First time poster here. I decided to make this post since I am having issues with my Wii U. Currently, my Wii U will not boot up to the main menu. It stays stuck on the Wii U logo indefinitely.
There are a few things to note about my console. The console is the black 32 gb model. I believe it was bought during the 2012 holiday season (release) as we were expecting to play Pikmin 3 before it got delayed. The system has never been modded in any fashion. It was not the most heavily played console, and I can't even give a good estimate of when it was last used (at least more than 3 years).
I have already tried doing the UDPIH, however it does not seem to be working. When using the second recovery menu, I get a white screen with some blue lines (see attached image). I believe this is similar to what @fadafwet described in his post. I was able to get the logs from the system, which I have attached to this post. Any idea what the issue may be and how to fix it? Any help would be much appreciated.
70W should be enough. Just try giving it more time and add a little bit of flux from time to time. If you have hot air use that to help, but take care to not desolder anything. If you don't have hot air, maybe use a hair dryer to heat up the board as much as possible, before you to to solder it.
But I really like that tip, as it also can remove a bit of solder or drag it, which is nice for going over an array of connections like on the sd slot
I've used tips like that before and agree it is good for drag soldering. The only issue is that I have one that's too small for effectively heat the board while the other other one is too large to fit through the hole. I'm definitely going to try preheating the board, but only after I double check my iron to make sure the temperature is accurate. Again, it wasn't melting solder at a temperature that worked fine before so I think there may be an issue there. The other thing I noticed that is probably related to the size of the tip is that the NAND-AID seems to be sucking away most of the heat from the iron and it has far greater contact with it as opposed to the pad on the Wii U motherboard. I'm looking into tips right now.
I recently picked up a Wii U with the exact same problem explained in this thread, and looking for some help on next steps. I'm been reading through bunch of posts throughout gbatemp, and this is what I've done so far.
Tried launching recovery_menu using a pi pico. Power LED turns purple, but still stuck at the Wii U logo screen. Logs were written to the SD card, and searching through them, it appears eMMC is failing.
Looking screenshots of the recovery_menu, I blindly pressed eject twice, then power button and dumped my otp.bin to the SD card.
Ordered parts and Voultar's PCB to build a Nand-Aid, and was able to dump an image of the eMMC .
I was successful with my Anker USB 3.0 AR200 SD card reader, but only when using a full sized SD card adapter into that slot. When using the microSD slot, it wouldn't recognize it.
Also, I wasn't able to use all 4 data lines, the dump would fail after a few seconds. It worked using only the D0 line, but it took around 5-6 hours.
Used wfs-tools and the otp.bin to extract the contents of the image, though with a bunch of failures.
Flashed a 32 GB Lexar microSD card with my dumped image, soldered the DIS jumper on the Nand-Aid, and it appears the Wii U is booting from the SD card, but still stuck on the Wii U logo screen.
If I eject the SD card, then turn it on, I just get a black screen, so it's gotta be loading from the SD card now.
It wasn't booting initially, until I noticed that the ground line for the Nand-Aid wasn't connected. Seemed that the ground connection under the SD card slot wasn't good enough, so I wired it to the leg of nearby capacitor.
Took a fresh syslog dump using the original recovery_menu.
I ran @SDIO 's recovery_menu_dumper, which I believe dumped my mcl.bin in parts (from the SD card in the Nand-Aid), and my slc.
I used the WiiU NAND Tools to check and confirm that my slc.bin had errors, and then the fixer tool which appears to have repaired it. Rerunning the check produces no errors now.
So what should I do next? I suppose I need to figure out a way to restore the fixed slc.bin back to my Wii U? Do I need a teensy for this? I have a teensy 2.0 and 3.2, but looks like the guides for this required a 2.0++. What about the mlc.bin image on the SD card, I'm thinking there's a way to use the file injector tool from wfs-tools to fix the broken files listed in the extract and the checker?
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I've just managed to configure the wifi with a network.cfg file on the SD card, and blindly started the wupserver after much trial an error. I've got the wupclient.py script connected to my Wii U now. I suppose I can use this to copy some valid files from the SD card to the eMMC?
Here's the contents of the `w.dump_syslog()` command.
As you did a raw dump in hardware, the file system is missing the parts, that are still in the SLC cache. So not all errors you see here need to be true errors.
Flashed a 32 GB Lexar microSD card with my dumped image, soldered the DIS jumper on the Nand-Aid, and it appears the Wii U is booting from the SD card, but still stuck on the Wii U logo screen.
If I eject the SD card, then turn it on, I just get a black screen, so it's gotta be loading from the SD card now.
It wasn't booting initially, until I noticed that the ground line for the Nand-Aid wasn't connected. Seemed that the ground connection under the SD card slot wasn't good enough, so I wired it to the leg of nearby capacitor.
Maybe the broken GND was also the reason why the dump gave you trouble. If the GND joint is broken, be careful to not rip the pads of the signals. The connection provided also mechanical support, which now might be missing. Maybe add glue on the "lose" end.
Yes, but the SLC dumper still has problems, so I wouldn't trust ist. The MLC dump is done through FSA, so it also includes the the cache, giving you a consistent image. If you extract that with wfs-extract, the errors should line up with the mlc_checker errors.
I used the WiiU NAND Tools to check and confirm that my slc.bin had errors, and then the fixer tool which appears to have repaired it. Rerunning the check produces no errors now.
The slc.bin dumped by my dumper in the recovery menu doesn't contain the RAS information. You see it is exactly 512MiB. The fixer regenerates the RAS information, you will see that fixed image is a little bigger (I belive 528MiB)
That would be a bad idea, your slc is probably fine, but by restoring that questionable Image, you might introduce more problems. Also keep in mind the slc has to match the MLC because of the cache.
That was the case just a few weeks ago. Now we have de_fuse and minute_minute. Which works with a pico and requires much less soldering. But we don't need that in your case
What about the mlc.bin image on the SD card, I'm thinking there's a way to use the file injector tool from wfs-tools to fix the broken files listed in the extract and the checker?
The best thing would be to replace the files on the Wii U through the recovery menu. wfs-inject is pretty limited, also if you would just inject it to the SD card, you would bypass the slc cache, which could cause problems. To go that route you would need to work on an Image dumped through FSA (like my recovery menu does), then work on that image and then flash the whole image back through FSA. I tried the flashing back, but I haven't released the code for that. Also the writing back was very slow, much slower than the dump.
I've just managed to configure the wifi with a network.cfg file on the SD card, and blindly started the wupserver after much trial an error. I've got the wupclient.py script connected to my Wii U now. I suppose I can use this to copy some valid files from the SD card to the eMMC?
Here's the contents of the `w.dump_syslog()` command.
You can also upload files with the wupserver, but that is very slow.
The easiest is probably to just just reinstall the broken titles. But we might need the wup server to deal with broken directories.
But if you have it running at the moment, leave it running, we can use it to upload the file it is currently crashing on, maybe you will then get screen output in the recovery menu.
It is crashing on /vol/storage_mlc01/sys/title/0005001b/10042400/content/CafeStd.ttf you should replace that, I would expect that then the screen output would work again.
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You have a lot of broken files and also 3 broken directories in the usr section. This shouldn't be too bad, but you should never run a Factory Reset on that console.
But for now we will ignore that.
Our first goal should be to get the console to a point where it can run the browser exploit.
For that we look at the current syslog on which file it is crashing and than reinstall that the title the file belongs to.
We repeat that till the console can run homebrew through the browser exploit.
When we can run homebrew, we can reinstall all the remaining broken system titles in one go, either with NUSPli or WUPInstaller GX.
When that is done you delete the damaged user applications using the data management (you only need to delete the damaged part (Main Game / DLC / Update). When that is done you can reinstall the Games / DLC or Trigger the updates.
You probably won't be able to delete the 3 broken save games. The best we can deal with that is moving the broken directory to some place where it won't cause problems.
I noticed this! So I tried replacing the file using the wupclient.py. I downloaded a copy of it from the decaf-emu repo on github, placed it on my SD card, and ran the command `w.cp("/vol/storage_sdcard/CafeStd.ttf", "/vol/storage_mlc01/sys/title/0005001b/10042400/content/CafeStd.ttf")`. Looks like it went through fine. I rebooted the Wii U, but still stuck at the Wii U logo screen.
Side note if it helps anyone, this is how I can reconnect the Wii U to wifi and start the wupserver.
Start a continuous ping on my PC to the Wii's IP address. (I know what it is because it already connected before. Could assign one through DHCP if I had to)
Launch the recovery_menu using the pico
Press eject 4 times (To select "Load Network config")
Press power
Wait for the ping to get responses
Press power (I'm assuming to clear the load-network-config page, and come back to the main menu?)
Press eject 11 times (Cycle the selection through the list and back to "Start wupserver)
Test the wupclient.py script can some something like mount the SD card and list with `w.cd("/vol/storage_sdcard/")` and `w.ls()`
Noted. Is this because even if I were to fix the Wii U enough to boot again, the filesystem will always be in a broken and unfixable state? Even with the SD card replacing the eMMC? I suppose the Factory Reset doesn't format the mlc.
Our first goal should be to get the console to a point where it can run the browser exploit.
For that we look at the current syslog on which file it is crashing and than reinstall that the title the file belongs to.
We repeat that till the console can run homebrew through the browser exploit.
Awesome! This sounds promising, will try this later tonight.
Thanks again!!
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Actually, are there any guides on how to reinstall titles using wupclient?
I've found this Uwizzard too, which I used to download the title ID `0005001B10042400`. I believe this is the font title which contains the CafeStd.ttf file.
I'm assuming I need to download these titles to the SD card, and run the `install_title` function?
I noticed this! So I tried replacing the file using the wupclient.py. I downloaded a copy of it from the decaf-emu repo on github, placed it on my SD card, and ran the command `w.cp("/vol/storage_sdcard/CafeStd.ttf", "/vol/storage_mlc01/sys/title/0005001b/10042400/content/CafeStd.ttf")`. Looks like it went through fine. I rebooted the Wii U, but still stuck at the Wii U logo screen.
check the current log, if it still crashes on that file or if it now fails on another.
You can download the whole title with JNUS and the -dlEncrypted option and install that from the recovery menu.
Noted. Is this because even if I were to fix the Wii U enough to boot again, the filesystem will always be in a broken and unfixable state? Even with the SD card replacing the eMMC? I suppose the Factory Reset doesn't format the mlc.
To delete a folder, you need to be able to read it, so the contents can also be deleted. But because of bits that flipped, it can't be read. A factory reset doesn't format, it just deletes everything expect the system files, or at least it ties. In case of these damaged folders it will crash or hang because it can't delete them.
I already tried formatting the mlc, but IOSU doesn't let me for some reason, even if it is unmounted. For now the only way to deal with these broken folders, is to move them somwere, where they don't cause problems. With enough time and looking at the wfs lib you could probably edit the file system to remove the directory entries for these broken directories. But I am not sure if it is worth the time.And then the space allocated to files, which were in this folder would still be blocked.
Maybe we find a way in the furutre to recreate the file system.
Seems to still be failing on that font file. I used JNUS to download the title with command:
`java -jar .\JNUSTool.jar 0005001B10042400 -dlEncrypted`
I renamed the `tmp_0005001B10042400` folder it made to `install_font`. It contains some numbered app files, and title.cert, title.tik and title.tmd. Unmounted the SD card using wupclient, connected it to my PC, copied this `install_font` to the root of it, put it back into my Wii U and mounted it.
I can do the following to confirm the folder is there.
w.cd("/vol/storage_sdcard")
w.ls()
Then I run the function: `install_title("/vol/storage_sdcard/install_font")`, which produces:
I remove my Wii U without launching the recovery_menu, and it's still stuck on the logo screen. I turn it off, launch the recovery_menu, check syslogs, and it's still erroring out on the same `CafeStd.ttf` file.
I looked through wupclient.py, but is there any way I can move the file somewhere else? Like you mentioned I'll need to do with the broken directories? I suspect trying the delete the file isn't a good idea.
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So I had a look at my extracted mlc dump, specially the other ttf files in the same directory. I noticed that the other 3 good ones are a bit different from those in the github repo I mentioned previously. I downloaded this `Wii U CAT-I (Kiosk) MLC+SLC NAND Dump` from archive dot org, extracted it, and these other 3 font files match in size. I tried copying over the CafeStd.ttf file from this dump onto mine. Same issue, frozen at the logo screen, syslogs still reporting a failed read of this file.
Did you make sure to look at the correct logfile? The meta.bin contains the number of the latest logfile in binary. You have to do mod 100 on that (because the Wii U wraps around after 100 logfiles) which in decimal gives you then the name of the logfile.
If it is really still crashing on that try renaming / moving the old file before copying the new one.
Get the new file from JSNUS. If you don't add the -dlExtracted option, it will extract the title and you get all the files. Don't use files from the cat models.
This is a bit messy and might fail. So instead of doing this put all the .app, .h3, title.tik, title.tmd and so on files into sd:/install/ (no subfolder!) and install through recovery menu (not with WUP Server but the "Install WUP" option).
As always: Great writeup! Just a small addition: WUPClient has a delete_title function which seems to work great for this, too (I used it when the factory reset crashed for me). So instead of deleting the titles at such a late state I would do this as a first step: Delete all games/updates/DLCs (backup savegames before) to reduce the possible error surface. Make sure to call flush_mlc() after deleting all the titles (so no need to flush every title while deleting but a single flush after the last title is enough).
Lastly a bit off-topic but try using this fork of wupclient: - I changed FS handling here so things like flushing the MLC should be a bit faster. Also this has w.mv() implemented (credits to @Maschell, too) which might be needed to move corrupted folders away (before un- or reinstalling the corresponding titles).
//EDIT: Another thing which might be worth to note is that @SDIO and me where able to identify the following quotas on the MLC:
This still needs a bit of confirmation but I think the data is correct. Now why is this worth to note? Cause you can't move folders past quota borders. So keep this in mind when trying to move corrupted folders to some place they won't crash the console (except when doing a factory reset. As SDIO said: Do not try to do a factory reset as it will crash for sure).
Also do not move the corrupted folders into tmp folders as the Wii U tries to delete the contents of these folders at every boot, which would create a crash.
put all the .app, .h3, title.tik, title.tmd and so on files into sd:/install/ (no subfolder!) and install through recovery menu (not with WUP Server but the "Install WUP" option).
I'm looking at logs using the wupclient `w.dump_syslog()` command, so I was hoping it was always showing me the latest. Looking at it now, it's failing on a new file:
00:00:12:445: FSA: ### DATA CORRUPTION ERROR ###, dev:mlc01, err:-1245211, cmd:11, path:(null)1003FFC)
00:00:12:445: failed to read file /vol/storage_mlc01/sys/title/00050030/1001010a/code/hbm.rpx, err -196635
So I'll keep at it, downloading the titles with JNUSTool and installing them with the recovery_menu instead. Thanks for the new wupclient @V10lator !
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I just installed `000500301001010a` and now I'm getting a new error screen, but I noticed I can also see the recovery_menu now! I then installed `0005001010040100`, and it's booting to the main screen! I tried singing into the existing user, but got yet another error screen.
Thanks! This is good to know!! I've attached the latest log file too.
So it seems I now need to deal with these corrupted usr folders. I suppose I can just move them somewhere else, and make a new user from the system menu? Maybe I can run another mlc_checker, get a fresh list of the problematic files and folders.
Could you please explain this more? By quotas I assume you mean "amounts", but you've given a list of directories. How can I check the "quota borders"?
Exactly. Move them away, then reinstall the corresponding titles (as the corrupted folders most likely contained important system files) or deinstall it (in case it's just a game or something other than an important system title). After that try to create a new user.
Look at my example of this:
Sure thing. A quota in a filesystem is to reduce the maximum size of a directory. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disk_quota for more informations. My guess is that Nintendo used multiple quotas so you can't overfill the system folder by installing games.
But this also means that the sizes of the files and folders are metadata of the quota. Looks like Nintendo didn't add methods to move that metadata from one quota to another, so it's impossible to move things past the borders:
Code:
>>> w.mkdir("/vol/storage_mlc01/test", 0)
0
>>> w.mv("/vol/storage_mlc01/test", "/vol/storage_mlc01/sys/test")
WARNING: MOVING A FILE OR FOLDER CAN BRICK YOUR CONSOLE, ARE YOU SURE (Y/N)?
y
moving /vol/storage_mlc01/test to /vol/storage_mlc01/sys/test failed : 0xfffcffde
As the root of the MLC is a quota and the sys folder is a quota, too, you can't move files/folders between them. You can move files inside of /vol/storage_mlc01/sys/ freely through.
So in case you have a corrupted subfolder like this /vol/storage_mlc01/sys/bla/blub/foo you can move it to /vol/storage_mlc01/sys/corrupted but not to /vol/storage_mlc01/corrupted.
The quota borders are exactly the directories listed above.
Give it a minute. So load the recovery menu, wait a minute and after that try to dump. Also IIRC the newest dumper codes have a delay which I can't see in your screenshot (should say something like "Waiting for the system to settle" before unmounting). With these newer codes you don't have to wait a minute. Maybe @SDIO could give a link?
Yeah, that error happens after the "waiting for system to settle" goes away. I guess I can try waiting a minute before even going into the dump option, though.
The logs did dump, though, yes.
And, yeah, as expected. Media errors.
EDIT: Okay, waiting a while before going into the dump option worked. I guess the "waiting for settle" message needs to last a little bit longer.
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...Is this a proper dump?
It seems smaller than the dumps I had from my other WiiU, but I definitely marged all the files correctly
Dumped with a different app, but I'm not sure how that'd matter, exactly; my full Wii U NAND backup is 29.7 GB (including vWii and non-mlc data). Just the "mlc.bin" data is 28.6 GB.
Yes the dump through FSA is smaller. The Wii U doesn't use all of the MLC, it leaves a few blocks empty at the and. The FSA method only dumps the used part.
That's also why SD cards work, that are a little bit smaller than the eMMC.
You can run wfs-extract on the dump and see if it works and if it is able to extract the relevant parts.
So it seems I now need to deal with these corrupted usr folders. I suppose I can just move them somewhere else, and make a new user from the system menu? Maybe I can run another mlc_checker, get a fresh list of the problematic files and folders.
Did you already delete the broken usr titles? Maybe there is just a banner broken, which causes the menu to freeze or something like that. Are there still errors in /sys?
But if I had to guess on a file, it would be /vol/storage_mlc01/usr/boss/00050010/10040100/user/80000006/oltopic/rawcontent.dat. 00050010-10040100 is the system menu. For me this file doesn't exist, my oltopic directory is empty, so you are probably fine if you just delete it.
And also this directory is a good candidate: /vol/storage_mlc01/usr/save/00050010/1004d100/user/80000006/ it is from the notifications. Because it's a directory you can only move it somewhere else.
After you replaced the eMMC this should be a quick fix.
If you never turned on the wii u, after doing the dump, then you can use it for preparing the SD card. If you booted the wii U after that you need to do a new dump and hope it didn't get worse in the meantime. But you should still keep the dump, in case it gets worse.
While I would assume the same I would still suggest to reinstall the titles in question afterwards. Just to make sure they are like they should be (you remember me reinstalling all and every system title after fixing the eMMC? Yes, that was overkill but still I don't feel bad that I did it. In my eyes I still made sure that there are no hidden corruptions left without any drawbacks other than that it needed a night of running NUSspli (but it worked while I slept thanks to NUSsplis queue system, so that was no big deal) ).
Did you already delete the broken usr titles? Maybe there is just a banner broken, which causes the menu to freeze or something like that. Are there still errors in /sys?
I just finished an attempt at reinstalling all the sys titles, and deleting/moving the faults in usr. There are 3 titles that fails to install with the error code.
0005001010062100: error fffcffe5
0005001010066000: error fffbf3b5
000500301001310A: error fffcffe5
Here's the latest filtered mlc_checker file, I used bash to remove all the "good" line. `cat ./mlc_checker.txt | grep -v 00000000 > mlc_checker-filtered.txt`. Any ideas how I can fix these ones? In any case, it look much better now, and best of all, it's booting up to the main screen!!
Now I've got a new problem. This Wii U bundle I got, was nearly free, but I just noticed the gamepad it came with it EUR region, but the console is USA. Turns out I can't pair them properly :/
I see I can get around this with the system config tool, but I need to get homebrew figured out. Following the wiiu hacks guide website, I got my SD card prepared to install Tiramisu, and I have a regular Wii remote, but I can't seem to use it to launch the internet browser. The screen is saying I need to press the 'X' button, and a Wii remote doesn't have one. Any other way I can install the system config tool? Just enough so I can use it to pair my gamepad.
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