Hardware Western Digital 160GB Passport powers down on channel select

[sYndrome13]

I'd used a Western Digital 160GB Passport USB 2.0 external hard drive and WiiFlow to play games on the Wii for several months. I started experienced issues where I'd have to restart the Wii multiple times to get WiiFlow to load and read the hard drive. When it worked, it worked without any issues until reboot.

I hooked the 160GB Passport up to a computer, ran both Quick Test and Extended Test using Western Digital Data Lifeguard tools. The drive passed both tests.

I also ran chkdsk inside Windows. The scan didn't report anything anomalous.

Stumped, I popped open the casing of the Passport (the warranty expired long ago), plugged it into the Wii, and listened closely to the drive as I navigated the menus. As long as I was on the System Menu screen, the drive buzzed along happily. As soon as I loaded a channel--any channel, regardless whether it accesses the USB ports or not--the drive shut down (after what sound like, to my uneducated ear, an attempt to spin back up) and would turn back on. The indicator light stayed solid blue, but the drive was no longer accessible--no sound, no vibration.

Since I have to launch WiiFlow either directly through an installed WiiFlow forwarder channel or through Homebrew Channel, this effectively renders the drive useless on the Wii--which is a shame, because it seems to work perfectly otherwise.

My question: Is there any IOS or cIOS file that changes the way the Wii handles its USB ports? Specifically, I'm looking for some way to keep the Wii from powercycling connected USB devices.

Is there any such solution? Or am I just sunk?

I should mention I also have bootmii and Priiloader installed on my Wii. Perhaps there's a way to immediately load WiiFlow through Priiloader and avoid the powercycling routine that way?

One last bit of information that may be helpful: When I connect the 160GB Passport to my notebook, I have no issues reading and writing to it. Also, when I bring the notebook out of suspend (the Passport turns off when the computer goes into suspend), the Passport comes back to life, no problem. So my issue is something specific to the Wii (and therefore it may be pointless to contact Western Digital tech support).

 

[sYndrome13]

I should mention I also have bootmii and Priiloader installed on my Wii. Perhaps there's a way to immediately load WiiFlow through Priiloader and avoid the powercycling routine that way?

I found a way to autoboot to WiiFlow using Priiloader, but it still doesn't resolve the issue I'm having with this drive.

Now I'm down to determining which part is faulty: The hard drive or the SATA to mini-USB adapter. I have another 160GB 2.5" hard drive that works, so if it's the drive, I can swap it out and get back in business. If it's the adapter, well, I'll be keeping an eye out for cheap 2.5" SATA enclosures.

Still, any suggestions for keeping the Wii from powercycling its USB ports would be appreciated as it would be a simpler solution.

UPDATE: Looks like it's the hard drive. Specifically, the drive has trouble spinning up. Once it spins up, it's fine. Disabling RPS (Reduced Power Spinup) by removing the jumper motivated the drive to make more attempts at spinning up, but even that didn't seem to make a significant difference. I tried a different and longer USB cable, but that didn't work, either.

Time to format my working 160GB 2.5" drive, slide it into the Passport casing, and hook it up to the Wii.