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Wii U external HDD thread
- Thread starter Christberg
- Start date
Not for Wii U use. The sd cards slot is only for Wii mode compatibility.
Man, now that's a bummer. Sure hope I won't come across any problem during my playthrough, losing everything would sour me on the game forever.
No way to make the console store save files in the internal memory when they're created, either?
Tell me about it, I've lost things on mine twice!
#1. The (3 months old) HDD stopped working.
#2. The HDD worked and still works perfect, but doing a backup I fucked things up and lost everything on the original and the backup.
But #1 was faulty hardware and #2 was mine, so can't blame Nintendo. If anything, hoping the Spring update that allows cloud saving, allows it for Wii U games too and not just new stuff.
Nope, no current way at least.
Good thing I just remembered I have a 64GB Sandisk Extreme USB drive!
Should be enough for the games I want for now, going all digital on the Wii U I just bought, MK8 bundle for 250$, def want Splatoon too.
Didn't get the Smash bundle because honestly I love smash but I don't play it enough and I have a melee setup on a CRT, would rather play that locally with friends if any ever come over lmao
So I bought it. I hope your right about this.
SmiteOfHand
Member
Well, consider this. The internal storage for the Wii U is NAND flash memory. Funny that it is good enough for the default storage for the OS, patches, downloads, saves, etc... But for whatever reason Nintendo gets cold feet when it comes to external storage.
This is the actual wording they use in their FAQ. Their use of the word commercial is interesting as it seems they are implying their internal storage is some sort of special industrial grade stuff. To my knowledge what they are using inside the box and what you can get from any decent manufacturer is cut from the same cloth. Would be more than willing to read any evidence that counters that notion.
edit: worth emphasizing that the official word from Nintendo is not to use Flash drives. Personally their reasoning doesn't hold up so I'll be foregoing their advice, but I do so understanding that it is not recommended. You gotta go your own way.
Mass Effect
Member
This convinced me to go this route. It's pretty difficult to find an external HDD worth the price of only using for the Wii U (since I won't be able to use it on anything else). Something like a 1TB is way overkill for what I need and most of that space would go to waste. So screw it, might as well go the flash memory route.
Thanks!!!!
I assume you meant ssd.
It depends. Some don't, but most do need y-cable because the usb ports are very low-powered.
The Dutch Slayer
Member
For Xenoblade X I need a HD, still have none I use the 8 gig wii u and can't download anything except patches barley.
What modern WD external drive works now a days?
Thanks all.
The Dutch Slayer
Member
Pancakes R Us
Member
I'll be interested to know how it runs, please do report back. I have a 64GN ultra fit stick attached to my system.
KennyLinder
Member
I fancy a HDD that I can chuck in my bag and take to work (and if it works, use on the Wii U at work with my downloaded games on). Anyone used the Transcend external drives?
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B005MNGQ6C/
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B005MNGQ6C/
all of a sudden all of the content on my external drive is not showing up on my consoledownloaded games, save files. the hard drive is turning on, everything is plugged in properly, nothing has changed. has this ever happened to anyone else and do i have any recourse? i'm dumbfounded and bummed out.
Major Marvelous
Neo Member
If I'm reading correctly, you have a Wii U at home and at work and you want to switch between the 2? If that's the case, then that won't be possible since whenever an external drive is plugged in, it checks to see if it has already been used by that Wii U, and if it hasn't, it asks to format it.
Also, you wouldn't be able to play your downloaded games either way since they're attached to your account and the way the Wii U is set up, you can only have one system attached to an account at any time.
KennyLinder
Member
Ahh fuck. I've never tried the Wii U at work with my account, I had hoped it worked like it does with Xbox One. Never mind. Thanks for clearing that up.
Regardless, that external drive still seems like a reasonable deal for £45. Would invest in a Y cable too obviously.
Pokemaniac
Member
The Wii U appears to use full disk encryption with console-specific keys. Other Wii Us are literally unable to read the data.
sechsterangriff
Member
So... I decided I would use a 32GB sd card as external storage for Xenoblade X.
I also decided I wouldn't spend a single penny on additional hardware (cables, adapters, etc) and this is the result.
The Wii U doesn't recognize my card reader directly, so I added a micro usb B OTG adapter somewhere in the middle and now it works lol.
The irony is that the console itself has an SD card reader. Oh Nintendo...
I also decided I wouldn't spend a single penny on additional hardware (cables, adapters, etc) and this is the result.
The Wii U doesn't recognize my card reader directly, so I added a micro usb B OTG adapter somewhere in the middle and now it works lol.
The irony is that the console itself has an SD card reader. Oh Nintendo...
Fuck it that's cheap. I'll scoop one. I wanna download some classic Wii games.
sechsterangriff
Member
great, thanks. i should have some lying around or just buy a cheap one with fast speeds.
holy shit, picking this up just for Wii U. thanks for confirming they work fine with it.
Let me know if you, or anyone else has issues. I've still not seen anything and I just took some time to play Shovel Knight PoS last week. Curious to hear if anyone has any issues with the Xenoblade packs.
Nostremitus
Member
So... I decided I would use a 32GB sd card as external storage for Xenoblade X.
I also decided I wouldn't spend a single penny on additional hardware (cables, adapters, etc) and this is the result.
The Wii U doesn't recognize my card reader directly, so I added a micro usb B OTG adapter somewhere in the middle and now it works lol.
The irony is that the console itself has an SD card reader. Oh Nintendo...
What type of read/write speeds do you expect to get from that? Wasn't the reason the SD card readers are only included for backwards compatibility because they can't keep up? I would think your games will freeze/crash constantly with that...
KratosEnergyDrink
Member
I just bought a Samsung SSD 850 Evo, 250 GB. This package had a Sata->USB adapter included.
As expected it does not worked straight away with simply pluging in the USB port. It worked first when I copied all data from my old usb-hdd to the new one, but when I started a game (Hyrule Warriors) the SSD turned off. Obviously reading data uses more power than writing with this SSD.
So I simply bought an active usb-hub (with external power supply) and now the SSD works flawlessly. And thanks to the new usb ports I can put the two guitar hero controller dongles in the hub too.
So instead of buying an Y-cable or a HDD with external power connector you can just buy an active usb hub and use whatever usb-hdd you want.
Why I bought an SSD for Wii U? Because I can. Because of USB2.0 the speed difference between SSD and HDD should not differ much. But non sequential reads SHOULD be faster with an SSD, thanks to no mechanical parts moving.
Nonetheless it really seems that hyrule warrior now loads a bit faster, and when booting up to home menu the icons appear faster too, but I don't measure it, so this speed increase is perhaps only in my mind.
As expected it does not worked straight away with simply pluging in the USB port. It worked first when I copied all data from my old usb-hdd to the new one, but when I started a game (Hyrule Warriors) the SSD turned off. Obviously reading data uses more power than writing with this SSD.
So I simply bought an active usb-hub (with external power supply) and now the SSD works flawlessly. And thanks to the new usb ports I can put the two guitar hero controller dongles in the hub too.
So instead of buying an Y-cable or a HDD with external power connector you can just buy an active usb hub and use whatever usb-hdd you want.
Why I bought an SSD for Wii U? Because I can. Because of USB2.0 the speed difference between SSD and HDD should not differ much. But non sequential reads SHOULD be faster with an SSD, thanks to no mechanical parts moving.
Nonetheless it really seems that hyrule warrior now loads a bit faster, and when booting up to home menu the icons appear faster too, but I don't measure it, so this speed increase is perhaps only in my mind.
Auron_Kale
Member
Just ordered one and it'll be arriving on Thursday, so just in time for Xenoblade. I'll be picking up an external HDD down the line, but for now, this should be fine for the packs.
sechsterangriff
Member
You think wrong. I don't know why Nintendo chose to not to support SD cards on Wii U (probably to save costs on supporting newer standards), but depending on class SD cards can have high read/write speeds. That card I'm using is faster than any USB stick I have.
For example, If you think about how SD cards are used in cameras and how they have to keep up with the need to record huge amounts of data (4K video, RAW stills) it's not difficult to understand.
If anything I would be more worried if any of those adapters I'm using is working as a bottleneck to to card, not about the card itself.
Nostremitus
Member
You could be right, but remember that just because something can transfer one large file at 150MB/s doesn't mean it'll do anything close to that with lots of smaller files being constantly read and written. That's why you have to look at IOPS when buying an SSD. High bandwidth on a single large file doesn't mean it'll maintain those speeds with loads of smaller ones.
Nintendo probably avoided using the SD Card as a storage medium for the Wii U because A)the vast majority of SD cards are less that 20MB/s and B)Of those that are above 25MB/s most probably don't run enough Input/Output Operations Per Second to be viable for streaming content off the card.
Your SD card could work just fine, but it would have been dumb for Nintendo to advertise using one when most users would find their SD cards unusable in it.
FreedomFighter
Member
XCX has this thread rising to the top again!
I'd never heard of a Y cable before looking into getting a HD for my Wii U. Is there anything to actually look out for when buying one other than making sure you pick the right USB number? I have an older Passport I'd like to use for my Wii U and then buy a cheap external HDD to replace it with for backing stuff up.
Community Forum
Member
Thank you, bought one since the Xenoblade data packs filled up my drive, and I want to get Fast Racing Neo!
plenty out there like the WD ones. oddly enough, sometimes 500GB ones are more expensive cuz they're just not that popular anymore. get a 1TB one.
Nostremitus
Member
I almost bought one of these last night per your recommendation(not for my Wii U, though) but looked at the reviews and the Q/A on Amazon and apparently people are having issues with them getting dangerously hot and stop working after several minutes of use. Have you experienced this?
BassForever
Member
I bought a toshiba 1tb hard drive and a y cable and was able to move everything to the hard drive fine, the problem is whenever I try to access the hard drive in the wiiu data manage screen I get an error message. Have had no issues in game only when trying to access the hdd in the data manage screen.
Other than space, what's the advantage of the mini 128GB USB over this one:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00P8XQPY4/?tag=neogaf0e-20
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00P8XQPY4/?tag=neogaf0e-20
Not an exact answer to your question but I just added a 128gb SSD to a my Wii U with a Vantec 2.5-Inch SATA 6Gb/s to USB 3.0 HDD/SSD Aluminum Enclosure, Black (NST-266S3-BK) off of amazon.
Kingston drive and I used a Y cable that is usb 3.0 to super speed adapter.
Works perfect. Everything loads better than off an HD and the price off amazon for it all was excellent.
The Cruzer fits are little nubs so there is little risk of damaging the driver or system by start bumps.
But they don't go up to 256gb yet and that lager stick does. So it might be worth it for the extra size if that's A need for you.
you can move stuff back and forth but there's no way to actually set your preference based on games so everything keeps saving to the external unless you disconnect it which i can't do since i'm gonna use the Xenoblade data packs with it. ah well, i'll just do backups of the saves from time to time. don't wanna lose the Xenoblade saves in case the external dies for some reason.
At least this is an option for now. I wonder if a tweet or two(thousand) could ask the NoA to look into the feature to be set in the settings menu. I really liked the auto switch to use the external but yeah I have lots of local friends with Wii Us so toting saves via SD actually is a great idea so that option would be great. And yeah if was a per game basis that would be insanely cool.
Edit: xenoblade packs loading off on the SSD are sublime.
Watch Da Birdie
I buy cakes for myself on my birthday it's not weird lots of people do it I bet
Yeah, I definitely need an external harddrive---I imagine the new Smash 4 shit is gonna be pretty large and XCX has taken up everything.
Guess I'm going with this one since it's the one I see folks saying is the most stable:
http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Expansion-Desktop-External-STEB2000100/dp/B00TKFEE9E/ref=dp_ob_title_ce?tag=viglink20241-20
This is all I'll need, right?
Guess I'm going with this one since it's the one I see folks saying is the most stable:
http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Expansion-Desktop-External-STEB2000100/dp/B00TKFEE9E/ref=dp_ob_title_ce?tag=viglink20241-20
This is all I'll need, right?