Taking my hacked Wii from 3.4u to 4.0 without bricking

[ChimairaGT]

I've got a softmodded Wii running 3.4u and I want to upgrade to 4.0 mainly so that my Wii will recognize larger SD cards and so that I can run my VC and WiiWare games from the card. Maintaining the ability to run imports would be nice. However, in looking around the internet for help I have found a lot of people have bricked their systems in doing this update. I am looking for help on two fronts: 1. How can I best safeguard myself from bricking, and 2. What is the best upgrade path?

For the first part, I have heard that some software can help, I think Preloader or BootMii combined with backing up my Wii's NAND.

For the second, the simplest path I have found is by first installing "cIOS60 Custom IOS 60 WAD ( For Wii System Menu 4.0 ) [Victory]" found on The Pirate Bay, and then installing a custom system menu linked in the torrent description. I would have provided a link, but I am not sure about the forum's rules on posting links to custom IOSes. I am reluctant to follow this path because I have yet to take any safeguards against bricking, and The Pirate Bay isn't exactly the most reliable source of information.

Any help would be appreciated. Most of the pages I have found were written around the time of the 4.0 update, so they are not really indicative of the current scene.

[MrPopo]

I just used the system update to go from 3.4 to 4.0 without bricking. It kept my Homebrew channel intact. I'm now on 4.3 after I updated the Homebrew channel to the latest version (to prevent the auto delete from one of the firmware versions that goes by filename).

[ChimairaGT]

I just used the system update to go from 3.4 to 4.0 without bricking. It kept my Homebrew channel intact. I'm now on 4.3 after I updated the Homebrew channel to the latest version (to prevent the auto delete from one of the firmware versions that goes by filename).

But, if I take my system back online and update, won't it take me straight to 4.3? Also, do you know if any applications were affected?

[MrPopo]

Wiibrew.org has a good list of affected apps. If you update to the latest Homebrew channel it will survive the update. I believe Bootmii installed as boot2 gets overwritten, but you can reinstall it after the update.

[gtmtnbiker]

I think all you have to do is to make sure you have the latest version of the Homebrew Channel running and then do the update.

The 4.2 update deletes the channel by a certain name. The newest version just renames it to a different name so it does not get removed.

[lisalover1]

The 4.2 update deletes the channel by a certain name. The newest version just renames it to a different name so it does not get removed.

Nintendo; they're always ahead of things in piracy prevention and region lockout. This is almost as clever as the tiny plastic tabs in the SNES!

[t0yrobo]

I think all you have to do is to make sure you have the latest version of the Homebrew Channel running and then do the update.

The 4.2 update deletes the channel by a certain name. The newest version just renames it to a different name so it does not get removed.

Is updating the homebrew channel seriously all it takes? That would be awesome, I've been worried that my little brother might be given a game that requires the update for christmas and it would screw everything up.

[MrPopo]

As I said, I'm running the latest firmware (needed for NSMBW) and all I needed to do prior to using the official Nintendo update is update the Homebrew Channel to the latest version.

[ChimairaGT]

So here's the results of my experimenting on my Wii.

I was on 3.4u with Homebrew installed. I updated to 4.2 via the internet. BootMii no longer worked, as expected, but the Homebrew Channel loaded fine. WAD Manager didn't work, and I couldn't copy my VC games (even ones that I bought) to the SD card and run from there.

For BootMii and DVDX I just used the HackMii installer with the BannerBomb and everything installed fine. I backed up my NAND with no issues, so that lead me to the next step of getting my WAD Manager working.

I followed a post I found on another board which takes you through the lengthy process. You have to get ahold of a few IOS files using NUSD, which is unfortunately Windows only, but I have a bootcamp partition. You also have to use a couple of other apps to do some IOS tweaking, and it takes a few minutes, but everything is working fine. I can install wads, move them to the SD card, and run from the SD card with success.

[gtmtnbiker]

I followed a post I found on another board which takes you through the lengthy process.

Glad to hear that you got things working but you should post the link in case some future user come across your post and wants to know how it's done.