thx for the advice
diglett: thanks for redirecting me to that thread. I didn't realize how much was actually in there. I posted a question in there. I figure theres no harm in putting it in here too though.
Question about soldering. I read that you're supposed to apply solder to the wire you're about to solder to a point on the wii, and you're supposed to apply solder to the point on the wii. My question is, couldn't the solder on the point and on the wire solidify before you stick the tinned wire onto the point on the wii?
It will solidify, but it'll heat back up when you apply the iron to the point. The purpose of tinning the wire is it kind of acts like flux in that the solder on the iron will flow onto the wire.
For installing the Chiip, can I use the 30 gauge wire for everything? Including the programmer? Or do I need another kind of wire too?
30AWG is what's needed for the Wii. You can use 24 or 22 or pretty much anything for the programmer. The points on the back of the DSub are fairly large, so bigger wire would work. I used 24, I think, and it's perfect. I just ran out and had to cut up what I had left. 30AWG would work fine, the programmer doesn't need much current, but bigger wire is easier to work with. If you want to make the programmer look slick and contained, you should use 28, since it bends easier and more flexible than the bigger wire. I believe 28 AWG is 2x the thickness of 30, so it's great for making it a small contained project. If you don't care, then any wire will suffice.
When building the programmer, the end of the resistor that goes into the connector that connects to pin, has to be soldered right? How do I go about soldering that connection? How do you solder wires and resistors together?
The resistors have bendable wires coming out of them. Just cut them to about 1/4-1/2 inch left and stick it in the DSub hole and solder. All 5 resisters then connect to the capactior, which also has long legs. I snipped the resistors fairly short and bent them in an L shape to fold over the capacitor leg. With the capactior, the longer leg is positive and that's what connects to the resistors, the resistors aren't polarized so it doesn't matter what end goes where.
How do you solder wires/resistors/led/capacitor to a chip? Is it the same as soldering wires to a point on the wii's dvd drive?
Since the points are bigger and precision truly doesn't matter, you can glob solder everywhere, especially when connecting the 5 resistors to the capactior. The DSub has tubes on the back end for the wires to go in. Just tin the wires and shove it in the holes and apply more solder. The pogrammer is extremely easy to make, just follow the instructions and look at the user pics. When I did it, I soldered everything to the DSub first and then connected it to the IC Socket.
Also, can you open the Wii without a tri-wing screwdriver? Maybe with a really small flathead screwdriver? Someone said something about that stripping the screws. What does that mean?
You can, but you probably will strip the screws. What that means is you remove the grip for the tri-wing. If you strip the screw, there's nothing for the screwdriver to grip onto and you're left with a circle on top of the screw. Get a tri-wing screw driver. I tried opening mine without one and got 2 screws off before almost stripping the 3rd.
Also, kind of a dumb question, but why do things have to be soldered at all? Couldn't the wire just touch the point on the board, and work? Or is the outside of a soldered joint insulated by the outside of the solder?
The solder is needed to maintain the connection. If you try to glue it or tape it on there, chances are it'll pop off over time. Glue isn't conductive so if the wire floats in the glue, then it won't work. Soldering will allow the connections to last for years and years and years. There's really no other way to do it.
I would appreciate if someone could answer these questions. Thanks.