Wii bricked all of a sudden AFTER installing Bootmii and Priiloader.

[Duamutef_MC]

Troubleshooting is a bitch. In the end, it was the 512GB USB - for reference, avoid this model: Sandisk Ultra Fit. It only works if Priiloader is set to do a fake stand-by mode, i.e. the one with the continuous green light and uninterrupted power to the USB ports. If power is instead interrupted, the USB will prevent normal boot and must be removed. Basically, the drive is incompatible with Priiloader and messes with its boot operation. No boot option or other Priiloader setting - apart from the "fake stand-by" method described above - allows to bypass the issue without having to remove the flash drive.

I will try a Western Digital 2TB 'My Passport' next. Anybody using one of those? How is compatibility?

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Here is the chain of events:

Soft modded the Wii with Mailbomb and Hackmii.

Then I installed Homebrew Channel, USB Loader GX, tried a few games on an external USB drive. All perfect, as usual.

For good measure (the irony!) I then installed Bootmii, dumped a NAND backup copy on my SD card and then installed Priiloader.

On Priiloader I turned off the following options: 480p fix, CRT deflicker, as well as the 'A' button when starting the Wii.

Then I tried installing a few WiiWare wads onto the original NAND (risky, I know) by using YAWMM. I then rebooted.

And, then...

Black screen of death!

No image. When I boot normally the tv outputs a black image but declares a 480 resolution; when I reboot by pressing Reset+Power a 576 resolution is declared instead.

It's almost as the resolution is indeed changed but nothing else arrives - total black screen. No Wii menu music can be heard.

I cannot boot into Bootmii or Priiloader, apparently. Or maybe I can but there is no image.

What do you recommend? What could have caused this? I have my NAND backup, as well as the keys backup.

Thank you in advance for your wisdom... help me save Xmas!

DId you ever test that the BootMii menu works? Having the wrong video mode set in bootmii.ini can prevent an image from showing up, also if autoboot is enabled in bootmii.ini with no countdown the menu would just be skipped anyway. You can try to edit the ini file to disable autoboot and check the video mode setting and see if it helps. If you have BootMii as IOS and not as boot2 then it doesn't launch on boot anyway so it doesn't really provide much brick protection.
Also BootMii doesn't like a lot of SD cards, and might not work with SDHC, if it's not able to read the BootMii files from SD then it just skips loading BootMii.

Post automatically merged: Nov 6, 2024

Troubleshooting is a bitch. In the end, it was the 512GB USB - for reference, avoid this model: Sandisk Ultra Fit. It only works if Priiloader is set to do a fake stand-by mode, i.e. the one with the continuous green light and uninterrupted power to the USB ports. If power is instead interrupted, the USB will prevent normal boot and must be removed. Basically, the drive is incompatible with Priiloader and messes with its boot operation. No boot option or other Priiloader setting - apart from the "fake stand-by" method described above - allows to bypass the issue without having to remove the flash drive.

I will try a Western Digital 2TB 'My Passport' next. Anybody using one of those? How is compatibility?

That is very strange because I didn't think Priiloader had any form of USB support. But good that you figured it out.

It was a WD My Passport I used, but probably an older model. I've always had good luck with WD. And 2TB is the recommended (max) size so you should be good.

 

[TheRealKTRF2K6]

DId you ever test that the BootMii menu works? Having the wrong video mode set in bootmii.ini can prevent an image from showing up, also if autoboot is enabled in bootmii.ini with no countdown the menu would just be skipped anyway. You can try to edit the ini file to disable autoboot and check the video mode setting and see if it helps. If you have BootMii as IOS and not as boot2 then it doesn't launch on boot anyway so it doesn't really provide much brick protection.
Also BootMii doesn't like a lot of SD cards, and might not work with SDHC, if it's not able to read the BootMii files from SD then it just skips loading BootMii.

Post automatically merged: Nov 6, 2024

That is very strange because I didn't think Priiloader had any form of USB support. But good that you figured it out.

It was a WD My Passport I used, but probably an older model. I've always had good luck with WD. And 2TB is the recommended (max) size so you should be good.

It got used EmuNAND to remove the bricks things now!

 

[worm28]

Troubleshooting is a bitch. In the end, it was the 512GB USB - for reference, avoid this model: Sandisk Ultra Fit. It only works if Priiloader is set to do a fake stand-by mode, i.e. the one with the continuous green light and uninterrupted power to the USB ports. If power is instead interrupted, the USB will prevent normal boot and must be removed. Basically, the drive is incompatible with Priiloader and messes with its boot operation. No boot option or other Priiloader setting - apart from the "fake stand-by" method described above - allows to bypass the issue without having to remove the flash drive.

I will try a Western Digital 2TB 'My Passport' next. Anybody using one of those? How is compatibility?

Most of the time the hard drive is not the problem its the enclosure i have bought like five of these and they work with any hard drive i have tried just take your old hdd out of its enclosure and put it in this https://www.ebay.com/itm/275939372011

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Most of the time the hard drive is not the problem its the enclosure i have bought like five of these and they work with any hard drive i have tried just take your old hdd out of its enclosure and put it in this https://www.ebay.com/itm/275939372011

That could be a good option if he has any old laptops laying around, most of them have 500 GB, some 1 TB, 500 GB is probably enough for Wii/GC games.

 

[XFlak]

Nvm

 

[Blythe93]

500 GB is probably enough for Wii/GC games.

I second this. I have a bunch of Wii and GameCube games that I consider must-have and I'm yet to fill half of the 1TB SSD I use for those games.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

I second this. I have a bunch of Wii and GameCube games that I consider must-have and I'm yet to fill half of the 1TB SSD I use for those games.

I use an old 500 GB and I haven't been able to fill up more than around 380 GB. And that includes some mediocre games as well.

 

[master801]

Troubleshooting is a bitch. In the end, it was the 512GB USB - for reference, avoid this model: Sandisk Ultra Fit. It only works if Priiloader is set to do a fake stand-by mode, i.e. the one with the continuous green light and uninterrupted power to the USB ports. If power is instead interrupted, the USB will prevent normal boot and must be removed. Basically, the drive is incompatible with Priiloader and messes with its boot operation. No boot option or other Priiloader setting - apart from the "fake stand-by" method described above - allows to bypass the issue without having to remove the flash drive.

I will try a Western Digital 2TB 'My Passport' next. Anybody using one of those? How is compatibility?

USB flash drives have been known to cause problems in the past.

Only use USB hard drives (or SSDs), or SD cards.

 

[TheRealKTRF2K6]

I have to fix this shitty ass problem here? NO WAY!

 

[KokiKitsune]

Right now, I'm just trying to figure out where OP got the wiiware wads.

 

[Duamutef_MC]

Right now, I'm just trying to figure out where OP got the wiiware wads.

Send me a private message if you need the link. Happy to help.

 

[TheRealKTRF2K6]

Send me a private message if you need the link. Happy to help.

I am fixed the NAND issue now

 

[Duamutef_MC]

I am fixed the NAND issue now

What was the issue? How did you solve it? Tell us more...

PS: Where are you from?

 

[TheRealKTRF2K6]

What was the issue? How did you solve it? Tell us more...

PS: Where are you from?

ITALY, I'M GONNA FIX THIS NAND PROBLEM NOW OR ELSE I'LL GET A BSOD ERROR ON START-UP.

 

[Duamutef_MC]

ITALY, I'M GONNA FIX THIS NAND PROBLEM NOW OR ELSE I'LL GET A BSOD ERROR ON START-UP.

Non potevi dirlo subito? Ti do una mano io se vuoi; scrivimi in privato e vediamo di risolvere la situazione.

 

[TheRealKTRF2K6]

Non potevi dirlo subito? Ti do una mano io se vuoi; scrivimi in privato e vediamo di risolvere la situazione.

IT GOT FIXED AND USED THE NAND FIXER TO SUPPORT AND FIX THIS PROBLEM NOW OR ELSE WILL GET A BLACK SCREEN OF DEATH ERROR ON START.????!?!?!?

 

[nitr8]

Troubleshooting is a bitch. In the end, it was the 512GB USB - for reference, avoid this model: Sandisk Ultra Fit. It only works if Priiloader is set to do a fake stand-by mode, i.e. the one with the continuous green light and uninterrupted power to the USB ports. If power is instead interrupted, the USB will prevent normal boot and must be removed. Basically, the drive is incompatible with Priiloader and messes with its boot operation. No boot option or other Priiloader setting - apart from the "fake stand-by" method described above - allows to bypass the issue without having to remove the flash drive.

I will try a Western Digital 2TB 'My Passport' next. Anybody using one of those? How is compatibility?

I wonder why this would happen.

The only possible reason I can think about is the call to "fatInitDefault()" which does filesystem initialization.
I had the effect years ago and over several projects, where fatInitDefault() would not initialize "correctly".
In this case, your code would then still continue to run but maybe bail out at some point.
So it could be that a "Sandisk Ultra Fit" takes way too long to initialize.

I personally managed to fix this for most cases by just looping for some X amount of times around fatInitDefault(), logging the number of calls it took to get like a "lock release". The result of it always differed.

But even the issue I've mentioned by now could be wrong for your case.
On the other hand, I prefer calling fatInitDefault() by looping until it returns "success".
Most developers just call this function but never check it's return code and instead continue running their code.

FAIL!

 

[TheRealKTRF2K6]

I wonder why this would happen.

The only possible reason I can think about is the call to "fatInitDefault()" which does filesystem initialization.
I had the effect years ago and over several projects, where fatInitDefault() would not initialize "correctly".
In this case, your code would then still continue to run but maybe bail out at some point.
So it could be that a "Sandisk Ultra Fit" takes way too long to initialize.

I personally managed to fix this for most cases by just looping for some X amount of times around fatInitDefault(), logging the number of calls it took to get like a "lock release". The result of it always differed.

But even the issue I've mentioned by now could be wrong for your case.
On the other hand, I prefer calling fatInitDefault() by looping until it returns "success".
Most developers just call this function but never check it's return code and instead continue running their code.

FAIL!

Yay! I fixed it too!

 

[pyorot]

I wonder why this would happen.

The only possible reason I can think about is the call to "fatInitDefault()" which does filesystem initialization.
I had the effect years ago and over several projects, where fatInitDefault() would not initialize "correctly".
In this case, your code would then still continue to run but maybe bail out at some point.
So it could be that a "Sandisk Ultra Fit" takes way too long to initialize.

I personally managed to fix this for most cases by just looping for some X amount of times around fatInitDefault(), logging the number of calls it took to get like a "lock release". The result of it always differed.

But even the issue I've mentioned by now could be wrong for your case.
On the other hand, I prefer calling fatInitDefault() by looping until it returns "success".
Most developers just call this function but never check it's return code and instead continue running their code.

FAIL!

as i found out today cos of several different bugs in several different programs, priiloader doesn't call any kind of `fatInit` function at all lol. it seems to me like it wasn't needed a decade ago but now is cos the libraries changed