Homebrew Channel/Bugs

Attention: This page is for historical reference only. Please use the bug tracking link below.

Please fill bug reports for HBC 1.0.2 and up at HackMii::Homebrew Channel

Controller problems

Unresponsive cursor

My cursor barely responds. It seems to only respond to rotational movements of the wiimote. What can I do to resolve this?

If you are using a Nyko wireless nunchuck, try using the homebrew channel without the Nyko wireless receiver attached to the bottom of the wiimote.

I got a problem with the remote cursor( the hand)... when I'm on the wii menu its fine but as soon as I enter the HBC it gets upsidedown and the controls are inverted.

Wiimote will not work in the Homebrew Channel if Nyko's Wireless Nunchuck is plugged in.

I purchased Nyko's Wireless Nunchuck for my Wii today. I plugged it in and fired up my Wii to play a game, but when the Homebrew channel loaded the Hand Icon would not display and if I unplugged it, it functioned normally. But when I plug it back in the hand icon either freezes completely or moves oddly when you move the Wiimote. Please fix this.

3rd party Nyko Classic Controllers (wireless and wired) don't function inside of the Homebrew Channel

The Wireless Wing classic-style Wii controller manufactured by Nyko does not function inside of the Homebrew Channel or inside any applications that support the Classic Controller launched from within the Channel. The controller functions properly in the Wii System Menu, but when the Homebrew Channel is launched, the LED on the base that attaches to the Wiimote shuts off and the controller loses sync. Nothing brings it back except exiting the Homebrew channel and returning the System Menu.

In addition to the wireless receiver base shutting off in HBC, the wired version of the Wing by Nyko does not work within HBC. After plugging in a wired Wing, HBC and apps launched from within HBC act as if there are no controller extensions plugged into the Wiimote, even when the wired Wing is unplugged and replaced with an official Nintendo controller extension.

Datel Retro wireless controller won't work

The homebrew channel appears to ignore the Datel Retro Wireless controller as a valid input controller. According to the wiki I found here:

The way to get the Datel Retro Wireless working with homebrew applications is to recompile your chosen homebrew application against a modified libogc with this defensive code in classic.c removed (around line 91):

WIIUSE_DEBUG("Classic controller handshake appears invalid, trying again."); wiiuse_read_data(wm, data, WM_EXP_MEM_CALIBR, EXP_HANDSHAKE_LEN, wiiuse_handshake_expansion); return 0;

The user also notes: I'm not necessarily recommending that people do this because I don't know enough about the application and this change's impact, but it seems the Datel controller sends an invalid handshake that confuses wiiuse, and making this change will bypass this check for all classic controllers and allow the Datel controller to be used.

Any help in getting this application Datel Retro Wireless compatible would be appreciative. It would make jumping to my favorite homebrew app easier. source: Datel Retro Wireless Classic Controller —Preceding unsigned comment added by Startreker (talk • contribs) 15:38, 16 May 2009

This really needs to be fixed at the libOGC level -- besides, none of us has one of these controllers to test a fix. -- Bushing 04:33, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Loading problems

Black screen after loading bar

I have major problem with Homebrew Channel since version 0.9 beta.

Problem is that sometimes it not wants to properly load applications. After loading bar (normally reaches 100% and it moves away) I just get black screen and my Wii Remote turns off, after that I just can turn off my Wii by pressing "POWER" button for 5 seconds.

This not happen always, but very often with any type of applications (emulators, games, utilities). I don't have that problem with HBC v0.8 beta and earlier version. My Wii is PAL version with 3.1E FW, system uses IOS 34 v4.15. I don’t have mod-chip installed.

I think that problem is caused by some bug(s) in HBC, not by my Wii. I also want to mention that I never used applications like "IOS downgrader", DVDX, Starfall, etc.

I also tried to reformat my Wii's system memory, but problem in HBC is still persistent.

see http://bugs.hackmii.com/index.php?do=details&task_id=66 -- Bushing 04:06, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

WiiLoad Issues

When I use WiiLoad, it fails to transfer the file properly about 80% of the time. The progress bar goes up normally to some random point and then stops. Next the Wii shows the failed to receive file dialog box. WiiLoad says failure and "No Error". I've never seen any other network issues with my setup. The file that I'm transferring is about 8 Mega-bytes.
-- PaceMaker 02:02, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

• Is the source available to WiiLoad? If not, what is the protocol that the HBC uses to transfer files?

-- PaceMaker 05:20, 11 August 2008 (CEST)

    I've never encountered something of 8mb that need to be send over a network. What exactly are you sending? --Elk1007 04:29, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

HomeBrew Channel stalling in loading apps

To start out, I have a Wii updated with the latest firmware and it is not chipped. I've rarely experienced problems when loading HBC as everything seems to run smoothly. It has froze on me once only the first night I installed it which was a while ago, though all is fine now. I've encountered a problem the other night however; I've noticed upon HBC loading my SD card and its apps that I was free to choose anything as normal, though when I clicked on the Genesis emulator, HBC decided to take its own actions into play. I have not yet chose to Load or Cancel the application from the HBC interface. You know when you get the dim screen in the background when you choose an app or are reading a description?, I had gotten the dim screen (all while the background was still in motion. The bubbles, etc) and no menu whatsoever as well as the cursor having disappeared. My apps were still shown in the background but there was nothing left for me to do except power off my Wii. It only happened once. I will further notify of any other glitches/bugs/things that should arise. Peachy 01:18a.m., 26 August 2008

Network problems

Network problem - Network Not Initialized

I installed HBC on my 3.2J Wii using the iso method (I have a modchip) and connect it to my home network but i disconnect the internet from it on purpose (I don't understand japanese so I'm afraid I'll update my wii by accident). Im trying to use wiiload but HBC just says: "network not initialized". I tried addind my wii's BSSID to my routers MAC filter but with no luck. also i have nothing plugged in to my wii. 26 August 2008

Losing WiFi Connection

Despite being next to my access point, I've found that the homebrew channel/my wii is losing its connection. This happens when running homebrew and returning to the launcher (which I why I presume its a problem with the channel and not my wii or WiFi). Is anyone else experiencing this?--Unknown

Is it eventually reconnecting? The Wii's WiFi connection isn't persistent.--Timedroid 06:30, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

"Other"

Loading extra files as well as the .elf

Not really a bug, but particularly for development it would be quite handy to have a more convenient way of sending an application's data files over the USB gecko or wifi. This could be either something like ftpii built into the homebrew channel itself, or allowing wiiload to send whole directories. --Bigzoid 15:15, 11 July 2008 (CEST)

Strange sound when i press exit on the homebrew channel

When i exit from the homebrew channel, the system menu and the games sound like they have interference, this only happens if i use the option exit on the HBC, if i execute another app (like snes9x) and i reboot the wii from there, this doesn´t happen (spanish: cuando salgo del canal homebrew, el menu del sistema suena como si hubiera interferencia, solo pasa al usar la opcion salir en el canal hombrew, si ejecuto otra aplicacion que permita reiniciar (snes9x por ejemplo) y reinicio la wii desde alli esto no pasa) NTSC Wii, 3.2U, not chipped

I can confirm that this happens, exiting the Homebrew Channel on my NTSC 3.3U unmodded Wii produces slightly distorted sound on the Wii Menu and other channels/games that are run after. This bug does not happen if the system menu is returned to directly from other homebrew. The distorted sound seems to fix itself when I power off and turn back on the Wii. Kilroy 14:57, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

HBC doesn't read my SD Card/it's content

I installed the latest version (beta9) of HBC on my Wii but when I insert a SD card with the neccessary files in /apps/whateverfolder/ the HBC doesn't show it. It only says at the beginning "Load SD" then it disappears and the Icon for Internet Connection starts blinking. I have no Gamceube things like memcards in my Wii nor GeckoSD-Adapters. Sano 17:29, 31 Oktober 2008 (MEZ)

Same issue... this is with the recent 3.3 update and HomeBrew Channel beta9. I was using a 1GB standard SD card, configured properly. I moved the exact same format to a 32MB standard SD card and that worked for me. Is there a size limit to what HBC can read from? Technosapien 02:19, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Try moving the files off the SD card, use SD Formatter, then copy the files back on. LoganA 14:57, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, that seems to work. Any way to do this with linux, and not have to find a windows machine? Technosapien 21:39, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

mkfs.vfat -c -F 32 /dev/<path to block device, like sda>. this command makes a filesystem, vfat type, check the sectors for bad blocks, FAT32 to this block device. If this doesn't work, you may need use fdisk on it and remake the partition table, then format it again with mkfs.vfat.LoganA 02:07, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

HBC Doesn't Power Off Completely (when Standby Connect Enabled)

From what I can tell, when using the Power Button in the HBC, the Wii seems to turn off, but it doesn't turn off the video component, which is still outputting a black screen. I have a VCR that normally switches to a blue screen when the Wii powers off, and it stays on the black screen. I can even unplug the wii video cable, which causes the VCR to produce the blue screen again, and then plug the video cable back into the Wii, which switches into the black screen.

This only appears to be happening with the HBC, no other Wii software does this. All of this is happening during the "powered off" state, when the Wii has an orange light, and the Wii can still be turned back on normally during this state. Ooh... let me try it with WiiConnect24 turned off...

Yup. With WiiConnect24 turned off, the Wii stops producing video output as expected. So it seems that in order to get the Wii to stop producing video output while in Standby, you need to shut down the video hardware in a slightly different/more complete way? I'm running 3.3 here, but I prefer to leave my WiiConnect24 on, as I get messages from Nintendo and the Homebrew Browser, and I like to be notified when they arrive.

Should be gone in 1.0.1 --marcan 22:11, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Nope, the bug is still there. Powering off from the Homebrew Channel with wiiConnect24 Standby connect enabled is still leaving the Wii outputting a black screen while it is in standby. I've noticed that when the Wii powers back on, it turns off the video for a split second, probably due to its startup sequence. --Thegamefreak0134 07:10, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

HBC can't read my SDHC card

its a 1.0.2 and i have 4.0 i used bannerbomb. i had HBC through twilight hack at 3.4 but thats becide the point. i can copy all data from my 32m Sd card onto my 8gig SDHC card, but the SHDC's data will never appear on the HBC. Does the new HBC not support SDHC? or is it just me? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nayru (talk • contribs) 22:25, 15 May 2009

Yeah, the HBC 1.02 doesn't support SDHC cards, it seems.--Omni 22:09, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

It's an incompatibility with the SDHC support that Nintendo added in IOS60/61. It will be fixed in the next release -- Bushing 04:30, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Bugs I'm encountering after upgrading from HBC beta 8 to HBC 1.0.2 and 1.0.3

EDIT: now upgaded to 1.0.3 and these issues still exist.

Comments inline. -- Bushing 09:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I see that there's a different site for reporting HBC bugs, but I really don't want to have to register for yet another forum to be able to post my bug reports, so I'm going to post this here, but if anyone wants to copy&pate this information over there, that would be good.

Um, no. It's not a "forum", it's a bugtracker. It's a way we can actually keep track of these things without going insane. I'm glad to have detailed bug reports like this, but expecting someone random to just start cutting and pasting stuff for you is inappropriate.

I'm using a wii with system menu 3.3u and a 2 gig SD card to load homebrew (which I ran through scandisk before installing HBC 1.0.2). Nothing else is modified; no gamecube hardware is plugged into the wii. But because I have a wimmote charging station that plugs into the USB port of the wii, I have wiiconnect24 enabled (so that the wii doesn't totally power down and stop supplying power to the charger via USB port), but I have no internet access (though I have connected it to the internet in the past to update to version 3.3u).

(Quick note on how to do that: I set a wifi adaptor on my PC to "Access Point" mode and connect it to the internet via dial-up, which it then shares on its wifi access point network. Then I go into internet settings for the wii and tell it to look for a wireless access point. It finds my PC's access point, then does the connection test, and I set it to use that connection. Then I say I want to use wiiconnect24, and I agree to the user agreement. But then I go back to internet settings and I Clear the connection settings for the wireless network so that it will never actually be able to connect to the internet -- though this isn't strictly needed, since I don't actually run the access point form my PC anyway.... But wiiconnect24 is "on" so that when I turn off the wii it goes to standby mode -- I get the amber light instead of a red light -- and the wii charging station continues to get power from the USB in the wii....)

And that's my hardware setup....

I had been using HBC 8 beta (installed via Twilight hack), and since it was working fine I never updated to HBC beta 9 (I saw that I'd have to convert some of the invalid elf file, so I just didn't mess with it, since things were working).

With the new release of the hackmii installer and HBC 1.0.2, I decided to try it out on my wii and finally get up-to-date. Installation went smoothly via Bannerbomb with no problems. Then I used the ELF to DOL converter tool on about 7 games which all work fine afterward.

But I am noticing problems with some games not wanting to run now, and some other bugs popping up (I had none of these issues when using beta 8).

First, I noticed the exact same issue reported above: "4.4 HBC Doesn't Power Off Completely (when Standby Connect Enabled)" There's nothing really I can add to that; it's exactly as the other person describes.

Next, I also noticed the issue reported above: "2.1 Black screen after loading bar" This seems to be happening quite a lot compared to when I was using HBC beta 8 (there would occasionally/rarely be similar loading glitches with beta 8, but now it seems to be happening way too often). I have to power down the wii and try to reload the game, and then it will usually load.....

I don't know if any either of those glitches could have to do with the wii not being able to access the internet, even though wiiconnect24 is enabled....

Finally... I seem to have some major issues with incompatibilities with some games. Again, these all ran fine with HBC beta 8, and now they will not run with HBC 1.0.2. It would be great if someone else could verify any of these games are not working for them. I have tried completely deleting them from the SD card and re-installing them from scratch, but still no joy. And just to be completely thorough, I installed these games from scratch onto a separate, new SD card, and I get the same results.

I believe you that you're seeing this problem -- but I can't think of a technical explanation for it. I went and downloaded a few of these to try them. -- Bushing 09:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

I've noticed almost all of these games have something in common, probably having to do with the tools used to create them: they have a "data" folder.... Aspirin = Black screen of no return. Must hold down power button on wii (this one has no "data" folder though, unlike almost all the rest).

works for me -- Bushing 09:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Defendguin = Loading screen shows progress bar, then it just exits to HBC. I think I saw a "read error" or "cannot find error" once" looking for "child.mod" but that files does exist in the data\music\ folder.

works for me -- Bushing 09:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Helium boy = code dump

Works for me. Next time, please at least take a photograph of your screen. Saying "code dump" with no futher details is unhelpful; those numbers are displayed for a reason. -- Bushing 09:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Hexxagon = This one is probably an issue with DosBox and HBC 1.0.2 ; I have the exact same issue reported here: http://wiibrew.org/wiki/Talk:Hexxagon about "Hexxagon not loading." This worked fine with HBC beta 8. I do see a bunch of text on the screen before it drops me into DosBox at the Z: prompt, but it flashes up too fast to read.

Mad Bomber = Loading screen shows progress meter, then it gives a "can't read" error, I think it said, "bizjung.it" but again that file does exist in data\music\

Missile Command = Black screen, then exit to HBC. I actually updated the ELF file I had been using with the ELF to DOL converter before I saw there had been an updated version of this released for HBC 9. I downloaded that, but I get the same result either way trying to run this game on HBC 1.0.2

Paradroid = Black screen, the lights on the wiimote show it to be connected, then after a little while it just exits to the HBC. This one leaves some info in sd:\SDL_error.txt that says (the same errors every time I check):

4.25 20:50:20: Couldn't find DATA/IMAGES/C-FONT.BMP to get its length

4.25 20:50:20: Couldn't find DATA/DATA/FONT.BMP to get its length

Of course, those files do exist....

Teeter Torture = Black screen, then exits to HBC.

Vectoroids = I saw a read error, looking for "decision.s3m" which does exist in data\music

works for me -- Bushing 09:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Wiiero = left a note in sd:\SDL_error.txt (same error every time):

4.25 20:51:37: Couldn't find SPRITES/OTHERS/LITTLE~1.BMP to get its length

The file does exist in that location, as "littlefont.bmp"

Worked for me; even successfully saved configuration to SD. -- Bushing 09:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

If some more people could verify that these games are not working on HBC 1.0.2 (or test them on HBC beta 9 as well) it might be helpful.

Or if someone wants to bring these to the attention of whomever needs to be informed, that would be nice (I really hate having to register for forums all over the internet...).

I really hate having to scour the internet for bug reports -- Bushing 09:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

--Mr. Reaper 02:46, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

It seems that hbc1.0.2 broke the ability of homebrew apps to access the sd card. This is most probably already fixed with 1.0.3 which is not out yet in keeping with the time honored tradition of TT to drag their feet on releases (HBC 1.0.1 being the exception). The apps you mention all try to read from the card and fail if not able to. iiii otoh, tries to read from the card but when it fails it just loads the game anyway. Yossi 03:19, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Ah, thank you for that info. Let's hope they get it fixed up and that they release HBC 1.0.3 quickly, as this is a fairly critical bug.... --Mr. Reaper 04:10, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Yossi's comment is incorrect. HBC does not stay in memory once another program runs; it can't break other apps (and we have not seen it do so). If we can reproduce this, we'll fix it, but until then, we'd just be working blindly. -- Bushing 09:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Well, rats. I was happy to see they'd released 1.0.3 so quickly, hoping it would fix these problems. I downloaded it, installed it, and tested all this stuff to find that nothing had changed. All the issues with the games I reported above still exist in 1.0.3 along with the black screen output on powerdown from within HBC. I won't know if the random (too frequent) "loading, then black screen lockup" bug is still in there until I've used it some more though. They do know about these game issues, right? --Mr. Reaper 04:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)