A large question thread that may become a worklog

[carbsdog]

so im thinking of making a wiip, with gamecube and classic controller functionality, and and ive got questions that will hopefully be answered:
1. can you run a wii completely without the disc drive, and have a hardrive instead?[/color]
2. does removing the disc drive sacrifice any homebrew software or functionality?
3.. is it true that you can run the dolphin emulator on the wii, allowing you to play gcn isos?
4. can a gamecube controller be wired to a wiimote as a classic controller would
5. can a classic controller be wired to the gamecube p1 port on the wii
6. can games be accessed through homebrew channel without a wii remote (control the wii via classic or gamecube)
7. can i wire a screen in parallel to the wii, and use the wii power source (whether it be batteries or power cord) or will the cut down in amperage have negative effects?
8. are 3 3.7 4000mah batteries enough to sustain a wii? if so for what time period?
9. is making a case out of wood a bad idea (in terms of weight or heat, not aesthetics)
10. can the heatsink by trimmed down by about 4mm or will this cause it to overheat?
11.the wii audio and video composite cables, when the male connector is taken off has an insulated wire (in yellow plastic for video) and an uninsulated "wire" (made of lots of thin copper wires) which is positive and which is negative?
[/color]
(unanswered questions are red, answered are green)

hopefully this thread will help other n00bs with similar questions

 

[Σigma]

1. With a WiiKey or Sundriver, like SS did with the ZNWii
2. You can't play DVDs... ?
3. No, with a sundriver, it just emulates the diskdrive, and uses the GC hardware inside the Wii to play games
4. I don't know
5. Yes.
6. I think the Wii Classic Controller works
7. I don't know
8. The Wii draws less power than the gamecube, and has to have 12 volts to boot, not 11.1, so yes, maybe 2-3 hours (correct me if I'm wrong).
9. Yes, and in terms of thermal management
10. Use an IBM Thinkpad heatsink maybe?
11. No Clue. I think one's Composite and the other's ground.

Didn't know some of them, but I hope this helps.

 

[Atari]

1. can you run a wii completely without the disc drive, and have a hardrive instead?

1. With a WiiKey or Sundriver, like SS did with the ZNWii

Σigma is right about the Sundriver, but is not right about the Wiikey. The Wiikey is just a standard modchip for loading backups etc. through the disk drive. I'm sure he meant the Wiikey Fusion, but it is still not exactly what you are looking for either, because it loads backups off an SD card, not a hard drive. So you should pick either the Sundriver or the WODE, which both support loading backups via an HDD. The Sundriver is more what you are looking for, because it replaces the disk drive altogether.

2. does removing the disc drive sacrifice any homebrew software or functionality?

No. Most homebrew is loaded via SD or USB.

3. is it true that you can run the dolphin emulator on the wii, allowing you to play gcn isos?

No. The Wii is not powerful enough to run the dolphin emulator. That emulates the GameCube via software, which is very CPU intensive. I'm not sure why you would ask this though, because the Wii natively supports GameCube games. It is capable of doing this through hardware emulation, because the CPU/GPU are very similar to the original GameCube.

4. can a gamecube controller be wired to a wiimote as a classic controller would

No. The clock and latch lines are incompatible for various reasons, which mostly have to do with varying hardware. Since the controller would be unable to send or receive any data from the console, it wouldn't work.

5. can a classic controller be wired to the gamecube p1 port on the wii

See #4.

6. can games be accessed through homebrew channel without a wii remote (control the wii via classic or gamecube)

Yes, via BootMii. It launches before the Wii's OS does. It uses the GameCube controller. Read more about it here:
http://wiibrew.org/wiki/BootMii
Download link is on the right of the page.

7. can i wire a screen in parallel to the wii, and use the wii power source (whether it be batteries or power cord) or will the cut down in amperage have negative effects?

This really depends how much watts your screen really draws. If you are using one of those 7" screens floating around here (look in the Screens subforum) you will not need a separate power supply.

8. are 3 3.7 4000mah batteries enough to sustain a wii? if so for what time period?

Yes, it would work, but would not last too long. You are looking at about 1.5 hours, depending on how much your screen draws (do not quote me on that time, because it is only a guesstimate or approximation).

9. is making a case out of wood a bad idea (in terms of weight or heat, not aesthetics)

Wood is an insulator, and unless you are using balsa wood, it is also fairly hefty. So yes, it is a bad idea for a Wii project like yours.

10. can the heatsink by trimmed down by about 4mm or will this cause it to overheat?

Depending on how good you are with a dremel (or whatever tool you are using to shave the heatsink down) you could cut it down more than that. So yes, 4 mm should be safe.

11.the wii audio and video composite cables, when the male connector is taken off has an insulated wire (in yellow plastic for video) and an uninsulated "wire" (made of lots of thin copper wires) which is positive and which is negative?

The insulated wire is the composite signal, and the uninsulated copper strands surrounding it are ground.

If you have any more questions, feel free to ask.

 

[carbsdog]

1. With a WiiKey or Sundriver, like SS did with the ZNWii

nah i meant can you just remove he disc drive entirley, so its got nothing in place, and run games off a hardrive. so the two connectors that the disc drive uses becomes dead ends and nothing becomes a substitute. in summary, can you use a softmodded wii with usb loader and run games off a usb and disconnect the disc drive and have nothing in its place

 

[Ashen]

The drive daughterboard is needed for softmod USB loaders and such to work. Without it they all just hang when you load a game.

 

[Σigma]

A Sundriver is a SATA hardmod, far superior to a USB Loader or any softmods. I would use it over a softmod.

 

[unicycler17]

For the controller, I suggest you buy a gamecube controller that looks like the wii classic controller. Then, you could play all gamecube games, downloaded games, use bootmii, but you could still have that awesome wii look

 

[carbsdog]

oh unicycler, i want to play games that require the classic controller as well. what do you all think about a wooden case about 3mm thick, with a detachable section, soi can attach a classic or gamecube. dont worry about how the wires connect, just the aesthetics and functionality

 

[Σigma]

wooden case about 3mm thick,

I wouldn't go with wood, and do you mean 3cm thick? 3mm is very much on the thin side of things.

 

[Hermaphroditus]

Unless you have very good airflow and heatsinking, I would not suggest a wood case on any current-gen system, as they run fairly hot.

 

[carbsdog]

isnt plastic just as much of an insulator as wood?