Strange (modded) Wii behavior

[shmokes]

I dusted off the Wii and picked up a motion plus so I could play Zelda (I'll comment in the other thread when I've spent more time with it . . . but the graphics suck bad).

Anyway, strangest thing. The Motion Plus remote is incompatible with homebrew software. So when I load up USB Loader the remote just shuts off, and hitting a button won't even make the lights blink like it's trying to sync up. Until I exit the homebrew, then it works fine again. All of my non-motion plus remotes work just fine. It's just the new one.

When I say it only happens with homebrew, I'm not kidding. The remote even works fine while playing backups. I can use one of my original remotes to navigate the menu and select a game (no disc in the drive), and the moment the game starts I'm free to sync up my new motion plus remote again and start playing. So it's not really getting in the way of much of anything. It's more just a curiosity and minor annoyance.

[Howard_Casto]

That's interesting....

What loader are you using?

The reason I ask is because I have the wiimote+ addon dongles and they work great.  From what I understood wiimote+ shows up as a wiimote with a dongle attached.  I wonder what the problem could be?


You know it could be system updates.  Many of the hacks block system updates and thus you don't know when  a new one is released and yet you sometimes need them for things like a new type of controller.


I'm using wiiflow btw, because it's one of the few loaders that don't look like crap and is easy to navigate.  If you aren't using it then you should. 

[shmokes]

I'm using Configurable USB Loader. I agree about Wii Flow, though. I modded my nephews Wii recently, which was effectively a brick because the DVD drive had died. On his I took the time to figure out what cIOSes I needed to install and how to configure Wii Flow. I just got mine out of storage, though. I modded it nearly two years ago. I don't think Wii Flow was even a thing when I modded mine.

I think I'm gonna try that Pimp My Wii program mentioned in PBJ's thread. I suspect that whatever my problem is must be IOS related.

[TopJimmyCooks]

I modded my kid's Wii two years ago to use a USB hard drive and reduce the impact of their poor media handling skills.  its 4.3 softmodded with whatever was recommended by Wiihacks.com at the time (the 4.3 indiana jones exploit was brand new then iirc) and CFG usb loader. 

I said that to say this:  No issues whatsoever with the motionplus add ons. 

I do occasionally get a crash on cfg loader on app startup, so I may try Wiiflow per Howard's good advice.  I need to spend some maintenance time on that thing over christmas- install a few games we've gotten and delete some of the old ones they no longer play ( or never played -winter sports 2009 anyone?)

[Howard_Casto]

Yeah I can't say enough good things about it.

 A feature that I find particularly useful is that you can define several custom categories to sort your games, similar to mame's catver.ini A lot of people don't know about it because you have to "rick-click" the star to enter the selection menu (in other words click with the trigger, not the a button).   It also supports the loading of virtual console games via those little nvram loaders, so what I did was essentally dump all the Vc stuff in there and put it in the VC and Wiiware category.  (I did it pc-side so I didn't have to spend my entire natural life checking boxes)  My actual games are in the "Wii Games" category. 

So when it boots up I get my list of actual, physical games, but if I want to play vc games I can switch the category and there they are. 


Also a nice feature which is either absent or doesn't work right on other loaders is the ability to download artwork and cheats off the net and optionally just for the game you are currently on.  This means when you buy a new game and back it up you can quickly download a cover without dealing with the pc end of things.

[shmokes]

Also a nice feature which is either absent or doesn't work right on other loaders is the ability to download artwork and cheats off the net and optionally just for the game you are currently on.  This means when you buy a new game and back it up you can quickly download a cover without dealing with the pc end of things.

USB Loader GX, which is what I installed a couple years ago did this. So does configurable. Great feature.

[hypernova]

I still use GX myself.  I tried Configurable, and couldn't find any reason to switch.  WiiFlow I haven't checked in a while, but it didn't do anything new for me at the time either, and I believe GX at the time was still being frequently updated (still is).  I'd imagine updates are going to come to more or less a halt, since no decent games will be coming out, nor system menus.  They've been on 4.3 for a while now.

I don't know if GX has the WiiWare/VC ability to them.  Never been any games I wanted that I couldn't play on the emulators for VC, and I just don't have enough time to foray into new territory regarding WiiWare.

shmokes...which Wiimote is it?  The ones with the WM+ already inside?  Like Howard, I've not had an issue when having the dongle attached to the older Wiimotes.

[shmokes]

Yeah . . . plus is built-in. It seems to be happening only on Wii Motion Plus remotes purchased after ~Nov 25th. I found a thread on WiiHacks with other users experiencing the same thing. One of the users posited a plausible theory:

The Wii system menu is probably set up from the beginning to read a whole wide variety of different controller input codes just so in the future, Nintendo can add new accessories to be used with the Wii and have no problems at all. Where homebrew is only coded for one set of controller input aka the standard Wii remote. Here's an example of how this would work. Let's say that the regular Wii remote is coded as "1" and the new revised controller is coded as "2" (and possibly "3" "4" and on but that's not the case right now).

Both work fine on the default Wii applications because they are set up to read both "1" and "2". I believe homebrew is only coded for "1" because only the standard Wii remote was reversed engineered to find the right input for homebrew applications. So homebrew apps work perfectly with "1". So then a controller coded with "2" is used with the "1" coded homebrew apps. The app is not going to be able to read it because it doesn't know how to.

[Howard_Casto]

Also a nice feature which is either absent or doesn't work right on other loaders is the ability to download artwork and cheats off the net and optionally just for the game you are currently on.  This means when you buy a new game and back it up you can quickly download a cover without dealing with the pc end of things.

USB Loader GX, which is what I installed a couple years ago did this. So does configurable. Great feature.

Yeah they do, but the wifi connection is a tad bit touchy on both of those.  Regardless wiiflow seems to be the fastest in regards to downloading covers.  I can't really speak for any loaders (or updates) released in the last year or so though, once I got a loader that was stable and looked nice I didn't bother to update anymore.

[shmokes]

Configurable has viewing options that look really nice, but in my short time with it I had the impression that Wii Flow was still noticeably better looking and it has some great features that CFG doesn't have, like what you mentioned about shortcuts to VC/WiiWare channels.

However, since my Wii's been modded so long, the drive is formatted to WBFS and I read that newer builds of Wii Flow struggle with WBFS. Eventually I'll probably convert it to FAT32, but I'm in no hurry. CFG is working fine for me. And as far as my strange controller issue goes, although I haven't tested it, I know that Wii Flow will have the same problem.

[Red]

Howard,

On your WiiFlow system, is your hard drive WBFS, FAT32 or NTFS?

And does it really matter which format one uses?

Thanks.

[Howard_Casto]

I've got two partitions.  One is either ntfs or fat32 (can't remember which but it doesn't matter anyway) and I use that for nvram emulation for the VC and Wiiware games.

The other is WBFS. 

WBFS just makes more sense... it's the images and absolutely nothing else to get in the way. 

Shmokes says that the newer builds have problems with it though?  I don't see how... it's the simplier of the formats... ntfs and fat32 require complex libraries to be installed.  I'm going to have to see what the latest version is and check it out. 


I will say this.... I tend to manage the images on the pc end of things so if I do run into a problem (it's happend on a few rips that required some hackery) I plug the whole drive into the old pc and usually I can fix it. 

[Red]

I've got two partitions.  One is either ntfs or fat32 (can't remember which but it doesn't matter anyway) and I use that for nvram emulation for the VC and Wiiware games.

The other is WBFS. 

WBFS just makes more sense... it's the images and absolutely nothing else to get in the way. 

Shmokes says that the newer builds have problems with it though?  I don't see how... it's the simplier of the formats... ntfs and fat32 require complex libraries to be installed.  I'm going to have to see what the latest version is and check it out. 

I will say this.... I tend to manage the images on the pc end of things so if I do run into a problem (it's happend on a few rips that required some hackery) I plug the whole drive into the old pc and usually I can fix it. 

Thanks.  Yeah, I was thinking that WBFS is the way to go as well. 

Can a Windows PC read a WBFS formatted hard drive?

[crashwg]

Can a Windows PC read a WBFS formatted hard drive?

You'll need a program such as Wii Backup Manager or WBFS Manager.

[shmokes]

If it's a new project you want a single FAT 32 partition. There's no debate about this. WBFS is a relative pain to manage and offers fewer features (e.g., you can't run homebrew apps and VC/WiiWare titles from a WBFS drive). NTFS has compatibility problems with some apps and loaders and, similar to WBFS, it can only read Wii games (and movies), but it cannot store homebrew apps, WiiWare, VC, ROMS (for emulators), etc, and the Wii can't write to an NTFS partition, so you can't rip discs from the Wii. The 4 GB file size limitation of FAT 32 effectively doesn't exist. Files that are >4 GB are automatically split. You don't see any of this take place and it doesn't affect performance on the Wii. Not to mention that FAT 32 is fully compatible with PC/Mac/Linux so can manage the drive right from Windows Explorer if you want, and your computer's not going to prompt you to format the drive every time you plug it in (as it would with a WBFS partition).

Seriously, it's not even a decision.

[Bootay]

I have used both USB Loader GX and WiiFlow and they are both really good. I will have to check out the category options Howard referred to.

My drive is set up with a small FAT32 partition for covers and homebrew (So I don't have to have my SD card in because I mainly use it for something else) and the rest is a WBFS partition and that's where all of the games are installed. And yes you need a program to install and games, and read the WBFS partition. I forget which on I use. I think Wii Backup Manager. Not at home at the moment.

[Howard_Casto]

Seriously, it's not even a decision.

Sure it is.  Fat 32, like ntfs, takes up a decent amount of HD space just with the directory tree, so there's that.  Also fat32 is ok IF the loader in question supports the wbfs file format.  WBFS files can automatically have the extra partitions stripped away and when "scrubbed" they are the same space even decompressed.  So basically WBFS saves you a ton of space.  Also the 4gb limit isn't a big deal for files, but fat32 does tend to have issues with large harddrives in general.  Well they do without custom formatting.

I'm not saying that fat32 is a bad idea, but there are indeed pros and cons to weigh.

[shmokes]

fat32 is ok IF the loader in question supports the wbfs file format.

The short answer is, if you're setting up a new system why would you choose a loader that doesn't support what you need? But it's neither here nor there. Nobody hacking a Wii today is going to install Neogamma or the like. It's going to be Wii Flow, Configurable, or USB Loader GX. Those are the only options anyone would seriously consider today, and they all support loading .wbfs from a FAT 32 partition.

As for space, I don't think I understand what you mean about WBFS saving a ton of space. A #1, it's not like you're installing the 4 GB .iso on your drive. A scrubbed .wbfs file is as small as the game is gonna get and I don't see how it takes up any more space on a FAT 32 partition than a WBFS partition. Both use 32K clusters. I guess you are saying something meaningful and I just don't fully understand the technical aspects of it. Speaking of not fully understanding the technical aspects of it, that brings us to the "decent amount of HD space" taken with the directory tree. Again, I don't know much about it, but isn't there only two sectors reserved for the FAT? With 512 byte sectors we're talking about only a megabyte. But even if it were two clusters we'd still only be talking about 8 MB. What am I missing here? Regardless of what I'm missing, I honestly doubt that a meaningful amount of disk space is being used by the FAT (and directory tree, if that's a separate thing).

Anyway, much like the question of whether the USB loader supports .wbfs files, this size issue is really only academic. In actual practice FAT32 either saves space or uses the same amount as WBFS. This is because you are either going to dedicate a hard drive to the Wii, or you're going to use a drive that is also used for other purposes. If the drive is dedicated it's a non-issue because even the smallest drives sold today are way bigger than you need so you're not going to fill them up unless you are A) pirating games (likely, of course), and B) a completionist (somewhat less likely). A 120 GB drive will probably store >40 Wii games. Based on the number of actually good games for the Wii, there's no reason you would ever need more capacity than that.

That brings us to the second scenario, where you are using the drive both for Wii backups and other things like storing files from your PC. In this case, if you go with WBFS you have to guess at how much space you will eventually need for Wii games. And you'd better be liberal, too, cos WBFS partitions cannot be resized. You're stuck with what you initially set up, so if you run out of space you're gonna have to start deleting games, or reformat the whole drive to change the size of the partition. The practical effect of this is that you are going to render a huge chunk of your drive unusable, even though it's not being used. For example, if you have a 250 GB drive and you make a 100 GB WBFS partition on it, but only initially copy 50 GB of Wii games to it, you've got 50 GB of wasted space (somewhat larger than the size of a FAT directory tree, I'd wager). If you used a single FAT32 partition, on the other hand, you'd have access to the full 200 GB of free space on the drive.

I really don't believe that there is any realistic usage scenario today in which WBFS is a superior option. The only way it would be better is if the size of the FAT overhead (file allocation table, directory tree, etc.) is truly substantial (which I doubt) AND you know to begin with exactly which games you are going to copy to the drive and how big they are, and you format the WBFS partition to exactly the size needed to hold those games (thus wasting no space on the drive).

FAT 32. There is no longer a decision to be made on the matter. Formatting your drive to WBFS anymore is silly.

[Bootay]

Seriously, it's not even a decision.

Sure it is.  Fat 32, like ntfs, takes up a decent amount of HD space just with the directory tree, so there's that.  Also fat32 is ok IF the loader in question supports the wbfs file format.  WBFS files can automatically have the extra partitions stripped away and when "scrubbed" they are the same space even decompressed.  So basically WBFS saves you a ton of space.  Also the 4gb limit isn't a big deal for files, but fat32 does tend to have issues with large harddrives in general.  Well they do without custom formatting.

I'm not saying that fat32 is a bad idea, but there are indeed pros and cons to weigh.

I still stand by a small FAT32 partition for covers, homebrew and VC games and the rest WBFS. Then you no longer need an SD card plugged in. Plus if you make the FAT32 a decent enough size, you can fit all of the VC games on there. Not that I actually play any VC games. I prefer using the real consoles.

I personally wouldn't suggest FAT32 for the whole drive. WBFS is a much better option for the games as they are auto scrubbed and saves space like Howard said. It's not that big of a deal to manage with Wii Backup Manager either.

[Bootay]

fat32 is ok IF the loader in question supports the wbfs file format.

The short answer is, if you're setting up a new system why would you choose a loader that doesn't support what you need? But it's neither here nor there. Nobody hacking a Wii today is going to install Neogamma or the like. It's going to be Wii Flow, Configurable, or USB Loader GX. Those are the only options anyone would seriously consider today, and they all support loading .wbfs from a FAT 32 partition.

As for space, I don't think I understand what you mean about WBFS saving a ton of space. A #1, it's not like you're installing the 4 GB .iso on your drive. A scrubbed .wbfs file is as small as the game is gonna get and I don't see how it takes up any more space on a FAT 32 partition than a WBFS partition. Both use 32K clusters. I guess you are saying something meaningful and I just don't fully understand the technical aspects of it. Speaking of not fully understanding the technical aspects of it, that brings us to the "decent amount of HD space" taken with the directory tree. Again, I don't know much about it, but isn't there only two sectors reserved for the FAT? With 512 byte sectors we're talking about only a megabyte. But even if it were two clusters we'd still only be talking about 8 MB. What am I missing here? Regardless of what I'm missing, I honestly doubt that a meaningful amount of disk space is being used by the FAT (and directory tree, if that's a separate thing).

Anyway, much like the question of whether the USB loader supports .wbfs files, this size issue is really only academic. In actual practice FAT32 either saves space or uses the same amount as WBFS. This is because you are either going to dedicate a hard drive to the Wii, or you're going to use a drive that is also used for other purposes. If the drive is dedicated it's a non-issue because even the smallest drives sold today are way bigger than you need so you're not going to fill them up unless you are A) pirating games (likely, of course), and B) a completionist (somewhat less likely). A 120 GB drive will probably store >40 Wii games. Based on the number of actually good games for the Wii, there's no reason you would ever need more capacity than that.

That brings us to the second scenario, where you are using the drive both for Wii backups and other things like storing files from your PC. In this case, if you go with WBFS you have to guess at how much space you will eventually need for Wii games. And you'd better be liberal, too, cos WBFS partitions cannot be resized. You're stuck with what you initially set up, so if you run out of space you're gonna have to start deleting games, or reformat the whole drive to change the size of the partition. The practical effect of this is that you are going to render a huge chunk of your drive unusable, even though it's not being used. For example, if you have a 250 GB drive and you make a 100 GB WBFS partition on it, but only initially copy 50 GB of Wii games to it, you've got 50 GB of wasted space (somewhat larger than the size of a FAT directory tree, I'd wager). If you used a single FAT32 partition, on the other hand, you'd have access to the full 200 GB of free space on the drive.

I really don't believe that there is any realistic usage scenario today in which WBFS is a superior option. The only way it would be better is if the size of the FAT overhead (file allocation table, directory tree, etc.) is truly substantial (which I doubt) AND you know to begin with exactly which games you are going to copy to the drive and how big they are, and you format the WBFS partition to exactly the size needed to hold those games (thus wasting no space on the drive).

FAT 32. There is no longer a decision to be made on the matter. Formatting your drive to WBFS anymore is silly.

WOW! A lot to read. LOL

I suppose this debate is all a matter of personal opinion. I tried NTFS and it didn't work too good (this was a few years back) I tried FAT32 and it worked fine. But I found that WBFS actually does save space. Maybe not A TON...but there are a lot of games that are 4gig ISOs and after being scrubbed are only 1-2 gigs. But you can get tools to scrub the iso before installing. And sometimes you can download them scrubbed. In this case I suppose it wouldn't make a difference on FAT32. I don't know. I like WBFS because that's what I am used to using. Not sure if there are any actual benefits aside from the space debate.

[shmokes]

I don't understand what you're saying. If you take a 4.7 GB ISO and add it to your drive via Wii Backup Manager, it's going to be scrubbed (read: shrunk) whether you're putting it on a WBFS or FAT32 drive. The end result will take up the same as much space on your drive regardless of which file system you're using.

For the most part, it really isn't a matter of personal opinion. It isn't. It is a matter of objective facts. If you are setting up a new system you should use FAT 32. In almost any scenario you will be substantially better off with FAT32.

[Bootay]

I don't understand what you're saying. If you take a 4.7 GB ISO and add it to your drive via Wii Backup Manager, it's going to be scrubbed (read: shrunk) whether you're putting it on a WBFS or FAT32 drive. The end result will take up the same as much space on your drive regardless of which file system you're using.

For the most part, it really isn't a matter of personal opinion. It isn't. It is a matter of objective facts. If you are setting up a new system you should use FAT 32. In almost any scenario you will be substantially better off with FAT32.

I wasn't aware that the iso's were scrubbed in FAT32 as well. How are you better off with FAT32? Curious. Based on the facts presented there doesn't seem to be any real benefit to FAT32 vs. WBFS aside from the fact that Windows can read the drive right?

[shmokes]

How are you better off with FAT32?

In addition to Windows being able to read it (which is actually quite handy) FAT32 also has the following benefits on the Wii:

- Store homebrew apps on it
- Eliminates need to boot with SD card
- NAND emulation for WiiWare and VC
- Install WADs from the hard drive
- Media player (stream .avi, etc., from drive)
- edit: Oh yeah, ROMS! Store ROMS for your emulators

And maybe more stuff that isn't popping into my head immediately. FAT32 does all this without a single drawback. Seriously, WBFS does not have a single thing going for it to counterbalance all this FAT32 functionality.

[Bootay]

How are you better off with FAT32?

In addition to Windows being able to read it (which is actually quite handy) FAT32 also has the following benefits on the Wii:

- Store homebrew apps on it
- Eliminates need to boot with SD card
- NAND emulation for WiiWare and VC
- Install WADs from the hard drive
- Media player (stream .avi, etc., from drive)
- edit: Oh yeah, ROMS! Store ROMS for your emulators

And maybe more stuff that isn't popping into my head immediately. FAT32 does all this without a single drawback. Seriously, WBFS does not have a single thing going for it to counterbalance all this FAT32 functionality.

Oh ok, yea...I already have those abilities because I use FAT32/WBFS as stated before. So I am not missing out on anything. I have no problem using Wii Backup Manager to read my WBFS partition. I do agree that at least having a FAT32 partition like I do is handy. If you read my above posts I said that I have a small FAT32 partition on a 1TB drive and that partition is basically used in place of my sd card. (ie VC, homebrew, covers, etc.) and the rest is WBFS for the games. I read somewhere that this was the best way to go. Times may have changed since then (about 2 years ago) but I don't care. I am fine with how I have it set up.

[Howard_Casto]

You guys are incorrect in some of your assumptions.  WBFS files are smaller than scrubbed isos. 

First off, scrubbed isos only save space when they are zipped up... when you extract them from a zip they are the full 4.7 gigs unless they have been altered in some way (NOT the same as scrubbing.)

Secondly, while it is possible to remove extra game partitions and save it to an iso format, it requires a bit of legwork.  Most wbfs managers can do it for you automatically.  Heck some of the loaders can even do it automatically.  Every single solitary wii game contains at least one partition that has the latest version of the IOS on it.  That means that each game has around 250 mb of wasted space.  wbfs can easily strip this, iso managers can't.  At least the last time I checked they couldn't.  250mb doesn't sound like a lot, and it isn't if you are dealing with a small library, but it adds up.  Also some games have multiple worthless partitions.

Lastly fat32 was never designed to handle more than about 40 or 50 gigs of space, after that the file table becomes exponentially larger as the size of the drive goes up.  Since in this day and age you are probably going to put a 500+ gig drive on your wii you might start to actually feel it.  Again, it isn't a super significant number, but it adds up. 


About schmokes list of benefits:

 First off, like bootay said I've got a fat32 partition as well, a much smaller one that won't be affected by table sizes.  I am in no way suggesting someone use only wbfs... you need both.

-Considering all the hb apps in existance can probably fit on a 4 gig sd card I don't see the benefits of this one, especially considering you'll probably get your hb apps off the net and have to get them on the wii with a sd card anyway.  You are really only adding an extra step.

-No it doesn't  many hb apps just won't run without a sd card in the drive.  Sure you can boot up your loader, but everything else is a crap shot.

-Yeah and the NAND emulation folders are a total mess, this is the reason I went with a split setup btw... I wanted to keep that crap as far away from my game images as possible.

-Since you'll have to get the wad's onto the wii, there isn't any benefit to doing this, actually it takes much longer to unplug a portable hdd and plug it into a computer than just taking out the sd and doing it that way, so this is actually a hindrance to do.

-Or you could just stream them from your pc.  Regardless, in the days of hd gaming systems, media players,and televisions with built in streaming and media support I don't know why you'd want to watch anything on a crappy 480p device.

-Fat32 is great for roms, I use my fat 32 partition for that, there's your only  "factual" good point there so your list of 6 became a list of one.

[Bootay]

I don't use many hb apps. I modded the Wii to pirate games. 

The hb apps that I do use all work from my FAT32 partition. All the VC games work form my FAT32 partition, and the covers get saved there too. I haven't had an SD card plugged into my Wii for 2 years. I'm sure there are some hb apps that won't run but...whatever.  I am not really that interested in them.

I always thought that scrubbing isos made them smaller. I know they are smaller once I add them via Wii Backup Manager. I assumed Wii Backup Manager "scrubbed" the isos hence making them smaller. Maybe I am using the word "scrubbed" incorrectly? Either way....I get the concept. 

[shmokes]

Howard, you don't run .iso files on a FAT32 drive. You run scrubbed .wbfs files. They're nowhere near 4.7 GB (unless of course the game itself is actually that big).

You can downplay all the features I mentioned all you want. But you're just being needlessly argumentative. Some people use the ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- out of those features. The built-in NAND on the Wii is completely filled up if you have more than six or seven WiiWare/VC games. NAND emulation is nice. Space for ROMS is nice. Compatibility with Windows Explorer is useful. Although I have no use for the media player, I personally know someone who modded his Wii solely for that purpose. It's a nice feature that I will never use. But people use it. People use the ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- out of Netfllix on Wii too. Go figure. Maybe you think using an SD card is more convenient. Guess what, SD cards work just as well whether you format your USB drive to FAT32 or WBFS.  

What you are suggesting is just plain stupid. WBFS brings nothing to the table. And if you guess wrong when you're initially setting up your drive, and you allocate too little or too much space to FAT32, there's nothing you can do about it later on when you realize you're out of space for your ROMs or Wii games, even though the drive itself has a big chunk of unused space. It's stupid. You're just acting like an old luddite. The method you're using is obsolete. It's nothing personal. It's the same method I'm using on my Wii. It wasn't obsolete when we did it. But the world has moved on. If you're setting up a new system now, doing it the way we did is stupid. Even if you think absolutely that you will never ever ever need one of the features I mentioned, it would still be stupid to split the drive into two partitions each with file systems that are incompatible with each other. The only reason we ever did that is because we had no choice.

You're just wrong, Howard. Full stop.

[hypernova]

I changed my HDDs at home and work to NTFS.  No issues that I've found, though my wife says something happened in Wii Fit Plus last week.  (Quit for some reason or something.)

I don't use WiiWare or VC games, so I can't talk about that.  Plus any ROMs I have are small in number.  I have about two dozen SNES games and a dozen NES games.  They're all on my SD card still.  I bought the SD card for the Wii, and don't have any other use for it, so in there it stays.

As shmokes said, for non-WBFS formats, they are not .iso files.  You create a WBFS file folder on the drive, and place in the .wbfs files (game images) inside.

[lilshawn]

there is no reason to use WBFS anymore. it's an unnecessary step to have to do to get the game on the drive.

there was a harddrive people where buying (can't find it at the moment) has usb and network connections. just dump your disk images onto it through the network... no need to pull the drive and plug it in and all that jazz... and it happily co-exists with everything else on the network since it uses normal file system. so you can store music and files and movies and junk as well as the wii disk images.

[Green Giant]

There is a little amazing program you must get called ModMii.
http://code.google.com/p/modmii/
This little guy is a cmd prompt windows program that updates your wii with everything you could ever need.  It can interact with an SD card to read your wii system and update everything on your wii to the latest possible stuff.  This little guy can update all of your software and write the correct folders to your harddrive or SD card.

I use a fat32 HD backing up my wii games with a wii remote that has the motion plus on it.  So far since updating CFG USB loader works amazingly well.  Modmii....use it.

[racecar]

Looking at softmodding my wii, Thinks its one of the old roms so it can play back ups on the dvd drive still.

Will I face this problem if I dont have the motion plus yet or zelda? thanks

[Green Giant]

Looking at softmodding my wii, Thinks its one of the old roms so it can play back ups on the dvd drive still.

Will I face this problem if I dont have the motion plus yet or zelda? thanks

Follow the tutorials on wiihacks and you will be fine.

[racecar]

Hey guys quick question.

i just updatd to 4.3 then did my first softmod etc

Now if I go an ge the new zelda an some wii motion controllers or the adapter you put on your original controller.

Will everything work fine? Thanks

[shmokes]

Worst case scenario is you'll have to do what I do. I have to navigate the menu with a normal, non-motion plus controller. After I start Zelda and it gets to the screen telling me to be sure a nunchuk is attached I press the home button and then press Remote Settings and there's an option to reconnect controllers. This disconnects all the controllers and a message appears on the screen saying press 1 and 2 on a controller to connect it. So then on the Motion Plus controller I press 1 and 2 and it starts up as controller 1 and I'm good to go.  The whole thing only takes about 30 seconds.

[racecar]

Thanks for the tip! I should try borrow someones an see if it works

great idea. I just thought because I have 4.3 I should be fine 


Will update at a later date 

[Howard_Casto]

I know this thread is old, but I thought I would give an update since I got skyward sword for xmas and it included a dedicated motion plus controller. 

Mine works fine shmokes, so it's something to do with the hacks/mods you've installed on your particular wii. 

[shmokes]

No, it's only the newest model controllers that just started showing up in some stores in mid-November. Your motion plus remote would work fine on my Wii too.

I should also claify for racecar, the new controllers work fine in the Wii menu. They just don't work in homebrew, hence I can't select games in the USB loader.

Also, I think the issue may have been resolved with updates released in the past month or so, but I haven't revisited it. Zelda is the only game I'm playing that uses Motion Plus, and doing the controller swap isn't a substantial inconvenience.

[natsuto]

Its format is relatively simple. NTFS and FAT32 need to install a complex library. I want to see what the latest version, check it out.

[Bootay]

Its format is relatively simple. NTFS and FAT32 need to install a complex library. I want to see what the latest version, check it out.

Uh...What? If you are trying to bring the NTFS/FAT32/WBFS conversation back, please don't. I think we beat that dead horse enough.

(Something tells me it's another spam account)

[Green Giant]

I know this thread is old, but I thought I would give an update since I got skyward sword for xmas and it included a dedicated motion plus controller. 

Mine works fine shmokes, so it's something to do with the hacks/mods you've installed on your particular wii. 

It was clearly outdated software on his wii causing the problem.

If his wii passes the mod update check and still acts odd we might actually have something to talk about.

[shmokes]

At the time this thread was made I updated everything to the latest. The problem was outdated software, in the sense that Nintendo physically changed the controller hardware and the most up-to-date software was not compatible with it. It's been a couple months now, though, and I wouldn't be surprised if the problem has now been addressed.

[hypernova]

As I stated before, I've been using NTFS, and some issues have shown up:

1.  I mentioned that Wii Fit Plus would not load up correctly at random times-haven't seen this in action personally.  This is according to the wife.
2.  Mario Kart Wii "delay freezes".  What I mean is that while playing with the family, we'd starting picking stuff.  When we get to choosing cars or any screens afterwards, randomly the graphics for the cars/drivers and each successive screen would not have the picture/movie files playing.  Text and such would still be visible, so you could choose your car and course, but you wouldn't see any of those preview pictures/movies.  And by randomly, I mean once it started, the pictures/movies were always gone on all the screens.  Once you picked a course, it would freeze completely.  You could go back and forth between all those selections, but you would not be able to back out to the main menu either.  This has happened about 5 times in the 2 hours combined we played with it over 3 days.
3.  However, in the times I've played Skyward Sword for hours on end, I've had zero problems.  Haven't really checked other games.

I'm going to remove everything from the drive, and reformat to FAT32, and see if that helps.  Before that, I'll try updating everything with the modmii as suggested (to save myself some research time).  I'll be interested to see what's out of date.  Shouldn't be too much.

I think I have read that NTFS may have some issues, while FAT32 has minimal, if any.  Thus my reasoning that may be the culprit.

[Howard_Casto]

You'd be suprised.....

I spent this weekend updating from wiiflow 2.2 to the latest version (because they finally have NGC loading support) and was a nightmare.  There were about a dozen wad packages to load up.  Even then I STILL don't have wiiflow working 100% They keep changing the skin format and now all the skins only partially load.  This is cool and all but they cause the loader to randomly freeze up.  On top of that I made the mistake of stopping the "download artwork" process halfway through the scan of my nand games.  Now the loader crashes whenever I switch to nand or system nand.  I'll probably have to delete the cache for like the 50th time. 

All of that being said... game compatability is MUCH better.  I finally got The Biggest Loser to load and that thing would never load properly.  (It's not mine, don't ask.)

[Bootay]

I spent this weekend updating from wiiflow 2.2 to the latest version (because they finally have NGC loading support) and was a nightmare. 

Whoa...NGC support? Nice. I need to look into that. My NGC stopped reading discs. Would be nice to be able to play them from the Wii instead.

[Green Giant]

My hard drive suddenly stopped working with my Wii, but was fine on my PC.  This is the second drive this had happened to.  Updated everything and now it's stable.... and I'm leaving the hard drive unplugged because the Wii is used 99.999% of the time for NetFlix.

Portable harddrive?  If so how is it connected/powered.

I found I had trouble with short run 3 ft usb mini cables direct to the wii, but when I go tsome 6-12" usb cables the harddrives had no problem getting power through one usb port.

[Howard_Casto]

I spent this weekend updating from wiiflow 2.2 to the latest version (because they finally have NGC loading support) and was a nightmare. 

Whoa...NGC support? Nice. I need to look into that. My NGC stopped reading discs. Would be nice to be able to play them from the Wii instead.

It's not all that great..... the disc images have to be on the Sd card.... I haven't tested it yet actually... finally got all my wiiflow ducks in a row.

[Bootay]

SD Card? Ick!

I will try it out eventually. I am sure they will perfect it.

[Howard_Casto]

No... so long as you upgrade via homwbrew tools and not via the wii's official system update you are good. 

What you want to check is the current methods to install an exploit on a 4.x machine.  You might run into trouble if your hacks ever get screwed up and you have to start over. 

For example:  At one point one of my games updated me to 3.3 (I thought I had a blocker turned on, but I didn't).  Now I could still re-install the HBC, but the twilight princess exploit no longer worked.  I had to instead use the indiana pwns exploit.  No big deal except for the fact that I didn't own that game!

Now days I think you can hack a wii via email believe it or not but I would check in first.

[shmokes]

Yeah . . . you put a file on the SD card and it puts a new letter in your inbox with a big bomb on it (the hack is called letter Bomb). Open it up and your Wii is hacked. You don't need to own any games.

[notroubleclubber]

After reading this thread I decided to up date my twilight hacked wii.
Started to use it again as I now has space in my living room.

It had 4.1e on it so I downloaded modmii and followed the easy instructions.
It's now updated to modded 4.3e and everything seems to work fine.
I've got to setup my new 1tb external hd for it but think I may use my backup 500gb hd instead.

May try and get my head around the NAND emus and try and run some vc/ware.

I'm now thinking about getting my 360'rghd as I hardly go on live then can run games from hd too.
Be even better to use 1 hd for both wii and 360 at same time.

Even my ps3 is hacked so use 1 hd for all 3?

.

[shmokes]

I'd like to get a 1TB 2.5" drive for my PS3. So many games require installation on the internal drive. I'm outta space even though my external drive has lots of room still. Also, it'd be nice to not have to use an external drive at all seeing as the PS3 (the slim model, at any rate) only has front USB ports, so running from an external drive means either unplugginhn/plugging in the drive every time I use it or having an unsightly USB cable dangling off the front of the console at all times.

[shmokes]

I've done that with one game. Will it work with all of them? I mean is the FAT filesize limitation the only thing keeping an internal-only game from working on external? I think there must be other issues at play cos the game I split was reported as external-only.

[racecar]

Hey all updated to 4.3, Soft modded. Been loading an palying all my games through the USB as my drive can read backed up GC an Wii games so i dont want to over use it.

I got the motion plus add on as Zelda is also the only game I use.

Everything is fine. Did have to change the USB loader to 250 to play it

I have to say after having all my games on USB with covers an complete sets of my SNES an NES on there I do play it alot more now 

Just need to get a wireless Gamecube controller for it so I can play luigis mansion then im set