Hacking Is it possible to extract the drive key ?

[H0ppus]

Hi guys,

I bought a wiiU with a faulty drive (Blue LED blinking and no screen ) and in the hope to fix it I've bought a replacement drive,
after replace it I've got screen and an error that googling around appeared to be an issue with the drive. so, It seems that the drive key has to match
the key in the SEEPROM.

I was wondering if someone think is possible to extract the key from the new drive, dump the SEEPROM, overwrite the old key in it and write the modified SEEPROM back into the console.

Thanks.

 

[snoofly]

why not just ask for a refund?
did you knowingly put yourself through this ordeal?

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Hi guys,

I bought a wiiU with a faulty drive (Blue LED blinking and no screen ) and in the hope to fix it I've bought a replacement drive,
after replace it I've got screen and an error that googling around appeared to be an issue with the drive. so, It seems that the drive key has to match
the key in the SEEPROM.

I was wondering if someone think is possible to extract the key from the new drive, dump the SEEPROM, overwrite the old key in it and write the modified SEEPROM back into the console.

Thanks.

I believe SEEPROM is read only, however Mocha can load SEEPROM from SD. Problem is, it ignores the drive key part so as to not break loading from discs. That could be relatively easily edited out of the source code though.
As for reading the drive key, I'm not aware of any homebrew that does this, apart from dumping the SEEPROM from the console the drive belongs to (obviously not an option in your case)
I'm not sure it's even possible to dump the drive key from the drive. It never needs to leave the drive, since the console already has its own copy of the key, so I kind of doubt it would be readable at all. Plus it kind of ruins the point of having a key if you can just read the key.

 

[H0ppus]

why not just ask for a refund?did you knowingly put yourself through this ordeal?

yeah I did. I like the fun of trying to fix these things.

 

[H0ppus]

I believe SEEPROM is read only, however Mocha can load SEEPROM from SD. Problem is, it ignores the drive key part so as to not break loading from discs. That could be relatively easily edited out of the source code though.
As for reading the drive key, I'm not aware of any homebrew that does this, apart from dumping the SEEPROM from the console the drive belongs to (obviously not an option in your case)
I'm not sure it's even possible to dump the drive key from the drive. It never needs to leave the drive, since the console already has its own copy of the key, so I kind of doubt it would be readable at all. Plus it kind of ruins the point of having a key if you can just read the key.

It makes sense. Since my drive is gone even if there was a way/tool to extract its key, it would be useless to me.

Well my only option would be swap around the ICs from the PCBs as planned before.

By chance do you guys have a clue in which IC the key should be stored ?

 

[The Real Jdbye]

It makes sense. Since my drive is gone even if there was a way/tool to extract its key, it would be useless to me.

Well my only option would be swap around the ICs from the PCBs as planned before.

By chance do you guys have a clue in which IC the key should be stored ?

No idea, but maybe you can replace the entire PCB. Chances are there's something wrong with the laser/motor assembly on the old drive, since those are moving parts and moving parts are more prone to failure. If that's the case then a PCB swap would work.

 

[H0ppus]

No idea, but maybe you can replace the entire PCB. Chances are there's something wrong with the laser/motor assembly on the old drive, since those are moving parts and moving parts are more prone to failure. If that's the case then a PCB swap would work.

Nahhh I've already tried a PCB replacement. If I swap around it works ( with error ), so it narrows down the problem to the PCB itself. Well I'll plug in my soldering station this week and try some IC transplants, let's see what I get. Anyway thanks for your help guys I'll update this post if I get anything good.

 

[Pachee]

I believe SEEPROM is read only,

No, seeprom is writable. It is another another reason why you should always use both otp and seeprom redirection in rednand. Wrong seeprom values could brick your console.

@QuarkTheAwesome is person you are looking for if you need more light on the issue with a different drive key/replacing the board.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

No, seeprom is writable. It is another another reason why you should always use both otp and seeprom redirection in rednand. Wrong seeprom values could brick your console.

@QuarkTheAwesome is person you are looking for if you need more light on the issue with a different drive key/replacing the board.

Ah, now that you mention it, I do remember reading that.

 

[H0ppus]

Ah, now that you mention it, I do remember reading that.

Thanks man !!

if you check this thread : https://gbatemp.net/threads/wii-u-160-1400-error-no-disk.407829/page-2#post-8292950

I have updated it with some new findings ( I have unboxed my soldering gear and was playing with my Wii U DVD drive PCB ) there are some extra info there.

I am planning to record a video and post on youtube with me soldering components around .

I will send a message to @QuarkTheAwesome and see if he can help or has an idea to fix this unit.

 

[QuarkTheAwesome]

Heyo, sorry about the slowish response.
I was looking into how the drive key affected things (for use in linux or via a sata adapter) but I never actually found much info. I seriously doubt there's a way to get the drive key out of a lone drive - the whole point is to force people to not swap the drives around. If you could get a drive with a known key, you could potentially look into seeprom redirection to change the console's side of it - otherwise, I think you're out of luck. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

 

[H0ppus]

Heyo, sorry about the slowish response.
I was looking into how the drive key affected things (for use in linux or via a sata adapter) but I never actually found much info. I seriously doubt there's a way to get the drive key out of a lone drive - the whole point is to force people to not swap the drives around. If you could get a drive with a known key, you could potentially look into seeprom redirection to change the console's side of it - otherwise, I think you're out of luck. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

I understand how busy life is anyway thanks for the reply man.

I have partially fixed this console with a hardware approach its DVD drive was with an IC faulty and replacing it has lead the game into recognizing the drive and booting into the OS .

https://gbatemp.net/threads/error-1...s-faulty-its-working-now.470524/#post-8321756

Thanks guys.