Here is the thread about my exploration…
http://forum.wiibrew.org/read.php?8,1693

I really need a few concrete menu patches and some advice. Hope I get some.

i have 3.3 with tp hack(at least i hope so, can’t remember deleting it from my system)

it just stops after the warning screen, leaving a black screen and menu music and the mote keep connected.

Now i know i would still need to buy a chip. but are there any chips that can autoboot without the starfall or without the dongle?

and if not, when will you guys show how you made this so people can be helped out with this?

1) It’s a hand-made device that plugs into the memory-card slot (closer to a USBGecko than to a memory card, but much simpler)

2) The system menu queries the EXI ID of any devices present in the memory card slot upon bootup, at the end of main(). If it detects the right ID, it runs BS2BootIRD(); otherwise, it executes BS2Entry() (which then calls mainmenu(), which then calls ipl::System::init and ipl::System:run).

3) disassembly of the system menu.

4) Likely. We’ve concentrated on looking for a lower-level tool that would explain how they were doing the initial NAND flash programming, etc, so I initially overlooked the significance of this.

If the bootup sequence goes something like this:
* boot0
* boot1
* boot2
* mount NAND filesystem
* load System Menu
* load IOS30
* Run system menu
* main()
* load settings.txt and SYSCONF from NAND (?)
* check for dongle
* load resources from NAND (including HTML resources)
* load list of channels, including all banners
* display “channel screen”

… you’ll see that this will only make a difference if the boot process gets all the way from boot0 to the dongle check. Thus, if the system menu dies during those last three steps, you can use an appropriately created disk to fix the problem.

In this case, “appropriately created” means “a valid Wii disc with a valid signature that has a valid system update on it, or passes BS2IsDiagDisc(), or both”.

Is the device a modified memory card, or is it something else?

How does the device put the Wii into recovery mode?

How did you find it?

Do you believe that this is the factory tool that is used with a factory disk to recover dead Wii’s sent in via warranty claims? (Like the previous factory blog posts, I am curious as to how they repair RMA’d or yield defects.)

Twilight Princess is still the only way of running homebrew for unchipped users.

1) (With an unchipped Wii) Do you have to use pressed autoboot disks to make this work, or can it used burned autoboot disks as well?
2) If it can used burned autoboot disks (without a drivechip) would it work with your Open-Source Apploader ISO Template? For example: to boot the HBC installer.
3) Do you have plans to release how you did this? Maybe a guide or tutorial on how to make it? Maybe schematics or something?

If it doesn’t require a drivechip to work, then it could be a great alternative to getting homebrew working on my friends’ Wiis without having to worry about scratching Twilight Princess. That way I could just burn a disk with the HBC installer with it set to autoboot and use that instead.

Can anyone confirm that this chip actually doesn’t support autoboot?

If you haven’t done anything strange, then 3.2 vs. 3.3 works to tell whether fakesigned discs will work. If you’ve screwed with your system (downgrades or whatever), then you should know whether you’re using the new IOS30 or the old IOS30, and that’s what matters.

Because I’m curious, why would it matter, as long as you’ve downgraded. Doesn’t downgrading reverse all the effects of upgrading? If not… what exactly ISN’T reversed that doesn’t allow this dongle to fix the problem?