Hacking Will Wii U work without the disc drive attached?

[rednekcowboy]

Wait, do now disassemble the drive and hook up only PCB? Will it need power connected still? Insulate it to avoid contact with metals and hopefully have room for hard drive? Trying to follow your idea. If power is off maybe the Wii U still won't detect drive? Still the same as taking it out. Would work with cables still connected and PCB insulated. I am curious to know what Wii U does with drive only disconnected. Then boot? In menu? When going to run games from a hard drive without disc drive in? Basic trouble testing;-)

You're making it too complicated. Leave all cables connected to the pcb from the mobo and just disconnect the pcb from the disc drive. Remove the disc drive and place the hdd in it's place. No need to insulate anything as the pcb is not insulated, it just sits on the bottom of the optical drive. I would make sure the hdd pcb and the optical drive's pcb aren't directly on top of each other to avoid interference. No need to "disassemble" the optical drive as the pcb just sits on the bottom of it (should only be a couple of screws to unmount it and 1 or 2 ribbon cables connecting it to the drive).

In theory, this should "trick" the system into thinking the optical drive is still installed, providing it works the same as the PS3 checks. Hell, my eject button on my ps3 still acts as though a drive is connected even though it doesn't do anything. For all intents and purposes from the system point of view, the system still believes the drive is connected.

This is all in theory, mind you as I won't attempt this myself for something like this. If I actually had a way to connect the hdd to the motherboard and use it instead of the optical drive, that would be something I would be interested in and then I would be "onboard" so to speak for a project like this.

 

[stomp_442]

Maybe you should get a usb stick, and put your games on that. Then when you go to your friends house, you can carry your Wii U, and put your games in your pocket. Em, who carries the power supply, sensor bar, wii remotes, and tv cable?

I doubt the Wii U will even boot without the dvd drive in it, bad idea to remove the dvd drive.

 

[Ray Lewis]

Hate to prove you wrong redneck but 5 minutes in and forward is for Wii U drive. Ribbon cable, one cable, and drive must be taken apart for PCB removal. See link:http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?featur...=/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=0DRhKC9x9ZY

 

[rednekcowboy]

Hate to prove you wrong redneck but 5 minutes in and forward is for Wii U drive. Ribbon cable, one cable, and drive must be taken apart for PCB removal. See link:http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=0DRhKC9x9ZY&desktop_uri=/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=0DRhKC9x9ZY

Like I said, I didn't look into it, I was basing my statements in theory based off the ps3 and 360.

So, again, in theory, if you remove the the pcb from the drive and just hook up the ribbon cable coming from the motherboard, it should technically work. PCB should not have to be insulated, but I suppose seeing as you have to dis-assemble the drive to get at it anyways, you could always use the bottom tray of the drive and just sit the hdd in it with the pcb.....

Again, until such a time where we have a way to make having an internal hdd useful on the wii u, I have no interest in doing this myself so everything I am saying is theory based on past experiences with other consoles. I'm not about to pull apart my wii u to test this for someone when you gain nothing except voiding your warranty by doing so. Big risk->no gain=no interest, at least for me.

 

[Ray Lewis]

He should remove entire drive, will it boot? System menu issues? Run game off hard drive without crashing/error? It is possible to use that ultra small PCB connected still. With power to it, make sure it is isolated and cannot move/contact metal. There is all the room you will get, lol. I won't do this, external self powered USB enclosure for me. Honestly this seems silly when you can be creative and mount drive on the outside. Good question though. Ts wanted to know. Could still give errors if laser not working; all about firmware and checks it runs. I won't be opening my Wii U unless it is needed to hack Wii U mode or read/restore nand. Fun little thread redneck, good fun and games. I wanted to see if PCB was outside of laser/disc loader.

 

[rednekcowboy]

I don't believe the system will even boot without the drive/pcb attached and powered, but there is only one way to test.

 

[Tommy084]

Sorry for bumpin, but i have been wondering about this for some time.
Today i did it, and it works :-D

Edit: im going to do this better, but now it just a proof.
One thing tho, i had to let the driver mobo connected

 

[pietempgba]

360 had the old "Jumper" trick for SATA port on motherboard. I have never heard of anyone wanting Wii U drive out. It depends on the checks, to be honest. It may look at hardware then stop booting (maybe error code, who knows?), or it may boot then only access when it is needed. The guy who started this thread should try it and let us know. Yeah, a guy mentioned looking on ebay for a Wii U without disc drives. It is so young though, this system, that I have not heard anything about a bad drive and taking it out, lmfao. Rednekcowboy was right also, what is the point if you must still run a USB cable from a port to the drive? UNLESS you want to really pull some crap and try to handle that internally with some soldering, lmfao. I've seen some crazy stuff with other systems, especially the 360.

I think it boots only if the cd drive is attached because the wiiu checks the cd drive when it boots up

 

[Tommy084]

I think it boots only if the cd drive is attached because the wiiu checks the cd drive when it boots up

You dont need the whole drive, just the morherboard ( its a lot smaler )
I think i can put in both of my USB HDD inside the case, and wil try to wire it to the usb's from the inside, but i need time to find the solder points...

 

[TeconMoon]

Anyone know how the Wii U reacts without a drive attached?

Couldn't tell if anyone actually answered the question in this thread, but here's the answer:

If you try to boot the system without a disk drive, when you get to the main Wii U Menu, the screen will go black and you will receive the error message: 160-1400

 

[Tommy084]

Couldn't tell if anyone actually answered the question in this thread, but here's the answer:

If you try to boot the system without a disk drive, when you get to the main Wii U Menu, the screen will go black and you will receive the error message: 160-1400

I have treid and it works
Have no error in the system menu or after, and it plays games from USB.
I did get error when i didt had the motherboard from the drive connected

Edit

Hehe, yea its an old post.
But i think its strange that it did give you that error, was the driver mobo still connected?

 

[TeconMoon]

I have treid and it works

It didn't for me, but I guess it doesn't really matter as I'm just now noticing that this thread is over 3 years old.

 

[kajeinarsson]

Sorry for bumpin, but i have been wondering about this for some time.
Today i did it, and it works :-D

Edit: im going to do this better, but now it just a proof.
One thing tho, i had to let the driver mobo connected

Sorry for bumpin, but i have been wondering about this for some time.
Today i did it, and it works :-D

Edit: im going to do this better, but now it just a proof.
One thing tho, i had to let the driver mobo connected

Had same idea like you. But if you really got that working u should find out how to soldering that to hide all cables.

 

[Tommy084]

u should find out how to soldering that to hide all cables.

Yea thats the goal

 

[kajeinarsson]

Yea thats the goal

Nice i must wait until my kids not play anymore. Maybe when i buy switch i gonna try if its working i keep it if not to the TRASH.

 

[DarkKaine]

You dont need the whole drive, just the morherboard ( its a lot smaler )
I think i can put in both of my USB HDD inside the case, and wil try to wire it to the usb's from the inside, but i need time to find the solder points...

I think you're better off soldering a cheap enclosure to it.
That way, you can always easily swap the drive without having to desolder.

 

[Tommy084]

Then its done, works also

 

[kajeinarsson]

Nice and then?

Then its done, works also

Nice

 

[Tommy084]

Nice and then?

I going to install i switch, that would alowe me to just use one of the hdds at the time.
Becouse in vwii having two hdds gives error in nintendont.
One thing thats cool is that i think that i am able to connect the wiiu' now extra hdds to a PC with a male to male USB

 

[lebrawurschd]

if you want to open youre wii u for a hardmod just try unplug the disc drive boot and see what happens