It's nothing to do with that. U5 doesn't do anything on a trimmed Wii, so removing it is of no consequence
Worklog The s-WII-ch (my first Wii portable)
- Thread starter Lemoncake
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Gotcha. Should I just wire everything up and test it in some last minute desperation hoping it will boot?
You can try, but I reckon it's time to call time of death on this trim. An invisible short like this is often unfixable. If you have a can of compressed air, you could blast under the BGA chips to clear any shorts caused by trimming debris, but that's about all that's left on the troubleshooting checklist at this point.
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That's what I was afraid of. Oh well, thanks so much for all the help and advice you and everyone else have given so far, even if at the end of the day we ended up at this roadblock. I'll let you all know how the test went.
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A few months back, I saw a thread that detailed how to wire a Wii's video port to your trim for testing (I think it was by Nold but I'm not sure). However, I don't remember what it was called and can't find it on BitBuilt. Does anyone know what I'm talking about or could instruct me on how to wire it up?
I can't remember the name of the thread, but the Wii Trimming Guide's Audio/Video section has the pinout for the AV-out port, and the two panels below it list all the convenient locations to grab the various video lines. If you keep the wires short (below 10cm/4") then you can just run unshielded wires from the mobo locations to the respective pins on a cut out AV-out port. Make sure you have a ground wire for return signal and remember to short 3.3v to Mode if using component cables and it should just work.
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So I need to run composite and GND from the AV port to those same spots on the Wii. Sorry for my lack of understanding, but what do you mean by shorting 3.3v to Mode?
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You have to connect the via, mode, to a 3.3v part of the board. Mode is another via and you to connect a wire to it that goes to 3.3v. Locations for mode and 3.3v and on the trimming guide video section
Stitches did say to do that only if you are using component, which is 3 cables, but I think you are doing composite which is one cable.
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Correct, Mode is an internal switch that tells the AVE what type of video to output. If Mode is left alone, the Wii will output composite and interlaced RGB SCART. If Mode is connected to 3.3v, the Wii will instead output yPbPr (or RGBHV VGA if you installed the patch) and composite will be disabled. In a non-trimmed Wii this is done automatically by a shunt present in the component cable plug
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Yep, those are the right spots.
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Time of death: 6/15/23, 2:54 PM (wow I haven't posted in 3 months? Sorry guys). Despite all our hard work and dedication trying to diagnose the issue with the Wii's resistances, it's all come to nothing. Thank you all for your support and comments guiding me through this process, even if the Wii was dead from the very beginning. I had no choice but to put this board out to pasture and call it quits for a while. BUT! Now I'm back, and ready to get into it again. I realise that during this entire process, I'd never actually explained what the goal of this project was. As you can see, I call it the s-Wii-ch. As the name suggests, my plan is to take the functionality of the Switch being both a home console and a handheld, and replicate that with a Wii, complete with its own docking system. I was going to bake in the video out port, usb ports, sensor bar port, and power port all so that they were able to slide into a dock (just like the Switch) and instantly convert the Wii back into its home console form. However looking back, I went about this project in the complete wrong way. Instead of trimming the Wii as small as possible and soldering back on the ports I needed, why not just trim the Wii with those ports still attached (just like Nold's Wii Micro). And as it happened, I had a semi broken 6 layer Wii (the one he said you need for the Wii Micro) that will serve my purpose perfectly. I'll keep you all updated on progress and if (and when) I will need some assistance. Thanks for showing interest in this project so far and answering my many cries for help. Hope ya'll are having a great day!
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Alright, first issue. I got RVLoader installed and everything is running smoothly so far (I'd heard people talk about how difficult setting up the game files are, but it wasn't that bad at all). I tested both a GameCube game (Paper Mario TTYD) and a Wii game (Super Mario Galaxy 2). The GameCube Controller worked flawlessly in TTYD, and the GCtoWiimote for Galaxy 2 worked great as well. However, GCtoWiimote is giving me a little trouble in the Virtual Console games. I can boot into them, but then it just hangs on the "You will need the Classic Controller" screen. I tried to set up my GameCube Controller as the Classic Controller, but still no luck. Anyone know the fix for this? (Side note, there is also no option for the Classic Controller Z buttons in GCtoWiimote. Am I just blind or are they not really there?)
You aren't blind, they really aren't there. The Gamecube controller doesn't have the ability to send a button signal that doesn't exist on a standard controller.
What VC games are you trying to play btw? I'm able to play VC games with just the Gamecube controller, no GC2Wiimote needed. Afaik all of the VC games have GC handling built in
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It was Paper Mario (my favorite N64 game of all time). That’s my bad. I should’ve tested a few more games before asking. I just booted up Super Metroid, and it is working perfectly. Does that just mean Paper Mario is incompatible? Are there any fixes for that?
Paper Mario worked fine for me. I'm not aware of any specific issues for it. Perhaps your wad is scuffed?
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I don't think so. I tried a few different wads from a few different sites, but nothing different happened. I know these wads work because I used WiiModLite to install them as a Wii channel and had no issues. But speaking of Wii channels, I might have a workaround. How do you put your Wii channels into the channels folder on your USB drive?
I haven't used the channels function yet
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I’ll worry about it later, then. Next question: do the 4 Layer Tech boards work with the trim Nold used for his Wii Micro?
6-layer boards should not be used for portables, they draw twice the power and generate twice the heat of their 4-layer counterparts. Given that a Wii with a broken disc drive is $20 shipped on eBay, it's not a big investment to pick one up for the project. That being said, you cannot use the PMS2 / Lite on a 6-layer board, at least for a whole portable. I've heard rumors of certain revisions of PMSs having buck regs rated high enough for the draw of a 6-layer board, but given the overall power limitation of the BQ output, it would not be possible to use the PMS in a full-on portable.