Hacking Wii backup Manager for Windows

fig2k4 · Nov 14, 2011

It's been suggested before that I should maybe have a setup wizard that pops up the first time the app is run (checking for a settings.ini file could tell me that if the app has been run before). I could use that dialog to allow users to download/enable titles.txt, GameTDB database, enable automatic cover downloads, select the cover renderer etc. and some common settings that are hard to guess when you've never used the app before. The wizard could obviously be used at any other time too from options menu.

I really need to do some tooltips for the settings dialog too, again because it's hard to tell what everything is if you haven't used the app from day one. That would mean a lot of work for translators though.

roubagalinhas · Nov 15, 2011

fig2k4 said:
@Bloodlust
Unless it happens for anyone else, I'd have to say it's definitely a firewall issue because it's working fine for me.

Remember that firewalls usually block traffic based on the exe. You know it's the same app but the firewall doesn't, so it can/will different rules applied to it. In other words, the build 73 exe could be blocked while the older versions aren't. The quickest way to test is to disable any firewall you have running.

I know it sounds obvious, but maybe so obvious that you ruled it out without checking it.

You did enable the automatic cover downloads too? I'm always forgetting to do that and for a second or 2, wonder why the covers aren't downloading..

@roubagalinhas
Can you email details about that custom NSMBW? I'd like to test it if possible, but don't post links here. Cheers.

well, i've re-obtained the game from a different source and now has passed the test

Squall Leonhart · Nov 15, 2011

A refresh button would be nice if you add a file to one of the autoloaded directories and don't want to restart.

s_unray · Nov 15, 2011

Hi. In the export templates I see in the config section 'entries per page = 1'. How do I get 3 entries in a row. If I change entries to 3 and in the template I use entry 1 entry 2 entry 3 I get the first entry 3 times in a row.

Can anyone explain how to get the first three entries in one row (and so on). I am trying to make a template in ncWBFStool style.

Other question: When I convert iso to wbfs files, the titles are changed according to settings, ie title_[gameid}.wbfs. Why does this not work when converting to ciso?

Grtz Simon

Nocturno · Nov 15, 2011

Hello guys,

Let's see if you can help me. I was using Wii Backup Manager to add a new iso to my HD and I noticed some games had weird names so I tried to edit the titles with no success. After that I activated all renaming options under "Titles" tab on settings. The result was that once I edited the names of a few games, and reloaded then on WBM, on the list that appears on the right all those games show their names in red, and WBM doesn't load them. And the USB loader I'm using doesn't load those games either.

I think I might have damage the ISO headers with the option on WBM that says to allow to make permanent changes on disc headers.

Is there a way to fix this?

Squall Leonhart · Nov 15, 2011

im not sure if this is an issue in windows 7's disk caching or WBMfW when write caching is disabled, but the night before when i copied a few backups to the hdd it lagged my system out badly because the Diskcache had grown to 2.5GB. i had to actually run cacheset and clear the disk cache to free it back up.

But now with write cachning enabled on the same drive the disk cache is running normally at around 150MB

Nocturno said:
Hello guys,

Let's see if you can help me. I was using Wii Backup Manager to add a new iso to my HD and I noticed some games had weird names so I tried to edit the titles with no success. After that I activated all renaming options under "Titles" tab on settings. The result was that once I edited the names of a few games, and reloaded then on WBM, on the list that appears on the right all those games show their names in red, and WBM doesn't load them. And the USB loader I'm using doesn't load those games either.

I think I might have damage the ISO headers with the option on WBM that says to allow to make permanent changes on disc headers.

Is there a way to fix this?

The actual disk headers only support within a certain range of bytes, so yeah, using a longer name than supported can corrupt the image.

fig2k4 · Nov 15, 2011

@Nocturno
What version are you using? Can you send the log to [email protected] so I can see where the error happens when you load the drive? It'll tell me a lot of other things too so I don't need to as loads of questions. If it is a bug I'd consider it to be quite serious, corrupting files. If you're not using the latest version, could you see if it happens with that as well?

I have tested the renaming and I've never had a corrupt file other than when I was making changes to code etc.

edit: BTW, a good place to upload the log and report as much detail as possible is at http://www.wiibackupmanager.tk/bugtracker

@Squall Leonhart
I think it is a problem with the Windows cache because I know there's no memory leaks. You could disable buffered transfers to see if it's still as fast without using the cache.

@s_unray
I'd need to see a sample of the ncWBFStool list export.

I haven't implemented the title renaming for ISO and CISO transfers, only WBFS. Nobody's noticed it until now.

I'll see about doing that in a future release.

Majinseed · Nov 15, 2011

Hey there, nice to see that active developement is still going strong. didn't check back for quite a time and was surprised by the recent addition of the database. nice one

if you still manage to put feature-requests in somewhere, here is something i'm kinda missing:
selecting a range of games easily (and fast). basically i'd like to be able to select the first and the last game starting with the letter "A" and then be able to select the whole range.

another thing i noticed but thats merely an optical issue: the app doesn't remember the window-size. it will always restart in the default size. if theres some code for that in there its not working.

Nocturno · Nov 16, 2011

@fig2k4

Thanks man. I just sent the email.

Squall Leonhart · Nov 16, 2011

I think it is a problem with the Windows cache because I know there's no memory leaks. You could disable buffered transfers to see if it's still as fast without using the cache.

Yeah, most likely. i remember utorrent having the same issue for a time, so they implemented its own write cache design.

Bloodlust · Nov 16, 2011

fig2k4 said:
@Bloodlust
Unless it happens for anyone else, I'd have to say it's definitely a firewall issue because it's working fine for me.

Remember that firewalls usually block traffic based on the exe. You know it's the same app but the firewall doesn't, so it can/will different rules applied to it. In other words, the build 73 exe could be blocked while the older versions aren't. The quickest way to test is to disable any firewall you have running.

I know it sounds obvious, but maybe so obvious that you ruled it out without checking it.

You did enable the automatic cover downloads too? I'm always forgetting to do that and for a second or 2, wonder why the covers aren't downloading..

@roubagalinhas
Can you email details about that custom NSMBW? I'd like to test it if possible, but don't post links here. Cheers.

The thing is previous versions have worked fine downloading covers and all. It's a bit strange that only the latest is blocked by a firewall... Anyway, I'll check it out thanks

fig2k4 · Nov 16, 2011

@Nocturno
From the log I can see that it's actually the WBFS header that's somehow got corrupted. Very strange.

I have a recovery mode for WBFS partitions, but it's not enabled for WBFS files. I'll get that working with WBFS files and maybe add an extra function to rewrite the WBFS header of broken partitions. I also need to disable the disc.info cache file while using recovery mode otherwise what you see in the list will be wrong (ie. it'll look like the files are fixed but they're not).

I'll send an exe to test once I've done all that.

The problem is that I've no idea how the header would get corrupted. The header that gets written to the WBFS file is the same thing that's read from it. If you can reproduce this, it would help to see that log. If you can, rename a file and if it gets corrupt send the log so I can see what happened.

edit: As a workaround when renaming the title, the WBFS header doesn't actually need rewritten so now it doesn't. Renaming should never corrupt the WBFS header again because it doesn't touch it.

@Majinseed
Those are on the ever growing todo list.

@Bloodlust
Let me know your results. I can't see why, but it may still be a problem in WBM. Obviously I wouldn't rule that out.

Bloodlust · Nov 16, 2011

fig2k4 said:
@Nocturno
From the log I can see that it's actually the WBFS header that's somehow got corrupted. Very strange.

I have a recovery mode for WBFS partitions, but it's not enabled for WBFS files. I'll get that working with WBFS files and maybe add an extra function to rewrite the WBFS header of broken partitions. I also need to disable the disc.info cache file while using recovery mode otherwise what you see in the list will be wrong (ie. it'll look like the files are fixed but they're not).

I'll send an exe to test once I've done all that.

The problem is that I've no idea how the header would get corrupted. The header that gets written to the WBFS file is the same thing that's read from it. If you can reproduce this, it would help to see that log. If you can, rename a file and if it gets corrupt send the log so I can see what happened.

edit: As a workaround when renaming the title, the WBFS header doesn't actually need rewritten so now it doesn't. Renaming should never corrupt the WBFS header again because it doesn't touch it.

@Majinseed
Those are on the ever growing todo list.

@Bloodlust
Let me know your results. I can't see why, but it may still be a problem in WBM. Obviously I wouldn't rule that out.

Seems to work fine now... much appreciated for your advice though.. cheers!

Nocturno · Nov 16, 2011

@fig2k4

I reproduced the error, I sent you and email with the log.

Hope it helps.

fig2k4 · Nov 16, 2011

I sent you an email with a link to the test version. Check your junk mail if you haven't received it

Edit:
Nocturno got back to me and the new function (Tools->FAT32/NTFS->Repair WBFS files) fixed the corrupt WBFS files. It totally rebuilds the WBFS header can fix files that haven't been trimmed correctly (Sector count mismatch) etc. A few problems that can cause the WBFS files to be unusable and show as invalid in WBM.

I changed the WBFS Recovery mode to work with WBFS files too. Using that you can transfer the invalid files to another drive or ISO etc. to repair them, where the repair function fixes them in-place.

I also fixed a potential cause of the corruption that I mentioned it in my previous post. When renaming the titles, the WBFS header was synced/rewritten. Even though there's no reason for that to cause the corruption, it's not needed so I removed it.

Jo GO · Nov 16, 2011

Hi all,
I'm a new user of Wii Backup Manager (0.4.4 build 69), but I'm already fan of it !
I have noticed that when doing a WBFS split at 4GB on a FAT32 HDD, the splitted file size is not exactly 4 GB = 4294967296 bytes but shorter of 32 KB i.e. 4294934528 bytes !
Is it really made on purpose (and I don't understand why) or is it some kind of OBOE: off-by-one error ?

@fig2k4: Keep up the great work !!!

fig2k4 · Nov 16, 2011

Yeah, that's the standard set by Oggzee IIRC. The file needs to be less than 4GB on FAT32, so it was decided to make it 32KB less (1 Wii disc sector) to keep things aligned. Makes sense.

Someone asked that exact same question a few days ago via email. If it was you, I did respond, but I'm having problems sending emails from my .tk address. I'm receiving emails OK, but when I send them they mysteriously vanish and don't get to the recipient. Some useless info, but I got in touch with the email host. Hopefully they get back to me soon..

lolilol · Nov 17, 2011

I was about to post the same message as Nocturno. I got the same problem, I wanted to change games titles and ended up with my file being invalid.

fig2k4 said:
Nocturno got back to me and the new function (Tools->FAT32/NTFS->Repair WBFS files) fixed the corrupt WBFS files. It totally rebuilds the WBFS header can fix files that haven't been trimmed correctly (Sector count mismatch) etc. A few problems that can cause the WBFS files to be unusable and show as invalid in WBM.

I changed the WBFS Recovery mode to work with WBFS files too. Using that you can transfer the invalid files to another drive or ISO etc. to repair them, where the repair function fixes them in-place.

I also fixed a potential cause of the corruption that I mentioned it in my previous post. When renaming the titles, the WBFS header was synced/rewritten. Even though there's no reason for that to cause the corruption, it's not needed so I removed it.

The thing is, in Tools->FAT32/NTFS I only have "Update Storage Convention" but no repair option.
I think I use the last version of Wii Backup Manager, tho. It's the 0.4.4 build 73 (x86).

This is what I have :

fig2k4 · Nov 17, 2011

OK, I'll up the latest build soon so you can fix this.

It's really strange because every file I've renamed is fine.

fig2k4 · Nov 17, 2011

0.4.5 Build 76 is up.

See the OP or http://www.wiibackupmanager.tk/WiiBackupManager_Build76.html

0.4.4 build 76
|-Added: Menu item on drive pages, "Tools->FAT32/NTFS->Repair WBFS files". This will fix most problems that cause games to show as invalid in WBM. For example, the corrupt WBFS header caused by the renaming bug below and also WBFS files that haven't been trimmed correctly.
|-Added: "Tools->WBFS->Recovery mode" now also works with WBFS files. If you have invalid entries in the list, this will allow you to transfer the games to another drive or ISO/CISO which will repair them.
|-Fixed: A serious issue with title renaming that caused corrupt WBFS files. By not rewriting the WBFS header when renaming the title, it removes the possibility of the header getting corrupt. It doesn't need rewritten anyway, so the code shouldn't have been there.
|-Fixed: (Issue #0000006) In WIndows XP, the visual styles cause the files list to turn black.
|-Fixed: (Issue #0000004) When I made some changes from WiiTDB to GameTDB, I missed the titles colour entry in the setting dialog. Because it used WiiTDB and the code expected GameTDB, the colour couldn't be edited.

Hacking Wii backup Manager for Windows

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