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[Ramune]

Just installed HBC last night and debating updating from 3.2 to 4.0 also. Guess I'll continue watching the developments. But I must say, it's nice to have the option of playing Japanese Wii titles like Tatsunoko vs. Capcom and the many audio/video utilities that are now available. And the homebrew browser...no words!

 

[viciouskillersquirrel]

Wiibrew's workarounds won't do a thing I imagine. I just updated straight from 3.3 (before the store update) and everything is working here fine (except SNES9x isn't working or doesn't like the SDHC card)...

Sweet! I won't be using emulators anyway (what would be the point?). I'll update later tonight.

 

[Linkhero1]

Wiibrew's workarounds won't do a thing I imagine. I just updated straight from 3.3 (before the store update) and everything is working here fine (except SNES9x isn't working or doesn't like the SDHC card)...

SNES9x works fine here, but I'm using SD cards not SDHC. I believe another user had similar issues. Just delete it and put it back on your SD card.

 

[Dragona Akehi]

SNES9x works fine here, but I'm using SD cards not SDHC. I believe another user had similar issues. Just delete it and put it back on your SD card.

I'm sure there'll be an update for it soon enough. I still have everything on the original 2GB SD card so...

 

[viciouskillersquirrel]

I think I might have just thought of a reason to use SNES9x. Can anyone confirm if it's just an issue with SDHC cards?

 

[SS4Gogita]

4.0 now has a working version of Preloader, which also helps one recover from bricks, or so I'm told. It's only been a few days, but 4.0 is quickly becoming the new 3.2, assuming your properly prep your Wii BEFORE updating to 4.0. 3.2 is probably still the most homebrew-friendly, but the gap is closing pretty quickly.

Is there a concise guide around for updating to 4.0? I mean, there's gbatemp, but that place is a garbled mess right now with all the USB Loader talk.

 

[d+pad]

Wiibrew's workarounds won't do a thing I imagine. I just updated straight from 3.3 (before the store update) and everything is working here fine (except SNES9x isn't working or doesn't like the SDHC card)...

You might want to try deleting your replacing your SNES9x file. I read about someone else having a similar issue, and this worked for them.

SNES9x works fine for me after the update (actually, all of my emulators still work), if that means anything.

Edit: Doh, beaten. Oh, and I'm using SD cards and not SDHC. Sorry...

 

[Carlisle]

I've changed my mind and back at least a dozen times about whether to update. I guess I'm just paranoid about something going funky with HBC and having it get corrupted or somehow deleted and then being unable to get it back. I know there are supposedly a crapload of new exploits waiting behind the scenes, but I still feel like I'd be jumping without a backup chute.

I suppose the most likely scenario is having my Wii breakdown again (just got it back from Nintendo a couple weeks ago) and getting it back sans HBC. With 3.2, I have Starfall and HBC and the twilight hack to get it back just in case...

I'll probably end up caving and doing it tomorrow, but I know I'll toss and turn quite a bit more before I get there. It was just as hard to not update my PSP to 2.0 back in the day when the web browser first came out for it.

Bah... decisions, decisions...

 

[SilverLunar]

I have a 16GB SDHC card and all the emulatores i have(VisualBoyA, SNES, genesis and famicom) works just fine.

I think I'll download everything from the HB browser, I have massive space here:lol

 

[Lucis]

Hey guys some newbie Wii question.

I have a launch day Wii (ya can you believe I actually waited in line all night for this?)
And a Wii Key. Since I mostly play japanese game and Wii isn't region free, I thought this is a good idea seeing I came from PS2 and one modchip just solves every import problem. However apparently this isn't case, with the constant FW update that breaks the modchip, it's a big hassle. Good thing is that WiiKey also has firmware update. And it kept up.

However I stopped playing Wii about 9-10 months ago (after I finished Dawn of the New World) and I haven't kept up ever since. I am trying to jump back to my Wii and I just got my Fragile import in mail. However I think the game wants me to update FW before I can run it, and TBH I don't want to do that just yet. And down the road I am interested in the new SD Gundam G Generation (I no longer have a PS2 ; and Arc Rise Fantasia.

Anyone has any idea what's the best course of action for me is? I see WiiKey is still at v1.9. But I am sure the Wii FW has progressed a long way since then. All I want to do is play Import, I don't need any emulator support since I have an ION connected to my TV. Is there an easy way to do this? or is the newest FW still working with WiiKey1?

Thanks.

 

[Mejilan]

What is "properly prepping"? That shady backdoor you speak of?

Yes. It involves installing a CIOS, which I understand is clearly in the "inappropriate" side of things, here on GAF. Once that's done, you need to patch the official IOS that comes with the 4.0 update, and that drives System Menu 4.0.

I'm on 3.3 and held off on updating when Nintendo changed the ToS and haven't done Wiibrew's shop or Mii channel updates either. Should I just update straight to 4.0 if I've already got HBC going?

Don't be concerned with the reworded TOS. There is no mechanism in place currently for Nintendo to push through unprompted/unwanted updates.

Is there a concise guide around for updating to 4.0? I mean, there's gbatemp, but that place is a garbled mess right now with all the USB Loader talk.

Nothing I can safely link to, most likely. I will say that I found a great tutorial on GBATemp, though. I would avoid any tutorial that calls for using Waninkoko's System Firmware Updater 4.0. It's completely unnecessary. I used Nintendo's standard update for mine, and everything works great. Of course, I made sure to properly prep the Wii before updating, and then used that backdoor to patch all of the exploits back into the IOSes Nintendo sealed, after the update.

 

[Dash Kappei]

damn 500'd dp

 

[Dash Kappei]

So guys, going a bit crazy here, I can't find anything on this "prepping for 4.0" stuff and I don't want to risk bricking my Wii, so the bottom line is:

1. I'm on 3.1 with all the Ios needed and stuff to run games such as MadWorld&Co.
2. I've got Homebrew Channel installed with apps such as Gecko and emu like GeoGX.
3. DVDX's already installed, I can read media files from DVD-Rs and even play DVD-Video.

Can I just update to 4.0 via Nintendo's official firmware update and be done with it?

If the answer is yes, can I continue to use my SD card for both HBC releated stuff and Nintendo VC games/saves and the likes?

I'd really, but *really*, appreciate if you guys could help me out with this.

 

[Ninja Kn1ght]

So guys, going a bit crazy here, I can't find anything on this "prepping for 4.0" stuff and I don't want to risk bricking my Wii, so the bottom line is:

1. I'm on 3.1 with all the Ios needed and stuff to run games such as MadWorld&Co.
2. I've got Homebrew Channel installed with apps such as Gecko and emu like GeoGX.
3. DVDX's already installed, I can read media files from DVD-Rs and even play DVD-Video.

Can I just update to 4.0 via Nintendo's official firmware update and be done with it?

If the answer is yes, can I continue to use my SD card for both HBC releated stuff and Nintendo VC games/saves and the likes?

I'd really, but *really*, appreciate if you guys could help me out with this.

yes and yes

 

[bh7812]

I really need some help I started up the Homebrew Channel a little bit ago and it told me there was an update for the channel so I downloaded and installed that. I didn't catch what IOS it was running before the update. During the update it updated the HBC to 1.0.1 and the IOS to IOS 36. When my Wii restarted I could get back into the HBC but now most of the apps within the HBC won't load! It says they're not valid Wii apps. Is the reason they're not loading now have to do with IOS 36 and if it does how can I fix it so my apps will work again? Everything else is running great. My wii is still at 3.2, I've been very hesitant to update to 4.0 so I just need help getting my HBC apps running again then I'll be ok. Would I be better off un-installing the whole channel and re-installing it? Thanks for any help..my feeling is telling me those apps are coming up not valid due to IOS 36.

 

[Linkhero1]

Are the apps .dol or .elf? Also which version of HBC did you have before updating?

 

[bh7812]

The apps, at least the ones I'm trying to get to run again are all .elf files. I had to re-name some of them from .dol to .elf when I originally installed everything. The exact HBC version I had was the most recent one before 1.0.1 I really didn't expect all of my apps to stop working after the update

 

[Linkhero1]

.elf files do not work with the latest HBC. You're going to have to change them back to .dol in order for them to work.

 

[bh7812]

Thanks a bunch Link I'll try changing everything back to .dol and hope it gets me up and running again. But thank you for helping out and a fast reply too!

Edit: Renamed everything to .dol, tried again, still no go. Still telling me they're invalid Wii apps. I don't know how else to fix it. I may as well update to 4.0 at this rate. The IOS 36 is version 4.15 or 4.18 one of those two. I don't wanna mess around much with this if the fix is too complicated I'll just update to 4.0 and be grateful for the time I was able to have the HBC on my Wii

 

[Dash Kappei]

Thanks a bunch Link I'll try changing everything back to .dol and hope it gets me up and running again. But thank you for helping out and a fast reply too!

Edit: Renamed everything to .dol, tried again, still no go. Still telling me they're invalid Wii apps. I don't know how else to fix it. I may as well update to 4.0 at this rate. The IOS 36 is version 4.15 or 4.18 one of those two. I don't wanna mess around much with this if the fix is too complicated I'll just update to 4.0 and be grateful for the time I was able to have the HBC on my Wii

don't "change them", just delete everything under "apps" in the SD and redownload them in the proper .dol, you'll se everything will be fine then.
www.wiibrew.org
Or you could just use the Hombrew Channel Browser.

 

[Linkhero1]

Thanks a bunch Link I'll try changing everything back to .dol and hope it gets me up and running again. But thank you for helping out and a fast reply too!

Edit: Renamed everything to .dol, tried again, still no go. Still telling me they're invalid Wii apps. I don't know how else to fix it. I may as well update to 4.0 at this rate. The IOS 36 is version 4.15 or 4.18 one of those two. I don't wanna mess around much with this if the fix is too complicated I'll just update to 4.0 and be grateful for the time I was able to have the HBC on my Wii

You have to delete them and download them again as the above poster suggested.

 

[Dragona Akehi]

.elf files do not work with the latest HBC. You're going to have to change them back to .dol in order for them to work.

.elf files DO work... it's improperly made .elf files that won't. This was done to avoid banner bricks.

 

[Linkhero1]

.elf files DO work... it's improperly made .elf files that won't. This was done to avoid banner bricks.

I haven't tried any .elf apps, but from what I remember people were having issues with .elf files. I didn't know they still worked if done properly, so thanks for clearing that up.

 

[bh7812]

You have to delete them and download them again as the above poster suggested.

Thanks Dash and Link, I'll re-download everything in the apps folder..hope the 3rd time will be the charm

Edit: I'm back in business It looks like HBC Beta 9 will NOT run any .elf files anymore, so I downloaded loadmii, put it in the apps folder and that got me up and running. Granted it's an extra step now but at least my stuff is finally working again Thanks to everyone who helped, I appreciate it a great deal. Without it I wouldn't have been able to piece together what I needed to do to fix it. So thanks again and sorry for bumping the thread several times. I hope I am able to help someone in the future when they need it.

@ Dragona: You're ok in my book I know Mods here get a lot of crap but you're ok in my book.

 

[Bogus]

Hm. Am I to understand, then, that system update 4.0 has rendered the Twilight Princess hack useless (and, subsequently, has made it impossible to get the homebrew process going without a modded console)? I haven't been following the Wii homebrew scene very closely, so forgive me for my ignorance.

If so, I guess it serves me right for not checking all this out sooner. It would have been so mind-bogglingly awesome to play Monkey Island through the Wii!

 

[Mejilan]

The Twilight Hack is dead, but if you used the TH to install the Homebrew Channel, you're still good to go. Most apps still work, and some elements of 3.2 homebrew are even being adapted to 4.0 successfully, something largely impossible in either 3.3 or 3.4. 4.0 is shaping up to be fucking awesome so far.

 

[Azure Dream]

Hm. Am I to understand, then, that system update 4.0 has rendered the Twilight Princess hack useless (and, subsequently, has made it impossible to get the homebrew process going without a modded console)? I haven't been following the Wii homebrew scene very closely, so forgive me for my ignorance.

They shut down the publicized method. Basically, there are a lot of ways in via Twilight Princess alone, which are being refined for a similar easy process, to my understanding. That's not even starting into methods via other games.

To think, all this started because a few people noticed they could overload the string holding Epona's name... :lol

 

[Mejilan]

Wow, 4.0 fucking rocks.
Didn't realize that some of the core channels could be moved to the SD Menu. I just practically doubled my fridge space from ~600 to ~1100 blocks free!

For reference, the following channels CAN be shifted over and launched from the SD Menu:
Nintendo Channel
Everybody Votes Channel
Check Mii Out Channel
Wii Speak Channel 2.0 (incidentally, there's a new version out that I didn't know about)
Internet Channel (and this one's pretty massive)
Metroid Prime 3 Preview Channel (which is now offline, sadly)
Mario Kart Channel
Wii Fit Channel

These cannot:
Disc Channel
Wii Shop Channel
Mii Channel
News Channel
Weather Channel
Photo Channel 1.1 (technically it can, but moving 1.1 reverts the menu version to 1.0, and that one cannot be moved, apparently)

Sooooo awesome.

 

[Bogus]

Well, shazbot! Suppose I'll just wait for the next exploit that makes installation possible. Thanks for the info.

 

[Mejilan]

There are quite a few exploits still working, but none of them are published yet.
Most of those are known by Marcan and Bushing, but I'm assuming that they're keeping quiet about them in order to save them for when their Bootmii is done. That will be frackin' awesome. Can't wait.

 

[DDayton]

Didn't realize that some of the core channels could be moved to the SD Menu. I just practically doubled my fridge space from ~600 to ~1100 blocks free!

The only problem is that, for some channels, that removes their update scroll capability.

I'm currently running the Wii with the Mario Kart, Internet, and Nintendo Channels installed. Everything else is on the SD.

 

[Mejilan]

Yes. Wiibrew.org has posted working US hacks for Preloader 0.29 / 4.0.
Bu-bye on-disc updates and health warning screens!!

 

[Linkhero1]

Yes. Wiibrew.org has posted working US hacks for Preloader 0.29 / 4.0.
Bu-bye on-disc updates and health warning screens!!

Can you explain preloader a bit? I'm pretty interested in it, but I'm afraid to use it because there is the possibility of bricking my Wii.

 

[Mejilan]

I think I'll tell you a story about how I got Wii games installed onto my PS3's HDD.

So, you know, I finally decided to play around with USB Loader, to see what the hooplah was all about. I had recently (more or less) updated the HDDs in my PS2 and PS3, which resulted in me having a spare 40GB Maxtor IDE drive (PS2), and spare 60GB Seagate SATA drive (PS3). I bought enclosures for both, connected them to my PC, and promptly forgot about 'em. Turns out, both are still empty!

Decided I was going to see if I could get one to work. Since the formerly PS3 drive is in a USB-powered enclosure, and was a bit larger, I figured I'd give that one a whirl first. I hear that externally-powered enclosures might be a bit iffy.

And it works! It recognized the drive right away, though it needed to be reformatted into some kind of proprietary partition. USB Loader 1.1, itself, is pretty janky. It reformatted the drive very quickly and easily, but not before hanging once and resulting in a code dump to the screen. 1 hard-reboot, and I was up and running, and the HDD was showing up as properly formatted and good to go. I already had Twilight Princess in my drive, since I'm slowly going through a second playthrough (between other games).

It opened the DVD drive, started spinning the disc, then stopped and resulted in another hang and eventual code dump to the screen. Ejected the disc, rebooted, then tried to install it again. This time, instead of having the disc in there from the get go, I inserted it when prompted. This time it began to dump the game in no time. It took exactly 3:23 minutes to dump and install the 1.07GB game... vastly speedier than HDLoader on a PS2, I'll let you know.

I proceeded to launch the game, and as a bonus, my save files were found intact. Booted up my first playthrough endgame file, ran through what remained of the final dungeon, and began the awesome four-phase battle with Ganon. Beat the game, and I'm listening to the fantastic credits theme as I type the end of this post.

All in all, USB Loader's a bit shaky for now, but so far so awesome. I don't recall TP on the Wii having any significant loads, so in that sense, I haven't really noticed an impact when playing, positive or negative. Well, the Wii's rather noisy drive is silent the entire time, which is certainly great.

I don't plan on continuing, since if there's something my PS2 taught me, it's that 60GBs is nowhere near enough. But clearly, this enclosure's solid as a rock, so I plan on ordering a second one, and another much larger (probably Seagate) SATA HDD to go with, possibly the same 320GB Seagate that now is installed on my PS3.

This is so fucking ace!

 

[Mejilan]

Can you explain preloader a bit? I'm pretty interested in it, but I'm afraid to use it because there is the possibility of bricking my Wii.

Preloader is basically the new Starfall, which only worked up to 3.2, and has long since been discontinued. It injects a barebones menu that loads BEFORE the System Menu (that is, before the Wii's OS). Once there, you can do all kinds of cool things, such as execute a file from your SD card (say... to recover from a bricked Wii), or toggle System Menu hacks (such as skipping that annoying Health Warning Screen, natively disabling on-disc updates, enabling region free channels, and plenty more!

If NOTHING else, the fact that it serves as a recovery menu that could salvage a bricked Wii is more than enough justification to install Preloader. If you're on SysMenu 4.0, only install Preloader 0.29.

 

[Linkhero1]

Preloader is basically the new Starfall, which only worked up to 3.2, and has long since been discontinued. It injects a barebones menu that loads BEFORE the System Menu (that is, before the Wii's OS). Once there, you can do all kinds of cool things, such as execute a file from your SD card (say... to recover from a bricked Wii), or toggle System Menu hacks (such as skipping that annoying Health Warning Screen, natively disabling on-disc updates, enabling region free channels, and plenty more!

If NOTHING else, the fact that it serves as a recovery menu that could salvage a bricked Wii is more than enough justification to install Preloader. If you're on SysMenu 4.0, only install Preloader 0.29.

If I want to remove Preloader, how do I remove it off of my Wii?

 

[Mejilan]

I believe that you would need to use Waninkoko's cIOS Downgrader to downgrade to an older System Menu (firmware), such as 3.2, then re-update to whatever you were at, if necessary. I haven't done it, and I'm not too sure why you'd want to.

 

[wackojackosnose]

Can someone help me with this?

I'm trying to install DVDX (non 3.4) on my Wii with 3.3E firmware. I've installed DVDX via HBC and after opening the program and installing it, it says it's installed the dvd stub (or whatever) and is successful and gives me the option to go back or exit the installer. So I go back to the Wii Menu and there is nothing new there. I checked again with the DVDX program and that gives me the option to uninstall the software, meaning that it has definately installed something on my Wii.

What am I doing wrong?

 

[Ramenman]

Oh well. It's probably common knowledge but I implied it many times in this thread and nobody seemed to be shocked at the idea that I thought updating my Wii would erase my US saves.
So I had everything (read : a No More Heroes save and a SSBB save) backed up to my SD card, knowing that I wouldn't be able to copy back the SSBB one for a while.

So I update, straight from 3.2E to 4.0E, with a kind message from Nintendo warning me that savefiles that have been created with unauthorized modifications of the console are going to be destroyed. The same message that came with the first update to invalidate the freeloader, and had all its owner fearing for their saves.

I update anyway.


And. My two US saves are still there. Ahem. Wat ? 3.2 to 3.3 erases saves yet 3.2 to 4.0 warns but forgets ? Well, I'm not complaining.


So just in case I'll say it : Updating straight from 3.2 to 4.0 doesn't do anything to your US saves.

 

[Jocchan]

What am I doing wrong?

As far as I know, nothing. DVDX is not an application, it's basically a set of libraries that allows other homebrew apps to use your DVD drive. That's it.

 

[wackojackosnose]

As far as I know, nothing. DVDX is not an application, it's basically a set of libraries that allows other homebrew apps to use your DVD drive. That's it.

oohhhhhh.

I really should have read the whole page on Wiibrew.org.

Thanks. :lol

 

[Dash Kappei]

What am I doing wrong?

Nothing, it's just that know you can make your apps/emus and such read from the DVD drive (like, open MPlayer and read avi.files from a DVD-R, or grab the roms for your emus directly from a DVD-R).

ediy: ultra-beaten

 

[Carlisle]

So here's a question about this preloader (if it's ok. is it? i think it is. if not, then ignore). It lets you boot into a homebrew menu before the Wii even loads up its own OS by holding reset or something right? So you can unbrick a bricked Wii this way. And you can get into HBC this way too? I'm wondering what happens when you boot into preloader if your HBC got somehow deleted.

I guess I'm just trying to find a way to reinstall HBC in the event it's accidentally removed in 4.0. If preloader lets you do homebrew stuff without HBC like, for example, downgrading to an earlier system menu for the purpose of reinstalling HBC and re-upgrading to 4.0, then that'd be cool. But I have a feeling that's not how it works.

 

[Wario64]

Preloader is basically the new Starfall, which only worked up to 3.2, and has long since been discontinued. It injects a barebones menu that loads BEFORE the System Menu (that is, before the Wii's OS). Once there, you can do all kinds of cool things, such as execute a file from your SD card (say... to recover from a bricked Wii), or toggle System Menu hacks (such as skipping that annoying Health Warning Screen, natively disabling on-disc updates, enabling region free channels, and plenty more!

If NOTHING else, the fact that it serves as a recovery menu that could salvage a bricked Wii is more than enough justification to install Preloader. If you're on SysMenu 4.0, only install Preloader 0.29.

Is Preloader difficult to install? I'm still on 3.3 and don't plan to go to 4.0 anytime soon. But it sounds pretty handy if it can save you from a brick

 

[SS4Gogita]

So here's a question about this preloader (if it's ok. is it? i think it is. if not, then ignore). It lets you boot into a homebrew menu before the Wii even loads up its own OS by holding reset or something right? So you can unbrick a bricked Wii this way. And you can get into HBC this way too? I'm wondering what happens when you boot into preloader if your HBC got somehow deleted.

I guess I'm just trying to find a way to reinstall HBC in the event it's accidentally removed in 4.0. If preloader lets you do homebrew stuff without HBC like, for example, downgrading to an earlier system menu for the purpose of reinstalling HBC and re-upgrading to 4.0, then that'd be cool. But I have a feeling that's not how it works.

Uh, yeah. I'm pretty sure you have to keep the HBC. The only way HBC can be deleted though is if you go in and manually delete it from the Wii system menu.

Is Preloader difficult to install? I'm still on 3.3 and don't plan to go to 4.0 anytime soon. But it sounds pretty handy if it can save you from a brick

No, it's very easy. Just put the .dol and the hacks.ini into the apps folder on your SD and run it from the HBC. I don't know about current versions, but older versions made you input the code HARDLUMPS before it would install.

And speaking of Preloader, I finally made the switch to 4.0. I lost Preloader, so I was going to get the new version. I put my SD card into the computer, but now it wants to reformat

On the plus side, SD loading is fucking ace. I have to wonder though, because it took like 5 minutes to copy My Life as a King over but only 12 seconds or so to launch it. Are those speeds normal? The latter sounds about right from what I've heard, but the former sounds like a lot longer than it should have taken.

 

[Anony]

Hey guys some newbie Wii question.

I have a launch day Wii (ya can you believe I actually waited in line all night for this?)
And a Wii Key. Since I mostly play japanese game and Wii isn't region free, I thought this is a good idea seeing I came from PS2 and one modchip just solves every import problem. However apparently this isn't case, with the constant FW update that breaks the modchip, it's a big hassle. Good thing is that WiiKey also has firmware update. And it kept up.

However I stopped playing Wii about 9-10 months ago (after I finished Dawn of the New World) and I haven't kept up ever since. I am trying to jump back to my Wii and I just got my Fragile import in mail. However I think the game wants me to update FW before I can run it, and TBH I don't want to do that just yet. And down the road I am interested in the new SD Gundam G Generation (I no longer have a PS2 ; and Arc Rise Fantasia.

Anyone has any idea what's the best course of action for me is? I see WiiKey is still at v1.9. But I am sure the Wii FW has progressed a long way since then. All I want to do is play Import, I don't need any emulator support since I have an ION connected to my TV. Is there an easy way to do this? or is the newest FW still working with WiiKey1?

Thanks.

i'm pretty sure about this one: just update to 4.0, u have a modchip already, so anything that's foreign and lower than your current fw should boot

100% sure: install HBC and have gecko os to boot your games to bypass update

 

[JoshuaJSlone]

On the plus side, SD loading is fucking ace. I have to wonder though, because it took like 5 minutes to copy My Life as a King over but only 12 seconds or so to launch it. Are those speeds normal? The latter sounds about right from what I've heard, but the former sounds like a lot longer than it should have taken.

Sounds about right. I know it isn't exact, but as a rule of thumb I used to figure on about a second per block when copying to the SD card.

 

[Mejilan]

Is Preloader difficult to install? I'm still on 3.3 and don't plan to go to 4.0 anytime soon. But it sounds pretty handy if it can save you from a brick

Nah. Easy-peasy. I just followed the readme. Once you have it installed, hit up Wiibrew.org's Preloader page to grab the hacks that pertain to your console's region and system menu version (mostly likely, 4.0 U.S.A.). Copy and paste those into a text file named hacks.ini (make sure to hit enter after the last hack in order to leave an extra blank line at the end of the file), then drop the hacks.ini file to the root of your SD card.

Now you can toggle those hacks on and off via the Preloader menu.

So here's a question about this preloader (if it's ok. is it? i think it is. if not, then ignore). It lets you boot into a homebrew menu before the Wii even loads up its own OS by holding reset or something right? So you can unbrick a bricked Wii this way. And you can get into HBC this way too? I'm wondering what happens when you boot into preloader if your HBC got somehow deleted.

I guess I'm just trying to find a way to reinstall HBC in the event it's accidentally removed in 4.0. If preloader lets you do homebrew stuff without HBC like, for example, downgrading to an earlier system menu for the purpose of reinstalling HBC and re-upgrading to 4.0, then that'd be cool. But I have a feeling that's not how it works.

Preloader allows you to autoboot either into the Preloader menu, the regular System Menu, or the Homebrew Channel. Pretty nifty. However, I would think that should you delete the HBC from your System Menu, then it won't be able to launch directly into it. For brick recovery, I believe you can launch directly into the HBC and run CIOS Downgrader in order to install a new System Menu, thus recovering from the brick.

Optionally, I believe it can also run an executable from the root of the SD card.

 

[Firestorm]

About the USB loader, is there any way to keep a partition for the Wii and then another partition to be used with Windows/Mac/whatever other partition you want?

 

[larvi]

About the USB loader, is there any way to keep a partition for the Wii and then another partition to be used with Windows/Mac/whatever other partition you want?

I haven't tried it yet, but from what I've read, yes. I believe USB loader will ask what partition you want to use so if you partition your drive ahead of time and leave a blank one for USB loader you should be all set.