Back Up And Play Your Wii Games From An External Hard Drive

I would put that if you're Wii serial number begins with LU64 or LU65, THEN THIS WILL NOT WORK AND INSTALLING THIS WILL BREAK THE WII!!!

With that said I use this primarily with my SDHC card to boot Super Smash Bros Brawl and playing on WiFi too, and works fine. So it isn't just an external hard drive, it's also an SD card

realwx

@[www.newegg.com] . It's cheap and it works. I even have it powered and working fine off one USB port with no external power supply.

jonny6pak

I would also suggest taking a look over at nes-hacks.com

tom804

@BtEO: No, you can install cIOS on 4.0 but you have to downgrade some IOSes (not all) to do this first.

dark42

@PenitentPenguin: Buy an older Wii, a brand new one won't let you do this.

dark42

@Ping: If I could be bothered, I'd totally do this. It's effort to swap out disks, after all >_>;;

@Ping: Piracy is rampant in all current forms of media. Wii games are already pirated; just do a search for 'Wii isos'. Why should LifeHacker fail to report on a new mod just because it's possible for some individuals to abuse it? I for one am going to try this out very soon.

bunky

@tehdahl: Should be obvious...

@arienh4:
Take it down a notch, arienh4.
As this is the internet, we can't really detect sarcasm, no matter how spectacularly deployed by the originator.

@Ping:
Is marriage disguised prostitution?

@dfp3050: BannerBomb. It's mentioned in the notes at the bottom of the article. But I believe you'll need to downgrade your System Menu before you can get the cIOS in place (then safely upgrade afterwards if you want with some other homebrew that brings the useful parts of 4.0 without the homebrew downsides).

@PenitentPenguin: Except of course there are some new Wiis (Serial numbers starting LU64/LU65) which currently resist attempts to install cIOS's.

BannerBomb should still work though, and will get you The Homebrew Channel.

@dfp3050: Bannerbomb.

WB3000

@dfp3050: yeah, never ever ever update!

lethaldose

Since the new Wii update, I haven't found a way to install homebrew. The Twilight hack no longer works. Any suggestions?

dfp3050

@shibathedog: It just needs a port of XBMC and I can toss my Xbox.

lowtolerance

So basically, this _is_ disguised piracy.

Don't get me wrong, Lifehacker, I'm all about some of the gray-hat stuff, but I only fear for your safety.

Ping

Oh word!? I have to get a wii now, it could be almost as cool as my modded xbox with this :P

shibathedog

Hey all, I hacked my friends v4.0 wii last week, and wrote a tutorial for it located here: [blog.staticanime.net]

Gonna have to try out USB Loader properly on it to make sure it works, apparently cISO_rev9 breaks USB/SD support on 4.0, so I added cISO_rev10 & cIOS60 to the guide

Conor Duffy

@lowtolerance: I know, I was joking.

@arienh4: It has legitimate uses, as well. I don't know if this is the case with the Wii, but I know on my Xbox games would load much quicker from the hard disk than they would from DVD. Also, it saves the effort of changing out disks, as well as eliminating the risk of scratching a disk.

lowtolerance

This has been around for awhile but I think it's now it's at a point where it's stable enough for the non-techies to use the loader. Not only does it copy backups, but it copies retail games to the harddrive. :D My Wii Sports and No More Heroes were close to being unreadable, then the first 1.1 came out and it saved my discs.

cIOS rev10 is kinda sketchy on some Wiis but I haven't had any problems with it yet. If anything, just install cIOSrev9.

There are many other loaders based on Waninkoko's original design. Some cosmetic, some actually functional. Personally, I'm messing around with this one at the moment.

+ Watch video

>.> Also, I've noticed you guys haven't mentioned that 4.0 is now able to have the Homebrew Channel Installed...

This is what I've been waiting for since I bought my Wii. Why they didn't include a HD to begin with is beyond me. This looks awesome, and I can't wait to try it out. Anyone have a spare USB 2.0 hard drive I can have?

lowtolerance

This video just convinced me to buy a wii =]

AWESOME mod, I never really had a "real" incentive to homebrew my wii, but my disks are all messed up(that includes a couple of PS3 games). Time to give this sucker a try.

Type1

So is this disguised piracy?

I've been using this for a while none.

This is awesome in loading times espiecllays, SSBB maps load in about 1 second

Although I think CIOS rev9 is better, and [code.google.com] is better then the usbloader 1.5

Diablo1123

Sicknasty. I've had the backup launcher, but this just makes it easier!

this is awesome. i can't wait to give it a try

EileenFlint

Man, the wii gets more impressive mods all the time!

simply amazing mod. THanks so much.

dimenson11

@lowtolerance: I'm almost tempted to take that on as a summer project... ;)

wardawg

So this means that you can just rent games and...
oh my god, im buying a wii tomorrow

Raul Caraveo Gamboa

So this will let you download isos and put them on the drive and play them directly through the wii?

It would be cool if this could be combined with wireless networking so I could store my backups on my media server and then access the games wirelessly from there. The problem with this I suppose would be the unreliability/slower speeds of using a wireless connection, however, still accessing backups on a media server via wired connection would still be interesting.

swsboarder366

will this work for ntsc AND pal format? or only the format it's intended for. so will a pal game on my hard drive work on my ntsc system?

calvin6

@ph15h: now knows what it feels like to be Archaotic:

Whats the name of that loader?

yourbuddypal

@ this list of USB Loaders for some of the ins and outs of each.

lowtolerance

@arienh4:
Prostitution?
Or the fact that you were joking?

I'm sorry, I was being sarcastic.

@thrashnbash1: Weird. GH:Metallica worked fine for me.

@martinjester: Nope. Nintendo really does nothing to check if you have a copy running from a different source so you're pretty much good to go.

@lowtolerance: Zero patience and low tolerance? What, your not going for the hat trick?

CaptCaveman

I did this a couple weeks ago to my Wii. Then helped a few other friends to do theirs as well. They were already soft modded and using the Backup Channel, so it really just required me to install CIOS36 Rev10 and copy a USBLoader to my SD card. Works like a champ. My only issue so far has been with Guitar Hero Metallica. When I go to play it off the hard drive it won't let me play it. It complains that the Logitech USB microphone isn't connected. Probably because I don't own one or want one. Its a shame too because the load times are unreal.

Anyway, if you own a Wii I'd stronly suggest this mod. To be able to backup your games to an external hard drive in just a few minutes. Plus the incredible load times. Definitely worth doing. Enjoy folks.

thrashnbash1

@jonny6pak: I have zero patience, so I went ahead and formatted by backup drive. I got everything working, thanks to the tutorial and some tips in here and I have to say it works great. Thanks anyway!

lowtolerance

Question for anyone who has done this; I assume using this method kills your ability to play online. Is this a correct assumption?

I've been running the ISO loader of my wii for sometime now. Very much worth it.

EganCursor

Can this break your wii?

ridgecity

So my question would be what is stopping anybody from renting/borrowing Wii games and copying them to the External HD?

@thrashnbash1: thank you =)

calvin6

@wardawg: Please do. Current Wii Media Centre offerings - while workable, and getting better every day... still aren't anything next to the neatness of XBMC.

tali3sin

@tehdahl: Did hou just try to point out I wasn't obvious with a much more obviously sarcastic reply?

I guess there is always a chance you can brick your Wii. The tutorial, although not the one that I followed, looks solid. Definitely a good tutorial. I'd say its pretty low risk.

thrashnbash1

@Raul Caraveo Gamboa: Not sure if they list the serial numbers for Wii on the outside of the box, but as someone mentioned you need to make sure the serial doesn't start with LU64 or LU65.

thrashnbash1

@Digitallysick: You mean, will it allow you to pirate and play games that you did not legally purchase - the answer is yes.

thrashnbash1

@calvin6: It will work with both. You can force PAL games to use NTSC for video. Works great.

thrashnbash1

@serotoninzero: Very strange. Which usb loader are you using if you don't mind me asking. I'm currently using Ultimate USB Loader 7.4.

thrashnbash1

@Kamatari+: I guess it's cheapness make it less of a problem if you screw it up, so people fiddle a lot around the thing.

If I had the cash to get me a PS3, I would never softmod it like I did with my wii....

@Kamatari+: However, backing up a blu-ray at 30gig+ is much more space consuming :/

mmsk8erboi

@FooSchnickens: Cant really complain. I wish I could back up my ps3 games to an external hard drive :[

@Phoshi: You don't have kids, do you?

Let N=the number of games I own for Wii
Let R=the number my kids have ruined by leaving them out.

How many games do we have left?

(N-R)+1

No, I won't replace them until they learn to put them away. This mod would solve a lot of problems. Of course, I won't do this mod until summer is over, or the kids would never leave the house.

DangerousLiberal

@StraightEdge25: ethics?

whiteflea

@Kamatari+: Now if it'd just get more impressive games! Not to say that the current ones are crap (I loves me some paper mario), but I do feel the lineup has been somewhat... lacking as of late.

I'll definitely be using this trick to help save some much-needed shelf space on my TV stand.

Or, another route is to use a flat-mii www.flatmii.com

It is a solderless modchip that installs in your wii. It require the wii to be connected to a computer running a special app. But, it is quite easy to use.

rbb

I've had this installed for the best part of a month and although it can take some time installing your games onto the HD, it more than makes up for it by having all your games within a few clicks away.

threestripes

@mmsk8erboi: most PS3 games use less than 8GB, around 20GB of padding...

ridgecity

After doing this, can you still buy/play games from the Shop Channel?

@realwx: wow how do you do that??

ridgecity

@Ping: I was going to tell Lifehacker linking to cIOS's are technically illegal, but I didn't want to be a buzzkill and they're just linking to a tutorial that happens to link to a cIOS. You can get cIOS's legally through opening up the update partitions on the discs of many Wii Games or downloading them directly from Nintendo servers.

Contrary to what the guide states, Seagate FreeAgent drives actually work great with the USB loader. I'm using a 250GB FreeAgent drive myself.

radiantchains

@StraightEdge25: the recession.

ridgecity

I can't wait to give this a try.

AJay Hubbard

Now if only the we could get something like this for the PS3....

SpringsteenFan

Can you still download the Wii Updates, etc from Nintendo after installing this?

555Filk

I'm pretty sure Punch-Out requires fw upgrade to 4.0 before allowing game playback. How does one get around such game restrictions, other than not playing the game?

hakujin1

Just to let everyone know, you can partition an external HD if you only have one to use. The Wii automatically detected the partition when I formatted it with WBFS and it means I can still use my hard drive for computer backups and such.

Screamteam411

@arienh4:
Is that a rhetorical question?

OK - just to go back to the issue with Seagate drives. I have a 400G Seagate Barracuda drive inside a CoolMax external USB drive case. Most games work perfectly fine. As I noted in an earlier post, GH Metallica would load and when I got to the point where I should have been able to play it asked me to insert the Logitech USB microphone. When playing Carnival Games with the wife, most games it wouldn't let us play because it said we didn't have 2 controls. Although we were using 2 controls for all other games within Carnival Games. I've copied both games to a generic 16G flash drive and both games play perfectly.

I guess my point is, if this is a specific Seagate drive issue, it may not be so obvious as just the games won't play at all or the drive isn't seen, etc... It may be different weirdness like I have seen.

@hakujin1. You can use Waninkoko's system updater to 4.0. That may work for you. You can also use utilities such as brickblocker and so forth to prevent the game from patching your system.

Anyone have any luck with a WD MyBook 500GB? I really don't believe that they can get a 1TB to work, but not a 500 gig. Hopefully i'm doing something wrong somewhere & i can fix it tomorrow after some rest =\

Sean McAdam

@ridgecity: The same way you have the flash drive...except choose SD/SDHC card instead of USB Mass Storage Device

realwx

It seems grate.I will definitely get this USB Loader. If it include any hd than that would be awesome.

@whitjm5: I totally understand that one. My 2 1/2 year old LOVES to help daddy, so this was a great hack. Plus, now I can just store all those games in a box somewhere and just keep the drive hooked up. Its been a HUGE space saver in the old entertainment cabinet.

@Sean McAdam: My buddy has a WD Essentials 1TB drive that is working flawlessly with over 100 games on it. He has it partitioned into 2 partions. The WBFS partition is 500G and he has 460ish left in NTFS format. It just works. As an extra bonus, when he powers off his Wii, the drive shuts down too. Pretty sweet.

@Sean McAdam: Im using a 300GB Mybook, no problems here...

Andy Bradford

@hakujin1: Im running 3.3 and it worked with no problem right out of the gate. So i dont believe that is true.

Andy Bradford

I have the newer 4.0 version of the wii menu, so had to use the BannerBomb method:

[bannerbomb.qoid.us]

And loaded The Homebrew Channel via HackMii available at:

[bootmii.org]

I'll be implementing the hard drive backup system just as soon as I can get hold of another external hard drive ;)

With a three year old who wants to change the games himself (and gets his prints all over the business side of the discs), this is something I'm going to do on my next day off. Hooray for Lifehacker!

whitjm5

just to answer some of your ?'s it does work online (been playing mario kart alot) and you can put other regions on it i have some JAP games on my WD drive and they work great...games run faster and every thing is awsome now! i have Wanikokos V2 but i like 1.4 more just feels more smooth

UndineCulleo

@Diablo1123: It let's you avoid all the Waninkoko stuff as well. You can use tona's CIOS patcher as well.

mzs

@thrashnbash1:

Thanks for the tips! I'll give it a try tonight after work.

@arienh4: Legitimately backing up discs is not piracy.

@tehdahl: Kind of.

@PhillySaxon: Everything has multiple purposes.

@Tanner Wood: Exactly what I was going to say Tanner. Good call. Another option is to downgrade your Wii to an earlier version (3.2 or 3.3) using Waninkoko's system downgrader app. Either way, you definitely have to make sure the wifi is connected and working.

@PhillySaxon: That said, I still use this method to keep me from scratching disks.

@Digitallysick: Technically, yes. But Nintendo aren't evil and I refuse to pirate their games, solely because they're the one major games publisher left who still care about their users.

@arienh4: Yeah, in the same way kitchen knives and glass bottles are nothing more than disguised murder weapons...

Man, I just leanred how to use my son's wii and now more to learn, LOL. Very cool stuff. Boy, things have changed since my days of atari and colecovision.

ndrake:

your -2011 error is most likely caused by the fact that your virgin 4.0 system does not have the system IOS files signed with the Trucha Bug.

Do a google for IOS Downgrader 1.2. Add that to your "Apps" folder on your sd card. MAKE SURE YOU ARE CONNECTED ON WIFI #1 BEFORE YOU RUN IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After it's done, you can try your CIOSv10 install again and it should work.

Tanner Wood

I ran into some trouble trying this. I was able to install the Homebrew Channel on my 4.0 running Wii using the bannerbomb, but trying to install cIOS36_rev10 fails with the -2011 error. From the article it sounded like this was an issue with Wii's running System Menu 3.4 not 4.0. Anyone have tips on how to fix this?

When your installing all this , do you need to keep the wii connect off unless you are downloading a update or something from the wii shop

HartleyAntiope

was wondering if this will also assist in copying gamecube games????? must know please

Fernando Antonio Garcia

This sounds awesome, but what happens if something goes wrong and I want to restore my Wii to all its original settings!?

LarinaBucco

Took awhile to install (including the detours experienced from having an up-to-date Wii) but in the end it was worth it. Also, for anyone wondering about hard drive compatibility, I can confirm that the Western Digital My Passport 160 gig works.

Rhynoxx

use Bannerbomb from http://bannerbomb.qoid.us

MyraMojojojo

does this void your warranty on the Wii?

UlandKeppler

finally a way to store a buch a shovelware that wont get more than 10 minutes of play time.
but my hats off to the homebrew comunity none the less

Anthony Felix

@ndrake:

Just tried to run the IOS Downgrader 1.2. My Wii just reboots, the downgrader doesn't seem to do anything.

@DangerousLiberal:

I'm pretty sure Nintendo has a policy that you can send back scratched discs and they'll replace them for free -- kind of their way of eliminating that piracy argument. Just saying, it might be easier for you than this hack.

libertao

@ndrake: Here are all the files & a tutorial I used to downgrade a friend's 4.0 system.

[dl.getdropbox.com]

@ndrake: There are a couple of things you can try.... forgive me because i won't have direct links or know the exact order. First you can get the "Custom WAD Installer" and try to install the CIOS_FIX.wad, then try to downgrade (this likely will not install with WAD Manager 1.3 or 1.4). You can also run the CIOS downgrader (be connected to the internet via wireless!!). Once that is done, then try to downgrade your firmware. This is all assuming you are you already have the Homebrew channel on. By the way.... what firmware are you running?

If you need more help, just ping me thrashnbash AT gmail DOT com

@Anthony Felix: So clever.

whitjm5