Gaming Forums => Nintendo Gaming => Topic started by: NeoThunder on November 19, 2012, 02:27:43 PM
Title: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: NeoThunder on November 19, 2012, 02:27:43 PM
Has anyone tried it and had success? I've tried 2 different drives I've had and it never does anything when I'm trying to format them. It just says "checking USB storage device..." And nothing ever happens, and there's never any drive activity while during this process.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Disco Stu on November 19, 2012, 02:38:10 PM
Mine actually freezes up completely every time I try to use mine. I had to unplug it from the wall to make it turn off. I'm also using a bus-powered drive which Nintendo doesn't officially "recommend."
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: ShyGuy on November 19, 2012, 03:20:12 PM
if you are using bus powered are you using dual usb plugs?
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Razorkid on November 19, 2012, 03:35:24 PM
I'm using a Toshiba 1TB drive that has an AC adapter that plugs into the wall. I didn't have any issues last night when I set it up with the system and installed NSMBU onto it. This morning, I moved my whole setup to my bedroom and played NSMBU for the first time and had no issues until about 30min in when everything froze on me, sound included. I turned off the GamePad, but the system wouldn't shut off. When I went to power it down manually, it wouldn't work so I had to unplug the system. When I turned it back on, NSMBU was gone from the menu on my GamePad. Turns out the harddrive some how became disconnected to the system. I checked the connections, power cycled the drive and then everything has been fine.
Just posting my experiences so far.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Disco Stu on November 19, 2012, 04:25:44 PM
if you are using bus powered are you using dual usb plugs?
I'm not right now. I can't seem to find a cable from Toshiba that would plug into my hard drive.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Razorkid on November 19, 2012, 07:49:22 PM
I noticed that when I power on my system, the harddrive comes on too, but it takes a few minutes after I've logged into my account and am at the WiiU screen for it to boot up register on the system. So when I initially get to the home screen, there aren't any downloaded games or the little USB icon at the bottom indicating a drive is attached. When I wait a few minutes, or go to another menu and come back, it pops up along with my games. Just an FYI for other folks who have harddrives attached and may be freaking out when their drive and downloaded games don't show up immediately upon boot up. I'm hoping Nintendo fixes this in an update, but as long as I know it's not a hardware failure on the WiiU or harddrive end, I can wait a few minutes to have my stuff pop up.
To those who own a 3DS, it's like when you boot back into your home screen from a game and all the downloaded software doesn't show for a few seconds before populating back into their places.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Kairon on November 20, 2012, 09:20:29 PM
I got a Western Digital 2 TB Desktop Elements Drive. I intentionally chose that model as it sounded very simple, with no/few frills like special software or etc., and because it had a dedicated outlet power cord. It arrived in the mail yesterday and pretty much worked right out of the box after a 3 step setup process for the HDD and like, a 10 second setup on the Wii U side to format the brand new drive. Transferring data from my Wii U's memory to the HDD's memory was also pretty speedy, definitely MUCH faster than downloading!
I proceeded to play the rest of the night, with Mighty Switch Force HD that was stored on the HDD, and with Nintendo Land which had an update stored on the HDD.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: MrPhishfood on November 20, 2012, 09:32:57 PM
I think USB hard drives tend to have a power saving mode where if its not being used then the magnetic disks stop spinning and it takes a while for them to start up again. Its probably the Wii U that's not accounting for the startup spin and thus it doesn't recognise the drive on the first attempt.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Kytim89 on November 28, 2012, 12:59:03 AM
Can you use USB flash drives without any issues for the Wii U?
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: azeke on November 28, 2012, 01:11:53 AM
Can anyone confirm that partitioning the disk indeed won't work? It would be a waste to use all of my 600Gb hard drive just for a dozens Gb actually needed for Wii U games.
If not i will just use my two old ass 150Gb IDE-hard drives with IDE to USB connectors. It's not gonna look pretty though.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: leahsdad on November 28, 2012, 12:22:33 PM
Can anyone confirm that partitioning the disk indeed won't work? It would be a waste to use all of my 600Gb hard drive just for a dozens Gb actually needed for Wii U games.
If not i will just use my two old ass 150Gb IDE-hard drives with IDE to USB connectors. It's not gonna look pretty though.
That brings up a good question. Anyone try or have issues with sticking old hard drives into hard drive enclosures yet (you know, the enclosures you can get for like $20 on Newegg?)? I have an old 300 GB IDE drive (that's right, IDE) in a $20 Rosewill enclosure, but I have yet to try it out because my Wii U is still "in the shop" up in Redmond. I figure, as MrPhishfood pointed out, that since enclosures are cheap and "no frills," my chance of success is high.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Oblivion on November 28, 2012, 12:26:47 PM
What's an enclosure? I know what a partition is, but I'm not sure.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: RedBlue on November 28, 2012, 01:47:22 PM
What's an enclosure? I know what a partition is, but I'm not sure.
An enclosure is for making an internal hard drive into an external usb hard drive
I brought it up, so I'll try to be a bit more descriptive. It's basically this little metal box that you stick any old hard drive into. Great way to repurpose an old harddrive that has outlived its usefulness for you in your main computer.
If you have an older drive (let's say, under 500 gb) then it's most likely and IDE drive (connector is about 2 inches wide). If you have a newer drive (1 tB or more) then it's most likely a SATA drive (connector is a tiny little red thing).
Enclosures tend to run between $20 to $40. Very easy to set up (literally, pop it open, stick in old hard drive, connector wire, close it up, you're ready to rock). Here's the one I plan to use: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182142)
You should also be warned that enclosures come in 2 general flavors, 2.5 and 3.5. 3.5 inchers tend to be for old, normal sized hard drives you'd find in your PC. They need to be plugged in with a separate AC adapter for power. 2.5 inchers are smaller harddrives for notebook computers. They don't need an external power source, as they come with those little y-shaped usb cables (1 for data, 1 for power). But according to Nintendo, these are not recommended for Wii U use.
As Louieturkey said, these SHOULD work. I just wonder if they really will, since these can used just about any hard drive you have lying around.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Louieturkey on November 28, 2012, 07:27:27 PM
As Louieturkey said, these SHOULD work. I just wonder if they really will, since these can used just about any hard drive you have lying around.
They could have a problem with them being IDE drives instead of SATA drives. But as long as the controller in the enclosure does a good job of converting the signal from IDE to USB, it shouldn't have any problem.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: leahsdad on December 07, 2012, 08:22:00 AM
As Louieturkey said, these SHOULD work. I just wonder if they really will, since these can used just about any hard drive you have lying around.
They could have a problem with them being IDE drives instead of SATA drives. But as long as the controller in the enclosure does a good job of converting the signal from IDE to USB, it shouldn't have any problem.
Finally got my Wii U back from Redmond yesterday, and I'm happy to say that my external enclosure works perfectly, even though it's just a super-old IDE drive. I would highly recommend this method if you've got any old harddrive lying around and you want to save some money for your Wii U storage solution.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: NWR_insanolord on December 07, 2012, 08:25:20 AM
Has anyone found a bus-powered drive that works right with the Wii U? Electrical outlets are at a premium for me, and I'd rather not have to take one up with this if I don't have to.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: leahsdad on December 07, 2012, 08:26:04 AM
I would also add that data transfer rates seem fast....very fast for a Nintendo product. I moved Zombi U, nearly 6 gigs, onto my USB enclosure in about as many minutes (5 or 6). I still remember fridge cleaning on the Wii OG. Man, just transferring 10 VC NES games seemed to take forever!
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: BranDonk Kong on December 07, 2012, 08:30:26 AM
Has anyone found a bus-powered drive that works right with the Wii U? Electrical outlets are at a premium for me, and I'd rather not have to take one up with this if I don't have to.
Any drive should work in theory. I have a 2.5" 320GB HDD on my original Wii and it's only powered by a single USB cable. If the Wii can do it, I'm sure the Wii U can do it.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: leahsdad on December 07, 2012, 08:31:33 AM
Has anyone found a bus-powered drive that works right with the Wii U? Electrical outlets are at a premium for me, and I'd rather not have to take one up with this if I don't have to.
I had read somewhere that those were not recommended by Nintendo...something about the spin rates of the platters affecting the way the Wii U accesses data?
And is it me, or is there no way to just keep the save data on the Wii U internal memory....the Wii U seems to just move everything wholesale onto the USB disk, which is kinda lame, because on the off-chance that my USB hard drive fails one day (which is certainly possible), I'd rather not lose my save data as well as my game file.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: NWR_insanolord on December 07, 2012, 08:35:37 AM
Has anyone found a bus-powered drive that works right with the Wii U? Electrical outlets are at a premium for me, and I'd rather not have to take one up with this if I don't have to.
Any drive should work in theory. I have a 2.5" 320GB HDD on my original Wii and it's only powered by a single USB cable. If the Wii can do it, I'm sure the Wii U can do it.
Yeah, I know that was the case, and Nintendo's warnings are likely them being their usual overly-cautious selves, but I don't have a drive lying around and if I'm going to spend a decent chunk of money on one I'd prefer to have something that's already been tested and been shown to work.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: leahsdad on December 07, 2012, 09:06:41 AM
I would also add that data transfer rates seem fast....very fast for a Nintendo product. I moved Zombi U, nearly 6 gigs, onto my USB enclosure in about as many minutes (5 or 6).
Whoa, I think I have to amend my previous statement. Data transfer from Wii U to USB storage is very fast. The other way around, however.....
I changed my mind, decided to just keep my games on the Wii U internal storage for the short term, and thought "Hey, I'll just pop it back onto the internal storage." 30 MINUTES LATER, still moving Zombi U back, at about 80% complete. I don't know whether the bottleneck here is my USB hard drive's read speed, or the Wii U's write speed. But the difference is huge. Literally, about 1 gig per minute leaving the Wii U. Coming back to the Wii U...I'm guessing Zombi U will take about 40 to 45 minutes.
Anyone else experience this? Is it just my crappy USB hard drive, or a poor Nintendo engineering decision?
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Gamejunkie on December 09, 2012, 09:34:46 AM
Has anyone found a bus-powered drive that works right with the Wii U? Electrical outlets are at a premium for me, and I'd rather not have to take one up with this if I don't have to.
I had read somewhere that those were not recommended by Nintendo...something about the spin rates of the platters affecting the way the Wii U accesses data?
And is it me, or is there no way to just keep the save data on the Wii U internal memory....the Wii U seems to just move everything wholesale onto the USB disk, which is kinda lame, because on the off-chance that my USB hard drive fails one day (which is certainly possible), I'd rather not lose my save data as well as my game file.
I don't think Nintendo have ever said that regards bus powered hard drives. They do recommend you use hard drives that have their own power supply. However they've said USB bus powered drives should work just fine but you may have to use a USB Y cable connected to two of the Wii U's USB ports in order to provide enough power.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Razorkid on December 09, 2012, 09:46:16 AM
I would also add that data transfer rates seem fast....very fast for a Nintendo product. I moved Zombi U, nearly 6 gigs, onto my USB enclosure in about as many minutes (5 or 6).
Whoa, I think I have to amend my previous statement. Data transfer from Wii U to USB storage is very fast. The other way around, however.....
I changed my mind, decided to just keep my games on the Wii U internal storage for the short term, and thought "Hey, I'll just pop it back onto the internal storage." 30 MINUTES LATER, still moving Zombi U back, at about 80% complete. I don't know whether the bottleneck here is my USB hard drive's read speed, or the Wii U's write speed. But the difference is huge. Literally, about 1 gig per minute leaving the Wii U. Coming back to the Wii U...I'm guessing Zombi U will take about 40 to 45 minutes.
Anyone else experience this? Is it just my crappy USB hard drive, or a poor Nintendo engineering decision?
I have all my WiiU games on my USB harddrive and performance is fine when loading up games and playing them (no slower loading from disc vs harddrive). I'm curious, why are you transferring your stuff back onto the internal storage? The bottleneck is certainly the WiiU's internal storage write speed for transferring stuff, but I doubt it affects loading time negatively for games.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: DigitalGreenTea on December 09, 2012, 10:57:11 AM
I noticed that when I power on my system, the harddrive comes on too, but it takes a few minutes after I've logged into my account and am at the WiiU screen for it to boot up register on the system. So when I initially get to the home screen, there aren't any downloaded games or the little USB icon at the bottom indicating a drive is attached. When I wait a few minutes, or go to another menu and come back, it pops up along with my games. Just an FYI for other folks who have harddrives attached and may be freaking out when their drive and downloaded games don't show up immediately upon boot up. I'm hoping Nintendo fixes this in an update, but as long as I know it's not a hardware failure on the WiiU or harddrive end, I can wait a few minutes to have my stuff pop up.
Do you use a Harddrive without an AC Adapter? Because Nintendo recommends one that has an external power supply. That is because the Wii U can't give out that much power through the USB port because it needs the power for itself, it's not a PC. That could be why the Harddrive goes on when you turn on the Wii U and causes longer loading times.
I'm getting one soon too, the ones who use an AC Adapter have more storage than usual Harddrives - I think I'll go with 1-2 TB so I never have to worry about this problem ever again. Plus, these things are cheap actually! :-)
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Razorkid on December 09, 2012, 04:29:11 PM
I noticed that when I power on my system, the harddrive comes on too, but it takes a few minutes after I've logged into my account and am at the WiiU screen for it to boot up register on the system. So when I initially get to the home screen, there aren't any downloaded games or the little USB icon at the bottom indicating a drive is attached. When I wait a few minutes, or go to another menu and come back, it pops up along with my games. Just an FYI for other folks who have harddrives attached and may be freaking out when their drive and downloaded games don't show up immediately upon boot up. I'm hoping Nintendo fixes this in an update, but as long as I know it's not a hardware failure on the WiiU or harddrive end, I can wait a few minutes to have my stuff pop up.
Do you use a Harddrive without an AC Adapter? Because Nintendo recommends one that has an external power supply. That is because the Wii U can't give out that much power through the USB port because it needs the power for itself, it's not a PC. That could be why the Harddrive goes on when you turn on the Wii U and causes longer loading times.
I'm getting one soon too, the ones who use an AC Adapter have more storage than usual Harddrives - I think I'll go with 1-2 TB so I never have to worry about this problem ever again. Plus, these things are cheap actually! :-)
My USB 3.0 harddrive is AC powered. The problem has been fixed with the giant firmware update from last week. What was happening was my harddrive wouldn't be recognized until I went into system settings and then backed out again. Magically the drive would show up along with all my digital games. Previously, if I just bulled on and played something on disk, I would be missing progress or it would start up an old save. Now since the firmware update, I log into my profile and everything pops up immediately. Makes me doubly happy that it was a Nintendo problem (not with my 1TB Harddrive) and that they fixed it quickly.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: leahsdad on December 10, 2012, 04:10:12 PM
I'm curious, why are you transferring your stuff back onto the internal storage? The bottleneck is certainly the WiiU's internal storage write speed for transferring stuff, but I doubt it affects loading time negatively for games.
Why? Well, because I don't trust technology, I'm afraid of my harddrive failing one day and taking my save file with it :-)
But also, I realize that at this point, I was being silly moving everything onto the external when I had plenty of space on the internal for the 3 games that I own (Mario, Zombiu, Trine 2). And I save myself from walking over to my media shelves, bending down to where the hard drive is, flipping the power switch on the back....
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Razorkid on December 11, 2012, 01:09:43 AM
Ah, I forgot you have an enclosure. That makes sense then to avoid having to switch the thing on and such. If your WiiU dies, you still got a data problem. Get an external man! Mine turns on when the WiiU boots up and it feels so liberating having all that storage ready to fill up.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: PorkNBeans on December 11, 2012, 04:42:48 AM
Just ordered a 2TB drive last night, I'm hoping they'll eventually allow us to record to the external whether it be game footage or via TVii. Either way I only spent 109 for the supported Toshiba 2TB, was well worth the cash in my personal opinion.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: leahsdad on December 11, 2012, 12:02:48 PM
Ah, I forgot you have an enclosure. That makes sense then to avoid having to switch the thing on and such. If your WiiU dies, you still got a data problem. Get an external man! Mine turns on when the WiiU boots up and it feels so liberating having all that storage ready to fill up.
Well, it's easy to say "go buy a new expensive external hard drive" when I have a perfectly good enclosure and spare hard drive lying around. Tell me, do you enjoy being rich and being able to buy stuff willy nilly whenever you want?
Disclosure: Just kidding about the "rich" comment. If you did a search on my recent posts in the forums, you would see that I just posted about comparing the internet browser speed of the Gamepad to my brand new Ipad 4. :-) Hypocrite, thee is I!
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: Razorkid on December 11, 2012, 07:37:14 PM
Ah, I forgot you have an enclosure. That makes sense then to avoid having to switch the thing on and such. If your WiiU dies, you still got a data problem. Get an external man! Mine turns on when the WiiU boots up and it feels so liberating having all that storage ready to fill up.
Well, it's easy to say "go buy a new expensive external hard drive" when I have a perfectly good enclosure and spare hard drive lying around. Tell me, do you enjoy being rich and being able to buy stuff willy nilly whenever you want?
Disclosure: Just kidding about the "rich" comment. If you did a search on my recent posts in the forums, you would see that I just posted about comparing the internet browser speed of the Gamepad to my brand new Ipad 4. :-) Hypocrite, thee is I!
No, it's cool and I'm totally of the school of putting to good use what's lying around before buying something new. I've been so spoiled by Steam, psp go, and now 3DS that I'll happily invest in something that's gonna ensure my gaming is as immediate and convenient as possible.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: azeke on August 15, 2013, 11:17:03 PM
If not i will just use my two old ass 150Gb IDE-hard drives with IDE to USB connectors. It's not gonna look pretty though.
So. Yesterday when DuckTales couldn't fit into Wii U basic fridge space, i finally did it.
It looks like this: (http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3395/3661728576_03ba54b436.jpg) Luckily i managed to hide all that frankenstein thing behind my TV.
First i tried to connect that ancient hard drive to my computer to check if it holds some data i might want to recover from, but it acted up or something and was constantly reconnecting.
Then i gave up on that, and just connected it to Wii U and formatted the whole thing.
It works great so far. Despite that it says it's connected through USB 1 (!), it works at about the same speed as internal memory (Trine 2 loading times are definitely the same).
I had to mess around with saves a bit though, apparently you HAVE to place save and the game data on the same drive, and i honestly would prefer if all my saves went to internal memory, just for safety, in case my old hard drive will die on me.
When i turn my Wii U on, i can hear engine in the hard drive stopping and heads parking, so i think i will be just leaving hard drive power on 24/7, because drive's not working when Wii U is off and because i'm too lazy to mess around with these cables each time.
When i turn Wii U on, it takes some time for hard drive to boot, so Wii U actually boots up faster. Then it shows me some message that i should (re-)connect hard drives only when console is turned off and reboots again. By that time hard drive is fully operational and everything loads up as usual.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: toddra on August 16, 2013, 12:42:23 PM
I have a question, what is the theoretical largest drive a Wii U could read? I have several different drives and one I will be allocating to PS4 when I get it and one to the Wii U when/if I get it. I just want to make sure I don't give the Wii U something larger than it can handle.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: TJ Spyke on August 16, 2013, 12:49:19 PM
I have a question, what is the theoretical largest drive a Wii U could read? I have several different drives and one I will be allocating to PS4 when I get it and one to the Wii U when/if I get it. I just want to make sure I don't give the Wii U something larger than it can handle.
From their online FAQ (http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/systems/wiiu/en_na/system_external_storage.jsp?menu=general_info&submenu=wup-external-usb-storage):
If the Wii U has the most recent system update installed, it will be able to recognize a storage device of any size, but 2TB will be the maximum amount of storage capacity that can be used. Any extra capacity in the storage device beyond the 2TB will not be accessible via the Wii U.
Title: Re: WiiU external hard drive
Post by: toddra on August 16, 2013, 12:56:51 PM
thanks for the reply. all of mine are below 2TB so I will be fine.
