Hacking Haven't touched my Wii + HDD in ages. Requesting help in reclaiming it from WBFS

Eski · Oct 22, 2014

I was a stupid teenager and made my entire 1TB HDD into WBFS back in the day, so it was entirely useless beyond storing my Wii games. Now as a stupid young adult, I seek help in reclaiming it from the clutches of WBFS.

I haven't looked at the scene in years, but apparently there's this new Wii Backup Manager thing and it supports FAT32 or something like that. Thing is, I like my games so how am I going to convert my HDD to FAT32 or at least partition my HDD so it can be some use to me?

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

jonthedit · Oct 22, 2014

Eski said:
I was a stupid teenager and made my entire 1TB HDD into WBFS back in the day, so it was entirely useless beyond storing my Wii games. Now as a stupid young adult, I seek help in reclaiming it from the clutches of WBFS.

I haven't looked at the scene in years, but apparently there's this new Wii Backup Manager thing and it supports FAT32 or something like that. Thing is, I like my games so how am I going to convert my HDD to FAT32 or at least partition my HDD so it can be some use to me?

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

WBFS < FAT32 < NTFS

NTFS MASTER RACE!!

Good news, USB Loading supports NTFS! That 1tb will be much more useful than it is now!
You need to get WiiBackupManager and move over all the precious Wii games you want to save (if not all of them).
move them all over to your PC in a folder called "wbfs"
You can leave the formatting in [game].wbfs, just make sure the program creates the proper game-name folders for USB Loader recognition.

After everything is saved properly, FORMAT THAT ****!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Go ahead and do a NTFS format, clusters at default.

After the format is done, make a "wbfs" folder on the root of the drive.
Slap those Wii game folders into that "wbfs" folder (or move over the wbfs folder containing the games onto the root of the drive).

Bam, simple as that!

If you need any further assistance or have issues, PM me!

Eski · Oct 22, 2014

jonthedit said:
WBFS < FAT32 < NTFS

NTFS MASTER RACE!!

Good news, USB Loading supports NTFS! That 1tb will be much more useful than it is now!
You need to get WiiBackupManager and move over all the precious Wii games you want to save (if not all of them).
move them all over to your PC in a folder called "wbfs"
You can leave the formatting in [game].wbfs, just make sure the program creates the proper game-name folders for USB Loader recognition.

After everything is saved properly, FORMAT THAT ****!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Go ahead and do a NTFS format, clusters at default.

After the format is done, make a "wbfs" folder on the root of the drive.
Slap those Wii game folders into that "wbfs" folder (or move over the wbfs folder containing the games onto the root of the drive).

Bam, simple as that!

If you need any further assistance or have issues, PM me!

Wow, that sounds great! Thanks for the help!

Will I need to update my USB Launcher? Right now I'm using Configurable USB Loader and it's been working fine throughout the years. I don't really feel like tinkering more than I need too.

The Real Jdbye · Oct 22, 2014

Eski said:
Wow, that sounds great! Thanks for the help!

Will I need to update my USB Launcher? Right now I'm using Configurable USB Loader and it's been working fine throughout the years. I don't really feel like tinkering more than I need too.

You may need to update it, but you should already be doing that occasionally anyway. New features are added as well as compatibility fixes so it's really a good idea to keep it updated.
You could use the wbfs2fat tool (use search) to convert your drive quickly and painlessly, but that doesn't support NTFS. It's however a lot faster than copying all the games off before formatting and copying them back.

TecXero · Oct 22, 2014

You'll need the latest version of USB Loader GX. It doesn't really require any tinkering, beyond making sure you're using a cIOS. USB Loader GX can load ISO and WBFS files from FAT32 and NTFS partitions. A lot of different homebrew software can read from NTFS, so you might also be possible to use it with your other software. I tend to prefer ISO over WBFS, but I haven't done any in depth testing, I simply have more than enough HDD space to care.

jonthedit · Oct 22, 2014

The Real Jdbye said:
You may need to update it, but you should already be doing that occasionally anyway. New features are added as well as compatibility fixes so it's really a good idea to keep it updated.
You could use the wbfs2fat tool (use search) to convert your drive quickly and painlessly, but that doesn't support NTFS. It's however a lot faster than copying all the games off before formatting and copying them back.

^Wii Scene is almost dead, just get the new version of CFG Loader if CFG is what you like.
He should definitely update now, being he has been out of the scene in a long while. Other than that, the scene is not updated much so he should be good after this update.
For a 1tb HDD he wants to use for other stuff, NTFS is the way to go, no 4gb file limitation. Honestly, the copying won't take long, even with over 110gb of games. WBM does it quite well, even for 2.0 drives.

TecXero said:
You'll need the latest version of USB Loader GX. It doesn't really require any tinkering, beyond making sure you're using a cIOS. USB Loader GX can load ISO and WBFS files from FAT32 and NTFS partitions. A lot of different homebrew software can read from NTFS, so you might also be possible to use it with your other software. I tend to prefer ISO over WBFS, but I haven't done any in depth testing, I simply have more than enough HDD space to care.

TecXero, do I smell a member of the MASTER RACE USB LOADER GX? (I am too

) [To OP] However since you mentioned CFG Loader, just stick to CFG loader. Like TecXero said, WBFS is a compressed form of ISO. If you want to conserve space, WBFS is the way to go. The BackupManager I linked you in my first post will provide you with a way to convert and compress any ISO to WBFS. (You probably wont need to any time soon, since you were on a WBFS drive).

Eski
tldr;

Get new updated CFG Loader here, don't worry about updates after getting this new one, and stick to NTFS UNLESS you plan to experiment with GameCube USB Loading Backups, which require FAT32.

Eski · Oct 22, 2014

Thanks a lot guys! I'll be sure to follow your advice once I have time to do this.

jonthedit said:
Get new updated CFG Loader here, don't worry about updates after getting this new one, and stick to NTFS UNLESS you plan to experiment with GameCube USB Loading Backups, which require FAT32.

The GameCube game loading sounds rather interesting actually. I'll look into it on my own time, but any advice about the subject would be nice. Thanks again guys, you're awesome!

TecXero · Oct 22, 2014

jonthedit said:
TecXero, do I smell a member of the MASTER RACE USB LOADER GX? (I am too ) [To OP] However since you mentioned CFG Loader, just stick to CFG loader. Like TecXero said, WBFS is a compressed form of ISO. If you want to conserve space, WBFS is the way to go. The BackupManager I linked you in my first post will provide you with a way to convert and compress any ISO to WBFS. (You probably wont need to any time soon, since you were on a WBFS drive).

I thought CFG Loader was outdated and had issues. I could be wrong, it's been quite a while since I've looked into it as I haven't had any problems with my setup.

jonthedit · Oct 22, 2014

TecXero said:
I thought CFG Loader was outdated and had issues. I could be wrong, it's been quite a while since I've looked into it as I haven't had any problems with my setup.

All the main loaders are about equal. There are a few exceptions. WiiFlow, CFG, GX, are the common ones and are on the same level. Coverflow is a bit behind.
At this point all that matters is user preference and how each loader behaves.

Eski said:
The GameCube game loading sounds rather interesting actually. I'll look into it on my own time, but any advice about the subject would be nice. Thanks again guys, you're awesome!

If you ever do look into GC loading, DO NOT USE DIOS MIOS!!!! Yes it works, yes it was common for its time, but we have something better now, people just have a hard time converting over.

Nintendont is the future of GameCube USB loading, and it also works on the Wii U despite the Wii U's non-backwards compatibility.
I have not really experimented with GC loading, only with DIOS MIOS back when it was just coming out [building 000008.wad days

]
But I can say you will need a "FAT32 Partition0" to get any sort of GC loading to work.

Hacking Haven't touched my Wii + HDD in ages. Requesting help in reclaiming it from WBFS

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