UDPIH: USB Host Stack exploit + Recovery Menu

It's been a while without any major exploits in the Wii U scene, so I present to you:

USB Descriptor Parsing Is Hard (UDPIH)

An exploit for the Wii U's USB Host Stack. Pronounced like "mud pie" without the M.

The write-up can be found here!

What does this mean?​

Since the USB Stack is running before anything on the PPC side of the Wii U is booted, this allows unbricking things like CBHC bricks without any soldering!


Supported devices:​

  • Raspberry Pi Pico (W) / Pico 2 (W)
  • Raspberry Pi Zero (W) / A / A+ / Zero 2 W / 4 / 5
  • Steam Deck
  • Espressif ESP32 S2 / S3
  • Nintendo Switch capable of running udpih_nxpayload

Instructions​

Device Setup​

Follow the setup guide for the device you want to use below:

Booting the recovery_menu​

warning
Important notes for this to work:
  • Make sure no other USB devices are attached to the console.
  • Only use USB ports on the front of the console, the back ports will not work.
  • If your console has standby mode enabled, pull the power plug and turn it on from a full coldboot state.
  • Copy the latest release of the recovery_menu to the root of your FAT32 formatted SD Card.
  • Insert the SD Card into the console and power it on.
  • As soon as you see the "Wii U" logo on the TV or Gamepad plug in your prepared UDPIH device.
    This timing is important. If you're already in the menu, the exploit won't work.
    Depending on the device, you might have to plug it in sooner or later. This might take several attempts.
    If you get no video output or a distorted screen, your timing was most likely wrong.
  • After a few seconds you should be in the recovery menu.
So what's this recovery menu? The recovery menu allows you to fix several bricks:
screenshot

Wii U Recovery Menu

A simple recovery menu running on the IOSU for unbricking.

Options​

Set Coldboot Title
Allows changing the current title the console boots to.
Useful for unbricking CBHC bricks.
Possible options are:
  • Wii U Menu (JPN) - 00050010-10040000
  • Wii U Menu (USA) - 00050010-10040100
  • Wii U Menu (EUR) - 00050010-10040200
On non-retail systems the following additional options are available:
  • System Config Tool - 00050010-1F700500
  • DEVMENU (pre-2.09) - 00050010-1F7001FF
  • Kiosk Menu - 00050010-1FA81000
Dump Syslogs
Copies all system logs to a logs folder on the root of the SD Card.

Dump OTP + SEEPROM
Dumps the OTP and SEEPROM to otp.bin and seeprom.bin on the root of the SD Card.

Start wupserver
Starts wupserver which allows connecting to the console from a PC using wupclient.

Load Network Configuration
Loads a network configuration from the SD, and temporarily applies it to use wupserver.
The configurations will be loaded from a network.cfg file on the root of your SD.
For using the ethernet adapter, the file should look like this:
Code:
type=eth

For using wifi:
Code:
type=wifi
ssid=ssidhere
key=wifikeyhere
key_type=WPA2_PSK_AES

Pair Gamepad
Displays the Gamepad Pin and allows pairing a Gamepad to the system. Also bypasses any region checks while pairing.
The numeric values represent the following symbols: ♠ = 0, ♥ = 1, ♦ = 2, ♣ = 3.
Note that rebooting the system might be required to use the newly paired gamepad.

Install WUP
Installs a valid signed WUP from the install folder on the root of your SD Card.
Don't place the WUP into any subfolders.

Edit Parental Controls
Displays the current Parental Controls pin configuration.
Allows disabling Parental Controls.

Debug System Region
Fixes bricks caused by setting productArea and/or gameRegion to an invalid value. Symptoms include being unable to launch System Settings or other in-region titles.

System Information
Displays info about several parts of the system.
Including serial number, manufacturing date, console type, regions, memory devices...

Load BOOT1 payload
Loads a payload from the root of the SD Card named boot1.img and executes it from within boot1.
If the file is named boot1now.img it gets loaded automatically when starting the recovery_menu after a 5 second timeout.

Credits​

Special thanks to Maschell, rw-r-r-0644, QuarkTheAwesome, vgmoose, exjam, dimok789, and everyone else who contributed to the Wii U scene!
 
Last edited by GaryOderNichts,
Couldn't a laptop USB controller run in USB emulation mode with a Linux distro booted?

I've got a laptop that has nothing but USB C connectors on it and could theoretically could use the USB cable that comes with a PS5 controller. USB C on the laptop USB A on the opposite end to plug into the Wii u
 
esp32-s2 can probably also be used for UDPIH specially that this thing had option for USB timeout where you can time the simulation of plug and unplugging the USB device. Maybe useful for coldboot hacks.
 
Its been ages since I've touched my wii u, used to use Web exploit to boot hombrew loader and install utik format games.

Tried booting the other day, when booting the web exploit it would give an error saying cant find fat32 or something.

I assumed everything on the consoles sd card was what I used last time to install my games.

But its been that long since I've even been on my wii u, I cant remember.
 
Its been ages since I've touched my wii u, used to use Web exploit to boot hombrew loader and install utik format games.

Tried booting the other day, when booting the web exploit it would give an error saying cant find fat32 or something.

I assumed everything on the consoles sd card was what I used last time to install my games.

But its been that long since I've even been on my wii u, I cant remember.
Just need homebrew launcher folder in wiiu/apps
 
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this might sound dumb as i havent read the whole thing, but does it work with tiramisu?

EDIT: nvm i only have a windows pc
 
my friend bricked his wii u by pulling the plug when it was taking a long time to update.
it was using the haxchi and i installed some games including mario kart 8.
he said the wii u had an update message when he inserted a mario kart 8 disc and it took a long time so he pulled the plug.
naturally, there's no nand backup as it was using haxchi.
hope this new method can fix the wii U.
 
Took long enough, holy shit. We can finally restore our NAND backups Incase of a brick???
Depends on the type of brick. If the brick causes IOSU/IOS-USB to not boot properly this exploit won't save you. It's NOT a brick protection. I have two bricked console where this exploit doesn't work.

If you see an error message on boot chances at pretty high you are getting at least code execution with this new exploit. The MLC still might be already corrupted and about to do die completely "soon"
 
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this might sound dumb as i havent read the whole thing, but does it work with tiramisu?

EDIT: nvm i only have a windows pc
You could run a live version of Linux off a USB on your Windows PC and still use this exploit
 
afaik, on the switch scene, hekate is able to do usb host emulation (usm). Many modified wiiu users possess a vulnerable switch too. Perhaps it could be used instead of a rpi.
A RPI pico is $5 in an authorized store here. Why would I want to solder and do all the stuff to homebrew my switch and then do things a $5 chip can already do?

And why would I solder to avoid soldering? If I solder a microchip in my switch, I would just do the solderful method to unbrick Wii Us.
 

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