42 replies to this topic

[Cheese007]

http://uk.wii.ign.co...6/746907p1.html

[remowilliams]

Wow - that would blow!

VC stuff is tied strictly to the console too it says, that's not cool either.

[jbanes]

Yeah, that's the thing that sucks about modern consoles. With all these firmware updates, too many of them are turning into bricks. With the PSP, the only solution (apparently) is to send it into Sony for repair. Of course, they charge a flat rate of $100 to fix it. Even worse, the update is on many game discs as a required update, so it's not like you can choose *not* to update.

From the article:

Quote

You can contact Nintendo customer service and they will ship a new console to you in 3-4 business days. Option #2 requires that Nintendo send you a shipping label which should take 4-10 business days. Once you receive the shipping label, you can use it to send the console to Nintendo for repairs, after which they will send it back to you.

Excellent Nintendo service strikes again!
  

[awsomo3000]

yeah, with nintendos great service this problem dosn't seem that bad to me, I mean as long as you can get another one without paying any extra its fine with em, it would suck to be without one for a while though.

[supercat]

Cheese007, on Mon Nov 20, 2006 8:03 PM, said:

http://uk.wii.ign.co...6/746907p1.html

Funny... my 2600 never had any BIOS issues.

[-^Cro§Bow^-]

Might also explain the up to 15month warranty they have for the Wii. I don't know how many updates Nintendo plans to make between now and then. But I would imagine only a few more major firmware updates. Once they have all the stuff in there they need, the rest will likely be downloads from the Channel shopping area...

[Inky]

Where's sega saturn x when you need him?

[esquire]

Well, I can confirm this.  My Wii is now useless thanks to the update.  It no longer recognizes any discs, Wii or Gamecube.  Moreover, the Shopping Channel is dead.  Whenever I go to this channel, I get a black screen and my controller is disabled.  I have to reset the Wii.  Additionally the News Channel tells me I need to update my Wii before using it, but when I go to update it says my Wii is already updated.  Great.  

Now I understand that Ninntendo may have great customer service, but this is totally unaceptable for a new system release.  As I stood in line yesterday, we all laughed about the PS3's costs and the troubles people were having with HDMI and firmware updates for the controllers.  I now have 7 games, plus 3 on order, Wii points card, and two extra controllers sitting on the shelf useless.  So much for a fun filled holiday weekend.  Thank God for the XBOX 360 and Gears of War.

[Shannon]

From what I have seen regarding failures in systems that can do firmware upgrades lately the problem is usually a result of a hardware issue.  Chances are if you survive the first few updates then your hardware is fine.

Chances are the failure was a fluke.  I suppose only time will tell as the reports start coming in.  It sure sucks though.  Even I have this irrational fear of hooking up my 360 to live and getting firmware updates.  

[slip81]

Ugg, I really wanted to get one of these soon too.

Maybe I'm just old fashioned, but when I buy an electronic for a few hundred or few thousand dollars I expect it to work perfectly from the start. And I don't think that's such a crazy idea, these companies have billions of dollars, they could iron out all the bugs first.

Anyway, I'll still be buying one, but I'll wait now till long after Christmas when they are overstocked and get the EB warranty, that way if it breaks I just take it to the local EB and get a new one same day.

[Tempest]

Wow!  Is it just me or is it Nintendo that's dropping the ball on their system first rather than Sony?  I know that all systems have issues when they're first released, but I've heard of 4 problems on the Wii for every 1 on the PS3.  I would have guessed it would be just the opposite.

Tempest

[Lord Helmet]

supercat, on Mon Nov 20, 2006 9:14 PM, said:

Cheese007, on Mon Nov 20, 2006 8:03 PM, said:

http://uk.wii.ign.co...6/746907p1.html

Funny... my 2600 never had any BIOS issues.

..but we aren't talking about the 2600


I ran the update and had no problems.

esquire, on Mon Nov 20, 2006 10:55 PM, said:

Additionally the News Channel tells me I need to update my Wii before using it, but when I go to update it says my Wii is already updated.  Great.  

That's because the weather channel and the news channel are not yet available. Sucks your system is bricked though. Hopefully Nintendo will hook you up with a replacement quickly.

Edited by Lord Helmet, Tue Nov 21, 2006 9:10 AM.

[jbanes]

Tempest, on Tue Nov 21, 2006 9:07 AM, said:

Wow!  Is it just me or is it Nintendo that's dropping the ball on their system first rather than Sony?  I know that all systems have issues when they're first released, but I've heard of 4 problems on the Wii for every 1 on the PS3.  I would have guessed it would be just the opposite.

Before you jump the gun, do keep in mind that a lot fewer people have played the PS3. Some of the first round eBay systems have been shipped, but a LOT are still working their way into the hands of their owners.

I'm not saying that the PS3 won't be smelling like roses when this is all done, but it's kind of hard to judge yet.

[esquire]

Just a quick update here (no pun intended,   ):

NOA is shipping me a new Wii via UPS overnight 2-3 days, so hopefully I'll have it by the weekend.  

The representative said my situation was probably due to an internal problem and not the update.  I asked her what is the best way to connect, wireless router, and if so what brand, or via the USB Wi-Fi connector, so I could avoid any future problems.  She said it shouldn't really matter as the Wii is pretty flexible.  I told her I wanted to know because I would be a little hesitant running future updates, to which she responded its not the updates, and it was an internal problem which was exacerbated by the update.

So I guess for those who are hesitant to run the updates, I'd suggest you do them now while you are still in your 12 month warranty, because if there is something wrong internally with your Wii, better to find out now than later when you are outside the warranty.

Edited by esquire, Tue Nov 21, 2006 9:38 AM.

[Tempest]

jbanes, on Tue Nov 21, 2006 10:20 AM, said:

Tempest, on Tue Nov 21, 2006 9:07 AM, said:

Wow!  Is it just me or is it Nintendo that's dropping the ball on their system first rather than Sony?  I know that all systems have issues when they're first released, but I've heard of 4 problems on the Wii for every 1 on the PS3.  I would have guessed it would be just the opposite.

Before you jump the gun, do keep in mind that a lot fewer people have played the PS3. Some of the first round eBay systems have been shipped, but a LOT are still working their way into the hands of their owners.

I'm not saying that the PS3 won't be smelling like roses when this is all done, but it's kind of hard to judge yet.

Yeah true enough.  This reminds me of the whole Xbox 360 overheating issue for some reason.

Tempest

[MCHufnagel]

This whole need to upgrade the firmware for both the Wii and PS3 is plain BULLSHIT! It's one thing to upgrade months down the road to make things run more efficient or to add value to the system. It's an entirely different matter for a piece of equipment to need an upgrade the first week it's out. It just shows that the manufacturer didn't do their job and released the equipment when it wasn't ready.

The manufacturers are lazy because they know that they can offer a quick fix over the internet. The consumers are stupid for putting up with this kind of crap. It was bad enough for PC (and now console) games needing updates to work properly, but now for hardware needing to do so is just pathetic.

[Zonie]

Sounds like a new GM car. Wait a year until the bugs are worked out and buy one then...cheaper, usually.

[privateers69]

MCHufnagel, on Tue Nov 21, 2006 10:59 AM, said:

This whole need to upgrade the firmware for both the Wii and PS3 is plain BULLSHIT! It's one thing to upgrade months down the road to make things run more efficient or to add value to the system. It's an entirely different matter for a piece of equipment to need an upgrade the first week it's out. It just shows that the manufacturer didn't do their job and released the equipment when it wasn't ready.

The manufacturers are lazy because they know that they can offer a quick fix over the internet. The consumers are stupid for putting up with this kind of crap. It was bad enough for PC (and now console) games needing updates to work properly, but now for hardware needing to do so is just pathetic.

Far as I know the Wii has been in production since August (dunno about the PoS 3   ) But anyway there's has been some time in between the start and the launch of the system to have warrent a update.

[-^Cro§Bow^-]

This is true enough. The Wiis that we have are some of the first ones made. This means they will have older firmware on them to begin with.

Have NONE of you ever bough replacement motherboards for PCs? Did you ever get one that DID have the latest Bios update on it? I can tell you that at least when I did IBMs all the time, IBM never put the latest firmware on the mobos. They just put the same ole 1st released bios and pushed it out the door. So...we always had to run a Bios update when replacing the mobo in the PCs we serviced. It was crazy, because there were times when the bios load didn't go as planned, and yeah...you had yourself about a $200 green frisbee.

Point is the Wii units were made before the latest updates were available. How else was nintendo supposed to get the updates into all the units made? Upgrade with a disc prior to shipping? That might have been possible. But it requires resources, and I've no doubt that it was simply a matter of cost and was decided that it would be much easier to just make the updates available via the Wiiconnect.

What I don't quite agree with is how the rep stated they felt it wasn't a problem with the update as it was a problem with the hardware inside the Wii. I disagree. What I suspect is happening on these updates, is that the update itself is fine...but it likely gets corrupted during the download (which is possible from all the other people grabbing this stuff), and then is corrupted once installed in the Wii. At this point you have a corrupted OS more or less in the Wii and it won't boot or function properly.

I can tell you that in the future, updates via a direct connection will likely be more reliable than Wi-Fi. Afterall all it takes to corrupt the data signal for even a nanosecond is, someone turning on the TV that might be between the router and the Wii. Or picking up that cordless digital telephone, or GASP...heating up a hotdog in the nuker...as that will certainly kill any Wi-Fi signals pretty much.

Edited by -^Cro§Bow^-, Tue Nov 21, 2006 10:53 AM.

[jbanes]

-^Cro§Bow^-, on Tue Nov 21, 2006 10:52 AM, said:

What I don't quite agree with is how the rep stated they felt it wasn't a problem with the update as it was a problem with the hardware inside the Wii. I disagree. What I suspect is happening on these updates, is that the update itself is fine...but it likely gets corrupted during the download (which is possible from all the other people grabbing this stuff), and then is corrupted once installed in the Wii. At this point you have a corrupted OS more or less in the Wii and it won't boot or function properly.

I find that to be highly doubtful. Nearly all firmware packages these days come with their MD5 checksum embedded in the download file. The firmware loader will NOT install the update if the checksum doesn't add up. I have a hard time believing that Nintendo would skip such a basic step to ensuring the integrity of the data.

Also, Wifi includes CRC checks in every packet to ensure the sanctity of the data. Every time a packet gets corrupted, the Wifi card drops it and asks for a retransmission.

So I just don't see corruption as being a likely issue here. Unless, that is, the corruption is happening on Nintendo's servers.

[MCHufnagel]

It doesn't matter when these Wii's were made. Why wasn't the firmware right in the first place? Nintendo knew there was a problem, and it should have been fixed before the equipment was released. Now it's up to the consumer to be quality control for the manufacturer and spend their own time upgrading equipment.

It doesn't matter if Nintendo (in this case) spends a lot of money having to upgrade firmware before they sell a product. Next time do a better job and there won't be this expense.

Like I said, it's sad that we as consumers put up with this kind of crap. It will only get worse down the road.

[-^Cro§Bow^-]

MCH:

Just so there isn't any misunderstanding here...the Wii works out of the box with all the games WITHOUT the updates being needed. The main reason for the updates is to enable the ability to transfer saves to the SD card slot and to add the Wii Shopping channel to the Wii. Otherwise I was playing Trauma Center and Zelda for about 6 hours before I even tried to take my Wii online.

[Xot]

So if I successfully downloaded the updates is it safe to say my system won't go brick on me?

[MCHufnagel]

-^Cro§Bow^-, on Tue Nov 21, 2006 12:24 PM, said:

MCH:

Just so there isn't any misunderstanding here...the Wii works out of the box with all the games WITHOUT the updates being needed. The main reason for the updates is to enable the ability to transfer saves to the SD card slot and to add the Wii Shopping channel to the Wii. Otherwise I was playing Trauma Center and Zelda for about 6 hours before I even tried to take my Wii online.

Look, I know that it doesn't affect playing games, but gee the SD card slot and Wii Shopping Channel were there well in advance of selling the product. No excuse for not being able to do those things out of the box. In industries were you can't provide internet updates, those kind of things cause heads to roll.

[warmachine]

I'm sure that it is nintendo's best intrest to make sure
that every wii owner gets these firmware updates so that they can't
do anything with THeir wii that might affect nintendo's profit margins.

I'm sure that there are many more firmware updates ahead.