FlatMii Review

[Trukkle]

Sounds like a very useful piece of kit with a lot of potential.
As soon as Kick (or someone else trustworthy enough who accepts my card/paypal) gets some in, I'll grab one.

 

[WiiMoosh]

FlatMii - Wii DVD Drive Emulator (ISO Loader modchip) w/ Free Triwing + Phillips Screwdriver

IN STOCK

The FlatMii is a device that emulats the DVD Drive so you can make all the controls out of your PC! This means you can run your Wii without a DVD drive and load all of your ISO's from a PC.

So this basically emulates a DVD-ROM Drive, makes a PC to Access the ISOS from the HDD. Great improvement! This is what we call in PC's "Virtual DVD Drive" or "Virtual HDD" or Virtual Partidition" etc. But in this case we call it "Physical Virtual Drive" or" Wii to PC Physical DVD Drive conector". Has so many names!!

Well Still needs to be more than that... I bet coders/programmers can imitate this "Wii DVD Drive Emulator" as a Loader for the Wii. Most of it would be "Software" and you would need to use a "SD card" with "Homebrew Channel" to install it as a WAD(Channel) or use it inside the SD as an app. let's see most of it its already done:

WiiGator's Gamma v3 (002fix)
WiiGator's GC loader
IOS249
cIOS r7
MIOS 8
What we need now its to put all this together and hook a "Virtual DVD-Drive" homebrew App that manages to read External HDD.

Or at least from the SD and SD HC (8GB).

Well this all a crazy idea of mine and I know much of the Coders and Wii Users around here...

Thanks!

 

[WiiMoosh]

Sounds like a very useful piece of kit with a lot of potential.
As soon as Kick (or someone else trustworthy enough who accepts my card/paypal) gets some in, I'll grab one.

What do u mean by "or someone else trustworthy enough who accepts my card/paypal" ?

???

 

[ViRGE]

If you could just simply connect an external HD to the Wii's USB then it would be great, having to turn on my PC just for a quick game of Wii Sports just doesn't appeal to me, but maybe thats just me...

While such a device is technically possible, at least when it comes to using FlatMii's tech the market realities make it unlikely. The reason a PC is needed is that the FlatMii chip needs to be fed a single ISO in a controlled manner. If you get rid of the PC, some other device must do this.

This would entail a complete System on a Chip (SoC) that can receive commands and can read a complex partition format like NTFS. You'd be looking at pushing the cost of the device to over $100. It would probably reach half the cost of a Wii itself. And that's before adding a hard drive.

The hardware for such a device is simply too expensive to be practical.

 

[OzModChips]

just remember that we are in australia, so the prices on our website are in AUD, not USD
and the prices include 10% TAX, that people from overseas dont pay. ..so the price is about 60usd

 

[Lily]

Has anyone tried the Flat Mii with Call of Duty - World at War? I'm curious if it can handle the textures and fast action.

Yes, this game works fine.

 

[ron555]

Question for anyone who owns/tests the FlatMii


Can one scrub an iso - for example SuperMarioGalaxy4.7GB.iso (4.7GB) > SuperMarioGalaxy2.1GB.iso and send the SCRUBBED via the FlatMii WITHOUT having to unscrub it?

 

[enarky]

Woah, this really sounds like an impressive achievement for the manufacturer. Congratulations!

Can't wait for this mod to become platform independent. I hope someone will develop a Linux driver soon.

I doubt we'll see direct support of USB HDDs anytime soon, as I assume all the DVD ROM drive emulation happens on the PC and the chip just passes information through (speculation, speculation). But it would surely be nice.

EDIT:
Oh, and great review, of course, lilsypha.

 

[scognito]

Nice review lilsypha!
Anyway did you tested 1080 snowboard? (or other gamecube discs with soundpatch enabled because it contains streaming sound?).
I have 1080 with sound fix and when i start a level i don't get music!
Is there a way to "unpatch" a sound patched game? I want to play 1080!

 

[Sir VG]

Using up 4gig of HD space for the sake of a 10pence DVD-R, is a bit stupid if you ask me.

The money savings comes from if your disc drive breaks. FlatMii is $60. DVD Drive is usually $80+.

QUOTECan one scrub an iso - for example SuperMarioGalaxy4.7GB.iso (4.7GB) > SuperMarioGalaxy2.1GB.iso and send the SCRUBBED via the FlatMii WITHOUT having to unscrub it?

Scrubbed games work just the same as if you were doing it on a real Wii - which means you need 3.2 firmware. 3.3 or 3.4 is a no-go for scrubbed.


I have this and love it. Wii games I never had an issue with, but when I tested Ikaruga (USA, GCN) it didn't get to anything playable before looping back to the title screen.

I use this on a broken Wii (bad disc drive) and had some fun with it.

 

[FAST6191]

re: scrubbed games. They should work on any firmware (hacked or not) for the basic scrubbing, when you start removing update partitions and the like is when the updates (and their trucha/signing bug fixing properties) come into play.

re: hard drive loader. There was another of these sort of devices announced called the WiiZii that is a sata to wii drive adapter and more in line with what you want.
tehskeen thread:
http://www.tehskeen.com/modules/News/showa...0262&page=1

 

[shakirmoledina]

excellent review... it seems to be the best and safest solution for new users but be careful when installing
Oz are bit more expensive than most shops since they are in aus dollars but they are very good in terms of security and features for aus buyers especially
here's the conversion from yahoo finance
104.5 AUD ---> 66.8543 USD
with 10% cut meaning 60.16887 USD as the ppl mentioned above

 

[OSW]

Too be nitpicky, i could think of one more con (from what I've read), that the Wii's USB ports are no longer available... (one or both i don't know).

 

[Lily]

Too be nitpicky, i could think of one more con (from what I've read), that the Wii's USB ports are no longer available... (one or both i don't know).

Just one.

Posts merged

QUOTE(shakirmoledina @ Feb 17 2009, 06:32 AM) excellent review... it seems to be the best and safest solution for new users but be careful when installing
Oz are bit more expensive than most shops since they are in aus dollars but they are very good in terms of security and features for aus buyers especially
here's the conversion from yahoo finance
104.5 AUD ---> 66.8543 USD
with 10% cut meaning 60.16887 USD as the ppl mentioned above

Yes, and don't forget at the bottom of the review, GBAtemp members get free shipping with coupon code "gbatWC".

 

[Satangel]

Great review, thanks lilsypha!
Seems like avery good product, especially because it's totally region free! Wouldn't be so handy for me though (PC and Wii are too far apart), but I'm sure this is a great solution for other people.

 

[ron555]

I know someone mentioned this about this thread, but can anyone confirm if brickblocked + scrubbed Wii discs work while transferred via FlatMii?

 

[scousethief]

Looks like a good product if your wii and pc are close together ( or at least the length of a long usb cable) ? hope ie got that right , no use for me as like most people i know their pcs and wiis are in different rooms or on different floors , more interesting as to were this will lead.

 

[NextStep]

looks abit hard to install...

not sure, but you had to open your computer and your wii to install this thing?

at first, i thought we just needed to connect the two with a single cable or something.

this isn't good for people who aren't tech-savy.

like me, i haven't opened my wii or my computer at all, since i don't even know how the insides work.
that's also why i had to pay someone to install a wiikey for me (rather have guarantee).

 

[joe90]

is it me, or does the soldering look a bit off on the legs of the chips, and some are soldered together?

 

[Lily]

I know someone mentioned this about this thread, but can anyone confirm if brickblocked + scrubbed Wii discs work while transferred via FlatMii?

Yes.

Keep in mind if you want to use trucha-signed discs, your Wii firmware still needs to be v3.2.

QUOTE(NextStep @ Feb 17 2009, 10:02 AM) looks abit hard to install...

not sure, but you had to open your computer and your wii to install this thing?

at first, i thought we just needed to connect the two with a single cable or something.

this isn't good for people who aren't tech-savy.

like me, i haven't opened my wii or my computer at all, since i don't even know how the insides work.
that's also why i had to pay someone to install a wiikey for me (rather have guarantee).

You only have to open the Wii, not your PC. All you have to do is disassemble it down to where you can remove the DVD drive, connect some ribbon cables and seat the chip. I am quite sure that even a non tech-savvy person could do it, as long as they follow the instructions. There is no soldering required at all.

Once you've installed the chip, you reassemble the Wii, plug in the USB connector and connect it to your PC. My Wii is almost always disassembled in some way, so the install only took me about 15 minutes.