Reviewed by: Asskick
1. Introduction
2. Packaging
3. The Chip
4. Installation
5. Usage
6. Our tests
7. Conclusion
1. Introduction
Well we’re on the forth generation of Wii modchips, and now we welcome the complete solderless mods which intercept/inject the code directly to our Wii drives via a passthru chip. This means that no longer we will need to remove the Epoxy, solder 5/9/12/24 cables, just a simple 10 minutes ‘plug and play’ (Considering it takes 9 minutes to unscrew the console
) We would like to thank the Flatmod team for being so kind to send some free samples for our review.
This unit compares to most of the market currently, with some extra and unique features not present on the others.
Official Feature List:
• No soldering required,100% SOLDERLESS
• No clip required
• No firmware modification required
• Plug and Play 2 Minutes
• ALL chipsets compatible including EPOXY and D3/d2nothing drives
• 100% FLATMII compatible
• Easy region configuration Switches
• Flash memory SPI
• 3x Speed
• Supports ISO9660/Wii/Gamecube,Multigames and DL discs
• Configurable region free
• Configurable Updates blocker
• Configurable Autoboot (Insert disc and its directly played)
• Configuration disc and JTAG socket for full SPI/ACTEL Hw actel
• EXPRESS CONFIGURATION disc function via EJECT button
• Protect Drive System
2. Packaging
There is no much to talk about here, the package include the solderless mod, and a extra dvd data cable used for the passthru.
3. The Chip
As we’ve said before, this is a COMPLETELLY SOLDERLESS mods. The chip is designed to be connected between your drive and board (this chip is required for newer Wiis which have the Wii DVD Drive controller removed/hidden). But still most of the features presented on the chips that hooks up to the DVD Controller works on this mods, so far we’ve just found 2 draw backs for this kind of mods, there is no GC Audio Fix and that our backups are read at 3x (which it seems it aint that an issue since there are already benchmarks out there comparing 3x reading and 6x reading, making the loading speeds almost identical on both).
The chip comes with a Config Disk which lets you change 3 parameters from your chip, Region Free setting, Update Blocker and AutoBoot. (This disc can be downloaded from their official webpage,
www.flatmod.com)
4. Installation
The first thing you need to do is set the jumpers on your Flatmod to the ones on your region. Check that you have the correct switch position on your Flatmod or else your mod wont work
Onces you have set the mod jumpers correctly, follow the guides available elsewhere to expose your Wii drive (THIS WILL VOID YOUR WII WARRANTY). Once you have your Wii as shown on the picture, you just have to unclip the cable that connects from the Wii DVD Drive, and connect it to the Flatmod Wii Side (has a small label printed on the board). Now connect the cable that came with the mod, to the “DVD” side of the mod, and the other end to the Wii DVD Drive. We recommend you put electric tape all over the mod so it won’t short anything once you put your Wii all back together. To test that the mod is working, your boot up your Wii, you should see a blue led light coming from the mod. If it doesn’t work, check that the cables are inserted correctly, and that the Flatmod jumpers are set to the correct region of the Wii.
5. Usage
Usage is pretty simple, after you have you’re drivemod connected, you just insert your backup/original, and it should load the game onto the game channel.
This particular mod has a feature that we haven’t seen on any other mods, named by the developer “Protect Drive System”, which scans a game when inserted to see the conditions of the disk, and in case it detects that the drive has some severe scratches, it autoejects it to prevent DRE errors or teardown on a long run for the Wii DVD Drive.
Now lets take a closer look on what we can ‘tweak’ on this mod. The chip has a Config Disc, which burns onto a CD, and boots as a GC game.
In order to move between options, you have to do short ‘Reset’ presses. To toggle them on/off, you have to do a long ‘Reset’. Onces modifying what you want, you just have to click on Save config, and you’re done.
Now theres also another option called Config Express Mode, which is another preset config built in onto the mod. This can be enabled by turning on the Wii using the Eject button with no game inserted. When booted on Config Express, the Regionfree part of the mod gets activated, it disabled the update blocker, allows multiboot and disabled the autoboot (for games that are safe to run updates like in NFS Prostreet)
What we liked compared to previous generations (or at least to my Wiifree setup) is that now theres an Autoboot option, which makes games launch directly without having to wait to load on the game channel and click ‘Start’
Now heres something that I was given out to test, Wii/GC Multiiso on a ISO9660 DVD Image. In order to get tests this out I was given a special DOL executable which is the loader for the menu selection. Expect this tools to be released soon by an independend coder of the Wii scene onces they finish tweaking it. I've attached on this review a video I recorded for the multiiso game support. After loading the game, the screen looks black and white since the game I tested was PAL and im running on NTSC devices.
6. Our tests
Wii: NTSC
DVD Drivechip: D2B
We tested serveral brands and type of games, DVD+R, DVD-R, Wii and GC games, we put the results on the following table
- Wii Original DVD (SMG and SSMB) YES
- Wii Single Layer Backup (inc. scrubbed) YES
- Wii Double Layer Backup (inc. scrubbed) YES
- Wii MultiISO Backup YES
- GC Original YES
- GC Backup YES
7. Conclusions
Our impressions of the chip where quite impressive, everything we throw up on it will boot flawlessly. Any casual or hardcore gamer that would love to boot those beloved backups of your original games, wont be disapointed with this solution from the FlatMod team.
Pros:
+ No soldering required
+ Works great since the begging, no fixing required
+ Easy operation
+ SSBB and SMG original plays fine
+ Work on all current versions of Wiis
+ Resellers who sell all the current mods likes Flatmods better
Cons:
- Runs at 3x (you wont notice, but we still mention it)
- No GC audiofix
- You have to use a physical disc to access the chip config menu
Link:
Official Website
Resellers: Check
http://www.flatmod.com/resellers.html for resellers on your region
FlatMod Review
