Hacking Possible to softmod Wii with broken disc drive & modchip installed?

Hanafuda · Aug 27, 2018

I've got a Wii that's been in a box in the garage for over 10 years. It had the 1st gen modchip installed, can't even remember what that thing was called. But after some time, the disc drive gears started getting crunchy/slippy and then failed - teeth chipped off. I actually managed to get it back in service temporarily by re-treading teeth on the broken gear using plastic dust and super glue (I'm kinda handy), but it didn't last. We bought another Wii, later softmodding came along, yada yada.

Just looking for a project basically. Obviously not urgent. It's basically just was there ever an exploit found that could be executed from SD, or some other trick? Or would I need to buy a disc drive to have a chance of success?

ry755 · Aug 27, 2018

Yup! There's an exploit for the Wii Message Board and the Internet Channel. It's really easy to hack a Wii nowadays. https://wii.guide/

Hanafuda · Aug 27, 2018

ry755 said:
Yup! There's an exploit for the Wii Message Board and the Internet Channel. It's really easy to hack a Wii nowadays. https://wii.guide/

Thank you. But will the Wii function ok without the drive? I was expecting to hear that calls to the drive before booting a game require it to be there.

FancyNintendoGamer567 · Aug 27, 2018

@Hanafuda You can try to fix the disc drive by replacing it with a new one, however that isn't easy. If you don't know how to, then softmod your Wii and play Wii games from USB using a USB HDD (or flash drive if your's work fine with the Wii) and a USB Loader (popular options are WiiFlow Lite, USB Loader GX, and CFG USB Loader). Also before using a USB Loader, make sure to get a modern cIOS.

Hanafuda · Aug 27, 2018

FancyNintendoGamer567 said:
@Hanafuda You can try to fix the disc drive by replacing it with a new one, however that isn't easy. If you don't know how to, then softmod your Wii and play Wii games from USB using a USB HDD (or flash drive if your's work fine with the Wii) and a USB Loader (popular options are WiiFlow Lite, USB Loader GX, and CFG USB Loader). Also before using a USB Loader, make sure to get a modern cIOS.

Thanks, yeah I've done all that before. I have a softmodded Wii, which I've kept up to date over the years. This would be just to get some use out of the Wii that's been in a box in my garage for about 12 years. Playing from a USB HDD is what I want - no need for disc drive. I was just concerned that the Wii OS would bork on booting a game (even from USB) if the disc drive wasn't present.

DaMan4169 · Aug 28, 2018

Yes, during startup the Wii does check for the disc drive...
The drive doesn't need to be fully functional but it does have to be present and detectable. As long as the drive board is connected the rest of the drive could be removed.
There is a tutorial that explains how one member removed the drive's mechanical parts and installed an internal HDD. It's a little hard to follow because the forum has been migrated since it was originally written and it wasn't updated so the pics are no longer embedded but they are still there on Photobucket if you copy and paste the links...

Hanafuda · Aug 28, 2018

DaMan4169 said:
Yes, during startup the Wii does check for the disc drive...
The drive doesn't need to be fully functional but it does have to be present and detectable. As long as the drive board is connected the rest of the drive could be removed.
There is a tutorial that explains how one member removed the drive's mechanical parts and installed an internal HDD. It's a little hard to follow because the forum has been migrated since it was originally written and it wasn't updated so the pics are no longer embedded but they are still there on Photobucket if you copy and paste the links...

Thank you, that's pretty much the last of what I need to know. I'm gonna dig out that old Wii and see what it does on several on/off cycles. It's been too long for me to remember what it was doing when it went in the box. If I'm getting gear crunchy noises on startup, I open it up to take out the disc loading gearwork but leave the rest intact. If the drive doesn't do anything, I'll probably leave it as-is and start with wii.guide. If I do open it I might also remove that old modchip. It doesn't serve me any purpose now.

Hacking Possible to softmod Wii with broken disc drive & modchip installed?

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