Hacking USB Mod

[NimrodPSI]

Hello, I am trying to improve a mod I have done on the Nintendo Wii system. I have previously installed an SSD internally in my Wii by soldering a USB to SATA cable directly to the leads for one of the USB ports. The mod works great for me and allows the system to load and play backups without any "external" equipment. It does however mean that the USB port that is soldered onto should not (cannot?) be used for any other device. On the regular Wii this was not an issue for me since there are other USB ports, but I have recently gotten a Wii Mini and want to perform the same mod...

I am hoping to find a way to allow the USB port to still be useable with an external device (keyboard, flash drive etc) WITHOUT having to remove the soldered internal USB cable or drive. I have considered using a manual switch on the back of the unit to control which USB device is connected to the board, but I am hoping to find a solution that can be done entirely on the interior and will automatically switch to the USB jack when a device is plugged in and then switch back to the internal drive when removed. Unfortunately my electronics expertise is no where near as robust as I would like, so I am unsure what terms and devices I would need to do more research on. Would a relay work for this? If so, what kind of relay would I need to swap between each USB's four wires? How will it detect the presence of a USB? Am I going about this all wrong?

Thank you very much for your time and any help you can provide. I apologize if I did not post in the correct place, since it has more to do with USBs than with the Wii specifically.

 

[CMDreamer]

You can plug up to 127 diferent devices to the same USB port without issues as they will be enumerated independently. Take in consideration the power consumption as the Wii might -and most probably won't- provide enough power for too many devices connected at once.

 

[CoolMe]

You could use a usb hub that has external power supply, depends on how many usb ports it has you can put as much as the usb hub allows, if it has usb 3.0 and usb adapter is also usb 3.0 you can use just a regular cable and not the y-cable. And i think you should use a y-cable that connects the usb hub to the the Wii. I think they should be read fine because there's no usb power issue here.

 

[gudenau]

Doesn't the Wii mini technically have three internal USB ports? If that's the case you could just use the one that isn't used and try to use that one.

If you do solder to the single external one you will need to use some sort of USB hub, and those tend to break USB loaders in my experience.

 

[NimrodPSI]

Thank you all for the fast replies, it would seem I am over-complicating things here. I didn't know there was internal USB in the Mini, but if they work with loaders then that's definitely the easiest option I think. CMDreamer thank you, I didn't know about that at all and if I can overcome the potential power issues then that will certainly work as well. Again, I appreciate everyone's awesome and fast replies.