Hacking Wii Menu 4.2 Released

[zektor]

It was not meant to insult. It was meant initially simply to test and see if Nintendo did indeed simply add code to the new system menu to remove the "HAXX" id. Nonetheless, link has been deleted.
Feel free to test whatever, but there's no point in offering a "test" up for everyone else. Heck, I don't even have a problem with people trying to reverse engineer our exploits and even "protections", as long as they don't publish the results.

QUOTE(zektor @ Sep 30 2009, 04:28 AM) But I still have to wonder why the return stub would not be left in memory if the title id had been changed. Protective measure?

I don't get what you're asking there. Oh wait, you're asking why it breaks when the TitleID changes? Well, the TitleID is hardcoded into the stub (the code doesn't actively read it from the Wii, it's just hardcoded into the binary blob that becomes the stub). The stub is there, it just can't launch the proper title. There's a MY_TITLEID #define used all over HBC, it's a compile-time constant. I bet even the "reload" option of HBC's home menu didn't work when you changed the ID.

By the way, the source for our reload stub isn't public (to my knowledge, I'm not 100% sure). It's nothing out of the ordinary, but if someone's bored, I suggest they try to disassemble and reverse engineer it. It's pretty simple and you might learn something about the wii in the process (and it doesn't use libogc, so no cruft). You can dump it from lowmem from any app launched via HBC.

Very cool. I really appreciate the information regarding the reload stub. I am pretty curious and probably will try to reverse engineer it. Again, my apologies for offering up that test version.

 

[s3phir0th115]

And for fuck's sake, don't go around offering WAD versions of HBC, hacked or not. It's unsupported and illegal (and against forum rules, not that I'd ever expect the admins to give a shit), but moreso, it's very insulting.

Not something I'd do. I prefered to just patch the system menu to make the normal homebrew channel continue to operate without being deleted.

It's not the people who fuck up their consoles that annoy me, it's those that pretend they know what they're doing and then go around publishing crap as if it were the awesomest schtuff in the universe, only to cause grief to users. And this goes for everything from system menu mods to wanky's updaters and patchers. I've gotten several dozen e-mails asking whether you can fix a brick caused by his crappy, untested, unchecked, poorly coded updaters with a SaveMii. The answer is, of course, no you can't.

Well, some of these modifications were tested and just stated to work fine. Some people like me understand the risks and will use the modifications anyway.

The fix I used, in particular, was hex editing the 0000008.app file and changing 4 bytes to basically remove all of the homebrew deletion functions. The guy who tried it said it was fine, told others how to do it, and I used it and ended up fine. I'm well aware some people would fuck it up and brick their wii, and I can understand the annoyance. But I consider myself to be a responsible person, and I would not blame you or anyone else in the scene should my wii brick. I knew the risks, and I decided to try it.

So, if you screw up your Wii with stupid stuff I'll laugh a little inside, but if you go around publishing crap for the world to use, you'll annoy me and there's a chance I'll publicly flame you. You know, because I hope at least some clueless folk who doesn't know what he's doing who might think twice about touching the stuff after reading my flame. As much as you guys love to flame me, I think the track record of the software I used to help with for the Wii is good enough that at least I must somewhat know what I'm talking about.

And what if the said "crap" actually works fine and causes no issues when used correctly? There is no need to insult it then.

I wouldn't insult you for publishing the hackmii installer. (I actually have a rather humorous forwarder channel for it, just in case.)

I understand flaming things that don't work, but there isn't a good reason in my eyes to flame something just because other variants of it have failed.

QUOTE

Also, hint: there will be no issues caused by the Title ID change for HBC. Just because someone's stupid hexedit didn't work doesn't mean the real release won't. The HAXX title is hardcoded into the return stub left in memory by HBC, not into any apps (we're not monopolistic like that: if you use your own stub, you can make your own loader with a working return to it from apps). In fact, the "return to" stuff existed since the Twilight Hack, and it hasn't changed significantly since then. It predates even knowing how to launch channels or title IDs.

I'm not sure why people were saying this was an issue. I could tell you guys changing the title ID would turn out fine.

 

[mdp_1992]

@Zektor
Believe it or not... I'm actually laughing about now xD
I know you warned me and all, thanks, but I'm chill now. My backup games work, all the VC/Wiiware work so I'm good. The only important thing I lost was USB LOADER GX (which I was going to buy next week xD). The only thing left to d o is wait for HackMii

 

[Retrievil]

Marcan = Derek Smart?

I kid.

 

[zektor]

@Zektor
Believe it or not... I'm actually laughing about now xD
I know you warned me and all, thanks, but I'm chill now. My backup games work, all the VC/Wiiware work so I'm good. The only important thing I lost was USB LOADER GX (which I was going to buy next week xD). The only thing left to d o is wait for HackMii

You were going to *BUY* USB Loader GX?

 

[marcan_troll]

The fix I used, in particular, was hex editing the 0000008.app file and changing 4 bytes to basically remove all of the homebrew deletion functions. The guy who tried it said it was fine, told others how to do it, and I used it and ended up fine. I'm well aware some people would fuck it up and brick their wii, and I can understand the annoyance. But I consider myself to be a responsible person, and I would not blame you or anyone else in the scene should my wii brick. I knew the risks, and I decided to try it.

It's pretty simple. Ninty's update breaks HBC. That is, it breaks our software. Since we have a fix in the pipeline to be released soon, and it isn't the same as your fix, I think it's reasonable to say that your fix is unnecessary and can cause trouble in the future. Simply, there is no reason for people to touch their system menu when a fix (in the form of an HBC update) is coming anyway. If they do, once that happens, they'll have two redundant fixes for the same problem: one supported, and one not. Do you really want to commit to supporting the people who hack their system menu that way? What if, for whatever freak reason, Ninty decides to start checking the signatures on installed contents? A modified System Menu could brick a Wii. Maybe instead of that, it will just cause a bad interaction with some other homebrew tool. Who knows. It's unnecessary patching of a core system component.

Again, I don't really care if you do it, but I don't think encouraging it, telling others how to do it, etc is a good idea.

 

[Xiphiidae]

*snip*

 

[BBking83]

You were going to *BUY* USB Loader GX?

That's what I was going to say...

Anyway,
QUOTE(BBking83 @ Sep 30 2009, 01:40 PM) And, in regards to the SD menu and getting channels to load, I thought you needed to installed the patched/trucha signed IOS60, not 70??

 

[xzxero]

The fix I used, in particular, was hex editing the 0000008.app file and changing 4 bytes to basically remove all of the homebrew deletion functions. The guy who tried it said it was fine, told others how to do it, and I used it and ended up fine. I'm well aware some people would fuck it up and brick their wii, and I can understand the annoyance. But I consider myself to be a responsible person, and I would not blame you or anyone else in the scene should my wii brick. I knew the risks, and I decided to try it.

It's pretty simple. Ninty's update breaks HBC. That is, it breaks our software. Since we have a fix in the pipeline to be released soon, and it isn't the same as your fix, I think it's reasonable to say that your fix is unnecessary and can cause trouble in the future. Simply, there is no reason for people to touch their system menu when a fix (in the form of an HBC update) is coming anyway. If they do, once that happens, they'll have two redundant fixes for the same problem: one supported, and one not. Do you really want to commit to supporting the people who hack their system menu that way? What if, for whatever freak reason, Ninty decides to start checking the signatures on installed contents? A modified System Menu could brick a Wii. Maybe instead of that, it will just cause a bad interaction with some other homebrew tool. Who knows. It's unnecessary patching of a core system component.

Again, I don't really care if you do it, but I don't think encouraging it, telling others how to do it, etc is a good idea.

your right its not the best idea to throw out there for everybody to do
but can you say that knowledge didnt help or assist you guys at all in creating your fix?
i mean, it was just to show us that it was possible to fix what 4.2 has caused and to show what title id's this new system menu looks for

 

[mdp_1992]

You were going to *BUY* USB Loader GX?

*smack myself*
a HDD

 

[marcan_troll]

Oh yeah, I forgot. I absolutely despise the people running the various scams that sell you HBC+warez tools, and they're one of the larger causes of stress for me, moreso than scene drama even. Any Ninty updates that force them to use our newer installers (with the huge scam screen) are a good thing in that respect. This is another reason why I really don't like most "alternative" hacks to our installer. It's not the existence of the alternative, it's that most other people don't include the requisite scamscreen (it needs to be large, in big letters, and with a time delay, otherwise it isn't effective - this has been proven by the small bannerbomb warning). This already happened when someone figured out how to use comex's DVDX34 exploit installer thing to install an old version of IOS, then install HBC.wad. Days later it showed up in one of those scammer packages, who once again was able to offer a "4.0 compatible" package with an old version of HBC and no resonable scamscreen. These guys also don't know anything about wads: it wouldn't have happened if people hadn't dumped and posted HBC.wad on forums.

Please, please, if you're going to offer any exploits or similar, stupid, or not, I don't care, at least please put a huge 15-second scamscreen on it. Those scammers don't deserve to use your software. Please, if you're going to mess with HBC in ways that we disapprove of, at least do that. I still won't like you very much, but at least you won't enable the scammers yet again.

your right its not the best idea to throw out there for everybody to do
but can you say that knowledge didnt help or assist you guys at all in creating your fix?
i mean, it was just to show us that it was possible to fix what 4.2 has caused and to show what title id's this new system menu looks for

Honestly, it was pretty obvious, and it didn't take long before someone on the team disassembled the new system menu and checked the new code. I mean, thanks for the help I guess, but next time try something like telling us and getting confirmation that we're changing the title ID, and then mention it on the forums so people don't go around hacking together workarounds for something that is getting fixed soon anyway.

 

[illinialex24]

You were going to *BUY* USB Loader GX?

*smack myself*
a HDD

Oh ok good. Lol, that original quote came out wrong.....

 

[s3phir0th115]

It's pretty simple. Ninty's update breaks HBC. That is, it breaks our software. Since we have a fix in the pipeline to be released soon, and it isn't the same as your fix, I think it's reasonable to say that your fix is unnecessary and can cause trouble in the future. Simply, there is no reason for people to touch their system menu when a fix (in the form of an HBC update) is coming anyway. If they do, once that happens, they'll have two redundant fixes for the same problem: one supported, and one not. Do you really want to commit to supporting the people who hack their system menu that way?

Well, in all fairness, at the time I saw the fix I used, I wasn't aware that you guys started working on a fix to deal with the problem.

But that aside, I thought it was a bit of a learning experience for me. I had never hard patched the system menu before, only using preloader hacks. And I thought it may be fun to give it a shot and see if I succeeded.

I do prefer cleaner fixes. (However your fix will work, I'm sure it'll be clean.) But I don't go against people hacking their system menu in any way. The way I see it, if they break it, it's their problem, not mine or anyone else's.

What if, for whatever freak reason, Ninty decides to start checking the signatures on installed contents? A modified System Menu could brick a Wii. Maybe instead of that, it will just cause a bad interaction with some other homebrew tool. Who knows. It's unnecessary patching of a core system component.

If they did that, I'm pretty sure there would be a way to patch it. And I don't think such a change would come automatically without my explicit approval.

I do understand your point though. It's like any patch you use, things can fuck up.

QUOTE

Again, I don't really care if you do it, but I don't think encouraging it, telling others how to do it, etc is a good idea.

I partially agree with you on this. In the hands of noobs it can be quite dangerous information. But I think information should be available to people who will be responsible and not mindlessly blame others if they for some reason what they do goes wrong.



I believe I'm beginning to understand your reasoning. I don't have anything against you now provided you don't insult me for tinkering. And I can fully understand you not wanting this information wide spread when you think of how many inexperienced users can destroy their wii.

 

[xzxero]

Oh yeah, I forgot. I absolutely despise the people running the various scams that sell you HBC+warez tools, and they're one of the larger causes of stress for me, moreso than scene drama even. Any Ninty updates that force them to use our newer installers (with the huge scam screen) are a good thing in that respect. This is another reason why I really don't like most "alternative" hacks to our installer. It's not the existence of the alternative, it's that most other people don't include the requisite scamscreen (it needs to be large, in big letters, and with a time delay, otherwise it isn't effective - this has been proven by the small bannerbomb warning). This already happened when someone figured out how to use comex's DVDX34 exploit installer thing to install an old version of IOS, then install HBC.wad. Days later it showed up in one of those scammer packages, who once again was able to offer a "4.0 compatible" package with an old version of HBC and no resonable scamscreen. These guys also don't know anything about wads: it wouldn't have happened if people hadn't dumped and posted HBC.wad on forums.

Please, please, if you're going to offer any exploits or similar, stupid, or not, I don't care, at least please put a huge 15-second scamscreen on it. Those scammers don't deserve to use your software. Please, if you're going to mess with HBC in ways that we disapprove of, at least do that. I still won't like you very much, but at least you won't enable the scammers yet again.

your right its not the best idea to throw out there for everybody to do
but can you say that knowledge didnt help or assist you guys at all in creating your fix?
i mean, it was just to show us that it was possible to fix what 4.2 has caused and to show what title id's this new system menu looks for

Honestly, it was pretty obvious, and it didn't take long before someone on the team disassembled the new system menu and checked the new code. I mean, thanks for the help I guess, but next time try something like telling us and getting confirmation that we're changing the title ID, and then mention it on the forums so people don't go around hacking together workarounds for something that is getting fixed soon anyway.

i get exactly where your coming from.
those scammers really dont deserve your software even in a .elf form

but like s3phir0th115 said, it was a good learning experience learning how to hardcode a system menu

 

[sphere9]

This confuses me, if I update will it strip any channels I have installed with the wad manager? Because I've been planning to get rid of all of those anyway.

 

[ften]

I think it was a great idea to throw it out there, maybe someone learned how to use a hex editor today or got a little insight into the System Menu, LOL .

And if there are people out there who are randomly picking up a hex editor and using it to modify their 250 dollar console without any knowledge or precaution that is stupid and I agree, stupid people shouldn't do stupid things.

-FTen

 

[chrisman01]

It DELETES the homebrew channel??? Isn't that considered INVASION OF PRIVACY???

 

[Monster Hunter]

"Warez" refers primarily to copyrighted works traded in violation of copyright law. The term generally refers to illegal releases by organized groups, as opposed to file sharing between friends or large groups of people with similar interest using a darknet. It usually does not refer to commercial for-profit software counterfeiting. This term was initially coined by members of the various computer nderground circles, but has since become commonplace among Internet users and the mass media.

So in other word's it's not against the forum rules at all because it's not copyrighted and is not illegal. Wankos, gator software is not illegal. it's just apps made to manipulate the wii's firmware, NAND ect... It is NOT illegal to "hack" the wii in any form. It's your wii and you can do whatever you want with it. Look it up. What IS illegal is using the software to play backup games you didn't buy in the first place. If you bought the game and copied the game to a DVD then its legal. Thats why you see all these "Backup Launchers" out there.

 

[xzxero]

I think it was a great idea to throw it out there, maybe someone learned how to use a hex editor today or got a little insight into the System Menu, LOL .

And if there are people out there who are randomly picking up a hex editor and using it to modify their 250 dollar console without any knowledge or precaution that is stupid and I agree, stupid people shouldn't do stupid things.

-FTen

+1 the point marcan brings & the one we all agree on.

 

[mdp_1992]

And if there are people out there who are randomly picking up a hex editor and using it to modify their 250 dollar console without any knowledge or precaution that is stupid and I agree, stupid people shouldn't do stupid things.

-FTen

Ouch... that hurt my feelings

LoL jk