Hacking Is my Wii Safe?

[ayojoe]

Hey guys, I'm writing this topic to make sure if I'm safe or not to do some things so here's my case:

Some things date back...

A month ago my launch-day Wii started acting funny. It had the following: HBC, 3.4 WAD Fixes, IOS60 patched, and then later updated to 4.0 (in that order). The problems with it were weird. First, WiiConnect24 Standby Connection would freeze my Wii to a black start up screen. I'm convinced this is a heating problem because I would leave it like that for a while due to being pounded with school work and a busy schedule. One time I even put it on WiiConenct24 standby for a HALF hour, after cooling down my Wii, and it would still freeze it on start up.
The 2nd problem was that my Zelda OOT VC game (bought from Shop Channel) just randomly stopped working and would go to a black screen when chosen. It wouldn't even erase correctly, it would be stuck on "Erasing.." forever so I'd have to turn off the Wii manually. It would be gone but the blocks would be the same, when I tried to redownload it straight to an SD Card, the Wii froze and ultimately got the black screen brick for good.

I also had installed the update from Animal Crossing: City Folk in November when it came out (way after I installed HBC and before my 3.4 WAD Fixes). I heard this update is IOS38, rumored for Wii Speak, and contains fix for the fake signing bug. My friend says his game works fine without it.

Fast Forward to Today..

My Wii was fixed by Nintendo repairs, same Wii, same serial #. The receipt says they fixed "Main Circuit Board" and "Disc Drive Mechanism". It was on 3.3u but I updated through Nintendo to 4.0 due to advancements in soft modding for it. I used BannerBomb/HackMii to install HBC and DVDx. I then downgraded IOS35, installed IOS35 by WAD, installed CIOSv7 by WAD, installed patched IOS60, and upgraded to CIOS36rev10. The Wii had my Wii Shop Channel linked to it with my club nintendo account, and I was able to redownload my games and channels I used to have. What's weird though is that today I discovered AC:CF doesn't ask for a disc update so my Wii wasn't completely wiped I believe. I wonder if my Wii still had it's stuff installed, or if they added it. Which is weird because I have a new Wii Console Code and it was wiped to 3.3u when I got it back.

I'm curious now on the following:

1. If I was able to install all that stuff successfully after a Nintendo repair, am I safe?

2. Does it conflict with anything that my Wii doesn't ask for a disc update on my AC:CF game, that it possibly is still installed? I thought it disables the fake signing bug so how was I able to downgrade/install IOS35? This confuses me. Something tells me they didn't completely wipe everything off of the Wii.

3. If bannerbomb/hackmii says BootMii can be installed, should I do it? I'm not sure if they LU64'ified my Wii or not, again if I was able to do all the things above, is my Wii safe?

4. Am I safe to install/uninstall WADs, and do backups?

5. Just wanna make sure if there's anything I can do to figure out, or if you guys can verify, that they didn't put contents of LU64 type stuff into my repaired launch Wii.

 

[techboy]

1. Yes you're fine

2. You updated to 4.0 via Nintendo. That update is newer than whats on the AC:CF disc, so no update is needed.

3. Bootmii should be fine. Use boot2 if it's possible. Bootmii IOS offers no anti-brick capability.

4. No problem there either

5. If it had been loaded with LU64 code, the IOS35 downgrade procedure would not have worked. It would downgrade and install the old IOS, but everything using IOS35 would have stopped working. Old IOS versions don't run on LU64s. LU64s have a different hacking procedure (either IOS16 for 3.4, or cboot2 for 4.0)

Also, your console's system friend code changing is normal, since they replaced the main board. If you ever want to, you can change it yourself if you format the wii (not a good idea - tends to cause bricks), or i think using the Wii Backup Disc 1.31.

 

[ayojoe]

Thanks a lot for the response man, I appreciate it. What about future games that require updates? Such as NPC Mario Power Tennis or The Conduit? I want to be able to know if these updates will needed for the game to work 100% or if they just try to block IOS signing bugs and what not. Loading with Gecko the whole time would get quite tedious and annoying. Is there any solutions to that? Should we still update with game disc updates?

Edit: My friend told me that NPC Mario Power Tennis tries to block the IOS35 fake signing bug. How would we know which game updates are safe and which ones aren't, because I plan on renting The Conduit this week and I don't want to constantly load it with GeckoOS.

 

[techboy]

Just install preloader and use the Block Updates hack. That'll prevent any disc update from installing, as well as provide some more brick protection.

If you block updates, new games in the future may need new IOSes. Worst that happens is you need to look up online what IOS it uses and install a wad of that IOS with wad manager. It's something you learn to deal with. Currently, most games are using IOS 38, 53, and 55. You have those already, because the official 4.0 you installed over wifi includes them.

As for IOS35, the update is fine. You only needed that downgraded version to install cIOS. Updating it back to its original version is fine.

Conduit shouldn't bother you about updates.

 

[ayojoe]

A guy I'm currently talking to says The Conduit system update, updated his IOS36 and killed cMIOS for GC Backups. Since everything I did was with downgrading and installing IOS35 I guess I'm safe. The only loss I see if not being able to do GC Backups if I update with it though. And I'm not so sure about doing Preloader. Is that even compatible with BootMii on boot2?

I have all I need I just want to be able to play these games with their updates peacefully.

 

[techboy]

cMIOS gets killed because there is a MIOS update on the disc. If you don't use GC Backups, you're fine. You could always install cMIOS afterwards if you need it, but Conduit (and likely anything newer) will ask for updates if you do, since cMIOS is based on an older cMIOS than what Conduit ships with. The alternative is to get a modchip.

The IOS36 is already updated, since you updated via Nintendo Wifi. No problem here.

As for preloader, yes, it works with bootmii, since they work completely differently. Bootmii installs at boot2 or as IOS254. Preloader renames the system menu DOL and puts itself in its place. The only downside to preloader is that the "Rebooter" function of Gecko OS stops working.

If you don't want backups at all, any in-region disc update should be safe.

 

[ayojoe]

Alright. I'll take all of this into great consideration. Thanks for all the help man. I really appreciate it.

 

[techboy]

No problem. Post again if you need more help!