Hacking Basic Do's and Do NOT's of vWii modding

[CJLopez]

So, there's still no info on unbricking vWii

Looks like, along some of the wads I was installing (I use MMM to hack wii's, had been doing it this way for years and always worked) there was a normal Wii ios Installed, I do batch install of wads, and, as a result, my vWii is bricked

Its not a big lose, I can grab a cheap wii and play there, I moved out of my hometown past month and left my Wii with my little bro, only brought my WiiU, and wanted to hack my vWii to keep playing those awesome Wii games, but look like the batch of wads I made, there was some Wii wads, hence, bricked vWii

Any news on how to unbirck it? If its possible to enter Recovery Mode, given there's no way to connect a cube control? Or i'm left out to wait for scene to break the WiiU and see if some recovery way is developed?

thanks ind advance

 

[kosheh]

Hey - if it's the wrong topic, my apologies (also, apologies for the wall of text - yikes! I included a tl;dr for those who don't feel like reading it)

I've goofed around with homebrew on the Wii before. I've installed several cIOSes, installed BootMii, loaded BootMii backups, etc. so I'm pretty comfortable with screwing around with Wii homebrew. But I recently just acquired a Wii U, and given that I've pretty much bought the thing weeks ago I'd rather take the safest route possible doing things (meaning, I don't plan on patching any IOSes until a BootMii equivalent exists for vWii; for the record, I made a backup for the NAND and have the console keys onhand, but there's no way to restore it yet. I know)

So, to get my fix in the meantime I've installed the Homebrew Channel and run Nintendont to run GCN backups.
It works like a dream, and props to the team working on it (sometimes I get lockups in games, but I assume it's because I'm using a USB flash drive [so if I accidentally format it when I turn the WiiU on, it's not the end of the world] and it's autosleeping. That's not a problem for me; that's simply my negligence)

I should also mention I'm using Nintendont without patching any USBLoader-friendly cIOSes. It works fine, actually and I'm impressed!
However, I'm moving soon, and I won't be the only one using the Wii U...so I figured I'd try putting a USB Loader in the Homebrew Channel for ease of use. USB Loader GX is pretty foolproof from my experience on the Wii, so I figured I'd give that a shot. So, I get it, and update it to the latest version.
After updating, I reload it, and I see in the loading text "Patching IOS58" to which I exclaim "shit!!!", as I recall Cyan, posting in big red letters in other topics not to make any changes to IOS58 under any circumstances. I'll let you know, Cyan, that I heed your advice and take it quite seriously. <3

--
tl;dr version
I'm pretty much posting just to ask - since yeah, I'm trying my best to be SUPER CAUTIOUS, when a USB Loader claims it's patching an IOS, I assume it's an on-the-fly, temporary patch so the loader can boot properly?
After restarting the Wii, I prompted a system update (???), prompted a game update, opened up the HBC - all seemed to work fine and I don't see any problems, so I assume everything's OK.

Also, off-topic: Are there any USB loaders that I can use as a Nintendont frontend that allow you to download/scroll through coverart that doesn't require you to install a Hermes cIOS, i.e. CFG or WiiFlow?

(Personally, I think Nintendont is pretty as is. u_u;; but, it's mainly to use as an easier-to-navigate interface for a more casual user in the household)

 

[Cyan]

there's two way of patching IOSes.
the hard way : copying the content of the IOS to files, patching them and re-installing the result into the console (called patched IOS, or cIOS). Doing that to any IOS in slot under 1-80 is very dangerous on vWii.
The soft way : The patching is done in memory, at homebrew's boot time, to remove restriction such as FS access, USB access, etc. This is perfectly fine, and is what USBLoaderGX is doing when you see "patching IOS58" message.

If you don't have cIOS or are manually setting USBLoaderGX to use IOS58, it will patch it "on the fly in memory" to get access to NAND/USB/etc. that cIOS usually provides.


Some users thought they needed to reinstall IOS 58 on their vWii because nintendont didn't work. That's what should never be done. Never installer/reinstall/replace IOS in slot that Nintendo are using (80 and bellow). as a common practice, cIOS are installed only in slots above 200. anything below 200 should never be touched by the users.

 

[kosheh]

there's two way of patching IOSes.
the hard way : copying the content of the IOS to files, patching them and re-installing the result into the console (called patched IOS, or cIOS). Doing that to any IOS in slot under 1-80 is very dangerous on vWii.
The soft way : The patching is done in memory, at homebrew's boot time, to remove restriction such as FS access, USB access, etc. This is perfectly fine, and is what USBLoaderGX is doing when you see "patching IOS58" message.

If you don't have cIOS or are manually setting USBLoaderGX to use IOS58, it will patch it "on the fly in memory" to get access to NAND/USB/etc. that cIOS usually provides.


Some users thought they needed to reinstall IOS 58 on their vWii because nintendont didn't work. That's what should never be done. Never installer/reinstall/replace IOS in slot that Nintendo are using (80 and bellow). as a common practice, cIOS are installed only in slots above 200. anything below 200 should never be touched by the users.

Oh, okay - so I guess I was freaking out over nothing after all, as you're saying that it DOES "soft" patch of IOS58 at launch, and it's nothing long-term.
Whew. That's a huge relief.

That's exactly the answer I was looking for, though! I appreciate it, Cyan, ty <:

(I also didn't want to be that guy who tried to reinstall IOS58 because it might have been broken, lol)

 

[KTroopA]

I have my copy of Captain Toad - Treasure Tracker (PAL) on the way from Amazon. Does anyone know what is on the disc or likely to be the firmware version on this retail disc?

Nintendo UK site says the latest firmware for Wii u is version is 5.3.2E here

https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Support/.../Latest-system-update-information-677417.html

I want to keep my vWii hack and usb loader working, so is it safe to update to the new firmware?

 

[Cyan]

released WiiU firmware up to today didn't affect vWii.
You can install it safely and keep vWii softmod/hbc/etc.

 

[KTroopA]

released WiiU firmware up to today didn't affect vWii.
You can install it safely and keep vWii softmod/hbc/etc.

thank you for confirming, will update

 

[G0R3Z]

released WiiU firmware up to today didn't affect vWii.
You can install it safely and keep vWii softmod/hbc/etc.

What's the likelyhood that nintendo will ever try and patch vWii so homebrew is off-limits anyway? It's not really in their interests to do so, is it?

 

[Cyan]

they always tried when on the "current gen" console.
Now that they are focused on WiiU, they will probably not update vWii unless it opens WiiU hack/exploit.

 

[Ray Lewis]

they always tried when on the "current gen" console.
Now that they are focused on WiiU, they will probably not update vWii unless it opens WiiU hack/exploit.

Cyan, can you please change the Wii U hacking section to vWii hacking? Or move vWii to Wii section while eliminating the Wii U hacking section?

 

[Cyan]

I won't move vWii to Wii.
vWii has specific settings and limitations, specifically on cIOS installation.


Making a WiiU section is not really needed for the moment.
We will make a different one when there will be lot of thread for WiiU mode hacking only.
Currently, there are probably less than 10 relevant threads.

 

[marchrius]

Hi everyone, I'm completely new to this stuff, currently I own a Wii U. I only want to play my backups, from snes to Wii, gamecube included. Is that possible on the Wii U? I need brawl, an sd card and that's it? Sorry if this sounds like a dumb question (and probably is).

 

[teogeo]

Hi everyone, I'm completely new to this stuff, currently I own a Wii U. I only want to play my backups, from snes to Wii, gamecube included. Is that possible on the Wii U? I need brawl, an sd card and that's it? Sorry if this sounds like a dumb question (and probably is).

First, you need to softmod your vWii (Wii Mode) and install the Homebrew Channel: http://gbatemp.net/threads/full-vwii-softmod.339899/
Then, for each console's backups you need different stuff:
- For Wii games you will just need a USB loader like USB Loader GX: https://gbatemp.net/forums/wii-backup-loaders.190/
- For Gamecube games you will need Nintendont: https://gbatemp.net/threads/nintendont.349258/
- For WiiWare and VC games things become less easy: https://gbatemp.net/threads/wiiware-emunand-in-usb-loader-gx.345124/

Good luck!

 

[marchrius]

Thanks a lot man!

 

[Bu2d85]

I asked this question in another thread but did not get an answer so thought I would try again.

If I install a channel on my vwii that has an invalid banner and banner bricks my vwii would formatting the wii u delete the channel and fix the brick? Or does a wii u format not effect the vwii?

 

[NWPlayer123]

I asked this question in another thread but did not get an answer so thought I would try again.

If I install a channel on my vwii that has an invalid banner and banner bricks my vwii would formatting the wii u delete the channel and fix the brick? Or does a wii u format not effect the vwii?

It does not as far as I know, if you brick the vWii you're fucked unless you backed it up and are able to flash it back (hopefully possible some time in the future)

 

[teogeo]

I'm not 100% percent sure, but I'm afraid that formatting your wii u won't remove all homebrew data from vwii.
And depending on how severe the bricking is, you may or may not be able to fix it through the homebrew channel so don't take drastic measures before exhausting all other choices.

 

[CJLopez]

I asked this question in another thread but did not get an answer so thought I would try again.

If I install a channel on my vwii that has an invalid banner and banner bricks my vwii would formatting the wii u delete the channel and fix the brick? Or does a wii u format not effect the vwii?

I can confirm that, even restoring to factory setting the WiiU (tried this because I'm unnable to update my WiiU firmware. Seems like my current wifi doesn't like the WiiU update) I'm still stuck with a bricked vWii

 

[Bu2d85]

I know that formatting the wii u will not replace or reinstall a bad IOS but I thought maybe it would delete the channel from the menu effectively removing the corrupt or invalid banner fixing the banner brick. Like the way it removes your homebrew channel but leaves the cios.

 

[NWPlayer123]

I know that formatting the wii u will not replace or reinstall a bad IOS but I thought maybe it would delete the channel from the menu effectively removing the corrupt or invalid banner fixing the banner brick. Like the way it removes your homebrew channel but leaves the cios.

Well I know it doesn't remove the homebrew channel which is technically a custom/not system channel so I doubt it deletes any other channels either.