When Internal Memory Fails: A No-Solder Wii U Recovery - smolnero

It was just another hot Sunday at smol HQ. My wife and I were playing games with the family during our biweekly FaceTime game night, and as we were getting ready to end the call, my brother-in-law chimed in. “Oh yeah, before we get off the call, I’m gonna throw away the Wii U. Anyone have any protests before I throw it out? Five… four…” My sister-in-law immediately responded, “What? No! What’s wrong with it?” “I don’t know. It just doesn’t play games anymore. It gives me some kind of error.” “Aw man, I have sentimental value tied to it. But if it doesn’t work, I guess throw it away.” I don’t know what came over me. The last time I had seriously dabbled with exploits and low-level recovery was when I spent months trying to revive a bricked M1 Max MacBook Pro. Several companies and repair shops had told me that getting through the problem was impossible, but after months of working at it, I finally got the machine running again on New Year’s Day 2024. I am still using it today, and it continues to run strong. Imposter syndrome still pokes at me almost every week, but my love for computers, technology, and machine learning keeps me at my computer with absolute glee, wondering what new thing I might discover next. Since recovering the M1, however, I had not felt particularly called toward that kind of project again. Maybe it was the heat from not having air conditioning in the house. Maybe it was my ego. Or maybe it was just the particular kind of cheekiness I felt that weekend, the urge to fuck around and find out. After a minute, I spoke up. “Don’t throw it away. I’ll get it up and running.” They were stunned and immediately asked how. I told them I had absolutely no idea, but I would try. The youngest of the bunch said it sounded like I was making empty promises. I assured them I was not, although by that point I was mostly just more determined to get the Wii U running for this ungrateful bunch. The Starting Point When the Wii U was finally in my hands, I powered it on and found it in a familiar but frustrating state.