Hacking How to make a copy of your external hard drive

[brandon916]

It sounds like my external hard drive might be failing. How do I make a 1:1 copy of it using my pc? Every time I plug it into my computer, nothing shows up.

 

[EmulateLife]

A Wii U formatted hard drive will not work on PC. The only thing you can do is copy everything over through the Wii U itself in settings.

 

[AmandaRose]

It sounds like my external hard drive might be failing. How do I make a 1:1 copy of it using my pc? Every time I plug it into my computer, nothing shows up.

It won't show up on a PC as the drive is formated in the WiiUs proprietary format that pcs don't recognise. Plug your current hdd into the wiiu and also plug the new hdd into the wiiu goto data management and transfer everything from the old HD to the new one. Be prepared this may take many hours if you have a lot of games on it.

 

[brandon916]

It won't show up on a PC as the drive is formated in the WiiUs proprietary format that pcs don't recognise. Plug your current hdd into the wiiu and also plug the new hdd into the wiiu goto data management and transfer everything from the old HD to the new one. Be prepared this may take many hours if you have a lot of games on it.

But I'm not trying to move anything. I want to make a copy just in case it does fail.

 

[AmandaRose]

But I'm not trying to move anything. I want to make a copy just in case it does fail.

Well do exactly as I said above but select copy rather than move in data management.

 

[Shadow#1]

But I'm not trying to move anything. I want to make a copy just in case it does fail.

Only way is to move everything via Wii U to new drive

 

[EmulateLife]

There's already two posts telling you you can't make a copy on PC, it's not possible because Wii U uses it's own format that the PC cannot read.

 

[Shadow#1]

There's already two posts telling you you can't make a copy on PC, it's not possible because Wii U uses it's own format that the PC cannot read.

Oh it's one thoes spammers?

 

[Ryccardo]

It sounds like my external hard drive might be failing. How do I make a 1:1 copy of it using my pc? Every time I plug it into my computer, nothing shows up.

With a raw disk imaging software, such as "dd"... but remember the external drive encryption key depends, on top of a value in the console's EEPROM, also on the hard drive's identification data and the USB interface's, so making an 1:1 copy is of questionable value - much better to backup your saves over FTP/SystemConfigTool/savemii and keep installation files for your installed channels

 

[AmandaRose]

With a raw disk imaging software, such as "dd"... but remember the external drive encryption key depends, on top of a value in the console's EEPROM, also on the hard drive's identification data and the USB interface's, so making an 1:1 copy is of questionable value - much better to backup your saves over FTP/SystemConfigTool/savemii and keep installation files for your installed channels

Or he can just do what I said above lol which is the easiest way but sadly takes the longest time.

 

[brandon916]

Well do exactly as I said above but select copy rather than move in data management.

Ok. I'll give that a try. Hopefully this a 1:1 copy where I can plug this in if my main drive ever fail. Thanks.

 

[AmandaRose]

Ok. I'll give that a try. Hopefully this a 1:1 copy where I can plug this in if my main drive ever fail. Thanks.

It is

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Ok. I'll give that a try. Hopefully this a 1:1 copy where I can plug this in if my main drive ever fail. Thanks.

Yes. Also, as @Ryccardo said (but simplified a little) the encryption on the drive is actually dependant on the drive itself so just cloning the drive to another wouldn't work, the fingerprint of the drive wouldn't match the files, so the Wii U wouldn't recognize the drive.
But there is a way to read Wii U formatted drives on a PC. You can only dump the files (in decrypted format), copying them onto a new drive requires inserting said new drive into the Wii U, formatting it, and transferring the files over from a PC with ftpiiu_everywhere (which is a slow process). Also some keys from the Wii U are needed for the tool to work its magic.
Using the HDD->HDD copy feature of the Wii U is a much faster and simpler option. But if you did not have a second external HDD to dedicate to the Wii U, it would work in a pinch. https://gbatemp.net/threads/wfsdump-pc-util-for-dumping-wfs-devices-wiiu-file-system.478480/

 

[brandon916]

Yes. Also, as @Ryccardo said (but simplified a little) the encryption on the drive is actually dependant on the drive itself so just cloning the drive to another wouldn't work, the fingerprint of the drive wouldn't match the files, so the Wii U wouldn't recognize the drive.
But there is a way to read Wii U formatted drives on a PC. You can only dump the files (in decrypted format), copying them onto a new drive requires inserting said new drive into the Wii U, formatting it, and transferring the files over from a PC with ftpiiu_everywhere (which is a slow process). Also some keys from the Wii U are needed for the tool to work its magic.
Using the HDD->HDD copy feature of the Wii U is a much faster and simpler option. But if you did not have a second external HDD to dedicate to the Wii U, it would work in a pinch. https://gbatemp.net/threads/wfsdump-pc-util-for-dumping-wfs-devices-wiiu-file-system.478480/

Thanks again for the detail explanation. I feel a bit better now knowing I have a reliable backup option.