Wii Update 4.2 Tries (and Fails) To Block Homebrew

marcansoft writes "On September 28, Nintendo released a Wii update, titled 4.2. This update was targeted squarely at homebrew, performing sweeping changes throughout the system. It hardly achieved that goal, though, because just two days later a new version of the HackMii installer was released that brings full homebrew capabilities back to all Wii consoles, including unmodified consoles running 4.2. However, as part of their attempt to annoy homebrew users, Nintendo updated the lowest level updateable component of the Wii software stack: boot2 (part of the system bootloader chain). Homebrew users have been using BootMii to patch boot2 in order to gain low level system access and recovery functions (running Linux natively, fixing bricks, etc). The update hasn't hindered this, as users can simply reinstall BootMii after updating (it is compatible with the update). But there's a much bigger problem: Nintendo's boot2 update code is buggy." Read on for more details. "Boot2 had never been updated in retail consoles until now. During BootMii's development, its authors noticed that Nintendo's code had critical bugs and could sometimes permanently brick a console by writing incorrect or unchecked data to flash memory, so they decided to write their own, much safer flashing code. Now, Nintendo has pushed a boot2 update to all Wii users, and the results are what was expected: users are reporting bricks after installing 4.2 on unmodified consoles. Nintendo is currently attempting to censor posts and remove references to homebrew. It is worth noting that the new boot2 does not attempt to block anything or offer any additional protection or functionality. Its sole purpose is to simply replace current versions which may or may not have been modified with BootMii. Another interesting tidbit is that Nintendo is not believed to have any method to repair this kind of brick at a factory, short of replacing the entire motherboard."

Comments

Dear Nintendo,

[Narcocide]

Please stop making me cry.

Sincerely,
Your loyal non-modding customer.

P.S. Please spend all this time and effort addressing the cheating hackers plaguing the Mario Kart Network instead.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Anonymous Coward]

We often look at the past with rose-tinted sunglasses.

When we were children, some of us grew up with Nintendo. The NES gave us incredible gameplay. We fell in love with the company.The SNES brought even more to the table. Many of us are also plagued by the Tetris theme, thanks to the Gameboy.

Unfortunately, the reality is much more bitter. Nintendo has done some pretty rotten things since the very first version of their system. Whether it was the 10NES lock-out chip, their censorship policies, their anti-competitive attitude (which landed them fines in the European Union in 2002 thanks to how they ran their business from 1991-1998), Nintendo has a long track-record of "doing evil". We only never realized it because, at the time, most of us were children and only cared about getting that next fun game.

Compared to the way things were then, all of this is unsurprising.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[PhrostyMcByte]

I'm pretty sure they sell the Corn Syrup version in the US because we've got a huge tariff on importing sugar, not because of some sort of regional taste.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

You tell me how they do that. Not software - the ROM bits have no recovery functionality. Hardware? Massive props for you if you can find any kind of JTAG or similar port on the board, because quite a few people have wasted lots of time trying and failing to do so. As far as we can tell, they preflash the NAND chips before soldering, and I'm not aware of anyone who hasn't just had their motherboard replaced after this kind of unrecoverable brick.

Here's a pinout diagram of the Hollywood with everything that's definitely not a recovery port marked. Let me know if you find any flashing/recovery functionality on the remaining pins ;)

Re:Why is that legal?

[commodore64_love]

You mean from the top.

The people sit at the top level of authority, and that power flows downward to the state government, then the continental government. By revolting the people are merely taking-back the powers/rights that were illegally stolen from them by the lower levels.

Re:Sitting on the fence

[marcansoft]

FWIW, 4.2 is reported to completely kill modchip region-free functionality. If they've done what I think they've done (started to check the region on the TMD, which is cryptographically signed), region-free via modchip is dead and won't be coming back.