Hacking Please help a dad scrub a soft modded Wii U bought used

[-Unknown-]

So I recently ended up picking up a Wii U by accident (I was trying to buy additional Wii controllers for my kids to play Mario with their friends and it seems like the only reasonable deal was to buy a used bundle from Kijiji). The good news is that the Wii U is clearly an upgrade over the Wii and it's already pre-modded (boot up shows CBHC v1.6 by FIX94 (DS Title 10179B00)

Now, I was going to format the console to factory settings, but I also knew there may be a risk given the soft-mod so I started reading the guides (which say NOT to do that, lol, phew).

The dilemma now is that this person had all their Miis (about 6) on there and I assume also friends, accounts, users, etc. I want to essentially accomplish what the format would've done but without losing the softmod (or bricking the console!). So delete all Miis? Make sure friends are deleted? Sign out of users or Wii accounts? etc.

I just don't know what that checklist looks like exactly. Could someone knowledgeable please give me a checklist to run down so I don't have to worry that my kids are getting strange messages or somehow connected to someone they're not supposed to. The first and last item on the checklist is already about warning them not to touch that one icon on the menu unless they want to get a Final Atomic Buster.

 

[Boured]

Well first you should uninstall CBHC, as formatting the system in it's current state will brick the console as CBHC is just launching a DSVC game they legally purchased to launch CFW

https://wiiu.hacks.guide/#/uninstall-cbhc

This will show you how to do so, after, make sure that it loads normally and you can't load any unofficial apps. Then you may format. They may have edited the Virtual Wii, but that usually isn't effected by a format.

 

[V10lator]

The best way would be:

• Uninstall CBHC, so unmod the console - This needs research as I never did it before and doing it wrong will brick the console! It might work to edit some XML file by hand (so the console boots into the home menu like it should and not into the DS VC game which will get deleted at the next step) Just do what @Boured told.
• Factory reset
• Reinstall CBHC

If you don't want to do that delete Miis and Friends but neither the account nor the user the DS VC game belongs to!

For vWii there's https://gbatemp.net/threads/vwii-decaffeinator-restore-vwii-without-a-nand-backup.566252/

//EDIT: This is off-topic but as you're new to the Wii U some small hints:

• You can use one haddrive for Wii U, Wii and Gamecube games by transforming the Wii and GC games into VC injects.
• You need a Y-Cable or an external power source for your harddrive. Even if it seems to work without it's not stable and will introduce the weirdest bugs.
• NUSspli is able to download all content available on the Nintendo servers, even if the key is not on that title key site. To my knowledge there's no other tool available that's able to download and install content without knowing the key. Also I'm bruteforcing the Nintendo servers after every new content release and am adding every finding to http://wiiubrew.org/wiki/Title_database - so that database should be always complete (maybe lagging a few days behind the last release).

 

[Navlida]

I would also recommend reading the 'CBHC' section under the 'choose a CFW' section from wiiu.hacks.guide (Especially if you which to continue using CBHC).

 

[-Unknown-]

Well first you should uninstall CBHC, as formatting the system in it's current state will brick the console as CBHC is just launching a DSVC game they legally purchased to launch CFW

https://wiiu.hacks.guide/#/uninstall-cbhc

This will show you how to do so, after, make sure that it loads normally and you can't load any unofficial apps. Then you may format. They may have edited the Virtual Wii, but that usually isn't effected by a format.

The best way would be:

• Uninstall CBHC, so unmod the console - This needs research as I never did it before and doing it wrong will brick the console! It might work to edit some XML file by hand (so the console boots into the home menu like it should and not into the DS VC game which will get deleted at the next step) Just do what @Boured told.
• Factory reset
• Reinstall CBHC

If you don't want to do that delete Miis and Friends but neither the account nor the user the DS VC game belongs to!

For vWii there's https://gbatemp.net/threads/vwii-decaffeinator-restore-vwii-without-a-nand-backup.566252/

Thank you both, just to clarify, I want to keep the softmod.

I'm under the impression that if I do what Boured mentioned, then I would lose the softmod, correct?

So then, V10lator adds an alternate but warns that I shouldn't delete the Nintendo account as otherwise I lose access to the NDS game needed to run the softmod, correct? I'm pretty sure when I picked up the WiiU that this person had a switch so I assume they still use their Nintendo account (so I should probably try and be detached from that as I'd hate to affect them and delete their friends).

Is there no way for me to sign out their Nintendo account while retaining access to the NDS game that's needed for the softmod? Maybe that's the catch 22.

 

[V10lator]

I'm under the impression that if I do what Boured mentioned, then I would lose the softmod, correct?

Correct but reinstalling it isn't a big deal. You just need to purchase the DS game for yourself then [EDIT]or loose coldboot CFW but you could still use Mocha or normal Haxchi[/EDIT].

So then, V10lator adds an alternate but warns that I shouldn't delete the Nintendo account as otherwise I lose access to the NDS game needed to run the softmod, correct?

Also correct and loosing access means bricking the Wii U.

Is there no way for me to sign out their Nintendo account while retaining access to the NDS game that's needed for the softmod? Maybe that's the catch 22.

Also correct. If you want to remove the account you must uninstall CBHC first or you will brick!

 

[-Unknown-]

Also correct and loosing access means bricking the Wii U.

!!!

So wait a minute, does that mean that if this person, for example, was to change their Nintendo account password in the future or some other connectivity issue happens (since I wouldn't know how to login to their account other than turning on the system), that I'd risk bricking the Wii U without myself having done anything?

If so, it sounds like I should be turning off CBHC at minimum

 

[V10lator]

So wait a minute, does that mean that if this person, for example, was to change their Nintendo account password in the future or some other connectivity issue happens (since I wouldn't know how to login to their account other than turning on the system), that I'd risk bricking the Wii U without myself having done anything?

Now that I think about it: Yes, that could happen. So you want to uninstall CBHC immediately. When it's uninstalled there's nothing stopping you from factory resetting and remodding the console.

 

[-Unknown-]

Now that I think about it: Yes, that could happen. So you want to uninstall CBHC immediately. When it's uninstalled there's nothing stopping you from factory resetting and remodding the console.

Got it, thank you for the heads up.