app correctly, as the channel is detected/working, only the banner isn't.

Yes, copying the .app manually and renaming it to the gameID and changing its file extension to .bnr, as CheatFreak stated before, is working.

CheatFreak : which gameID have this problem?
Shiranui said : Excitebike (FBCP) and Ice Climbers (FBEP)
maybe you have this problem with the same games?

Excitebike and Ice Climbers were the latest games I installed but the problem with the banners happen with all VC and Wiiware games.

 

[HunterZ]

Cyan,

Here (and in the following couple of posts) is some info on how to command neek2o to boot a specific title: http://gbatemp.net/threads/neek2o.313314/page-61#post-4512796

 

[Cyan]

all VC and Wiiware?
I have just tested my own EmuNAND with some wiiware, and it correctly read the banners and created the cached .bnr
I have the EmuNAND on USB and the cache on SD, but it shouldn't matter as it's not in emulated state in the loader, it's only a folder's access.


HunterZ: Thanks, I'll keep that URL in mind, it will help to add it.

 

[Shiranui-san]

all VC and Wiiware?
I have just tested my own EmuNAND with some wiiware, and it correctly read the banners and created the cached .bnr
I have the EmuNAND on USB and the cache on SD, but it shouldn't matter as it's not in emulated state in the loader, it's only a folder's access.

Sooo... any idea why our WW and VC banners are not read and stored in the cache folder?
Any option that should be enabled? Maybe something's wrong with our emunands (I don't think so since I created two new emunands yesterday, one with showmiiwads + nand.bin and the other directly with GX, and the problem was still there)?
My emunand's path is USB\usbloader_gx\nand_gx and the cache banner's path is sd\apps\usbloader_gx\cache_bnr

I have a lot of banners that some old revision of GX (I don't remember which one) created in the cache folder when I created my emunand and installed the games for the first time, but if those banners are deleted/moved from the cache folder, they are not re-created.

 

[pdanpdan]

I made some tests and I think it's related to the number of channels in emunand.
My normal emunand has abou 350.
I made 3 smaller emunands, each with about 120 channels (all channels from the main one) and gx extracted the banners from all of them.
I'll try to test the limit later.

 

[HunterZ]

I made some tests and I think it's related to the number of channels in emunand.
My normal emunand has abou 350.
I made 3 smaller emunands, each with about 120 channels (all channels from the main one) and gx extracted the banners from all of them.
I'll try to test the limit later.

That's disappointing if true, as there are over 800 NTSC-U official WiiWare/VC titles in total.

 

[Shiranui-san]

I made some tests and I think it's related to the number of channels in emunand.
My normal emunand has abou 350.
I made 3 smaller emunands, each with about 120 channels (all channels from the main one) and gx extracted the banners from all of them.
I'll try to test the limit later.

My emunand has 48 channels installed right now

 

[Cyan]

I remember a user reporting an issue with EmuNAND and banner sound not playing if there's a "-" (minus) in the path. (I still haven't investigated that issue)
Maybe it has also a problem with _ (underscore) ?
My NAND is on usb1/wiinand42/ (only letters and numbers, no space or non alphanum. I'll try to rename it)

edit:
I renamed the folder and it's still working fine.
I don't have 500 games to install, so I can't test the issue with lot of installed channels.
maybe someone can test and report the exact number, and the exact revision which trigger that issue?

it worked with r1180?

 

[Shiranui-san]

I deleted all the _ and still not working for me.

I tried GX r1180, no success. I even went back to r1156 but the banners are not created, which is strange since I've just read old posts in a Spanish forum of people using r1156 and everything was working fine for them.

 

[Cyan]

So it's a bug either from your side (used SD or USB?), or a bug present since the beginning when Dimok added banner reading.
It will be harder for me to find the problem as he worked on it with Giantpune and I never looked into the sources for banner reading.