The "Thundervolt" reference in that post is a project where they cut up a Wii PCB to leave just the DRAM and the processors on the PCB, and then they slap an external DCDC board on top of that cut up PCB to provide power to it, while also undervolting it since you reduce the IR losses.
At this point I'm a bit surprised that nobody has created a netlist of the board and simply reinstalled the relevant chips on it. There has to be more density that can be eked out for easier that way than carefully taking a Dremel to an existing board.
There are a few reasons for it:
- the cut board is compact enough for most/all hobby projects
- you can get Wiis for very cheap nowadays, perhaps cheaper than the parts themselves
- the original board makes heavy use of serpentine tracks. If they are not just to equalize track length, it’d be very hard to account for all delays in a redesign.
ofc I’m not a part of the community so their reasons might be complete different
That's it. And they didn't include the controller ports and other bits. For instance, I don't think it has Bluetooth or WiFi antennas, so it can't connect to Wiimotes or a network.
So if you wanted all of that back, it would be a little bigger. But not by much. Probably the size of the Game Boy Advance in the picture. If that.
But if all you wanted was Smash Bros on a keychain, here you go.
The discussion in the forum points out that the Kawaii doesn't come with any wireless capabilities (they're all trimmed off the board), so unless the console is docked, you seemingly can't control it at all. Perhaps you could come up with a separate controller connector that mates with the plugs on the console without the rest of the dock.
This is absolutely lovely work, and the whole trim concept is mindblowing.
Buuuut yeah I thought similarly - there's no video output, power input or any way to connect controllers without that dock.
Compare it to one of the other tiny builds - https://github.com/loopj/short-stack - which seems to support wireless remotes, has HDMI and takes USB-C for power.
So is this project (a) taking the real Wii parts and putting them on a smaller PCB, (b) a different design with a more efficient same-architecture CPU, or (c) an entirely new design that is emulating the Wii hardware? Can the device run the real Wii OS or is it running a replacement OS capable of launching Wii games?
Check out the short stack GitHub for an overview of how a previous mod was done. Literally chopping up the motherboard to the bare minimum then adding back things with daughterboards https://github.com/loopj/short-stack
There's a long history of people taking an original Wii motherboard and physically trimming the PCB with rotary tools (or a hacksaw) to put them in smaller enclosures, usually to make them portable.
A NES SoC would fit easily within the area of a microSD card containing all ROMs ever published for it, and the embedded controller in the latter would still have a few orders of magnitude more transistors and be faster than it.
You would likely get into “full compatibility” lawyering very quickly. Many of the consoles have weirdo hardware components in some module or another that is still poorly understood.
This is very impressive but I think Short-Stack [1] is a more impressive project because it is a fully fonctionnal Wii (as in, it works on its own as you would expect from a regular Wii) compared to this one where it needs other accessories to be able to play.
> fully fonctionnal Wii (as in, it works on its own as you would expect from a regular Wii) compared to this one where it needs other accessories to be able to play.
I don’t believe the Wii you linked includes an IR bar, which is what your statement led me to expect.
Readit News
https://bitbuilt.net/forums/index.php?threads/thundervolt.62...
That is pretty insane.
- you can get Wiis for very cheap nowadays, perhaps cheaper than the parts themselves
- the original board makes heavy use of serpentine tracks. If they are not just to equalize track length, it’d be very hard to account for all delays in a redesign.
ofc I’m not a part of the community so their reasons might be complete different
https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Nintendo+Wii+Teardown/812
https://guide-images.cdn.ifixit.com/igi/ewv3yZPOujCRpKEj.hug...
That's it. And they didn't include the controller ports and other bits. For instance, I don't think it has Bluetooth or WiFi antennas, so it can't connect to Wiimotes or a network.
So if you wanted all of that back, it would be a little bigger. But not by much. Probably the size of the Game Boy Advance in the picture. If that.
But if all you wanted was Smash Bros on a keychain, here you go.
Buuuut yeah I thought similarly - there's no video output, power input or any way to connect controllers without that dock.
Compare it to one of the other tiny builds - https://github.com/loopj/short-stack - which seems to support wireless remotes, has HDMI and takes USB-C for power.
Some components in this build are reconnected to the board using a flexible PCB connector, but the core is just a cut down OEM Wii board.
And it still has the original controller/memory card ports!
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005006152991376.html
https://www.funkey-project.com
[1]: https://github.com/loopj/short-stack previously discussed 3 months ago here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40071826
I don’t believe the Wii you linked includes an IR bar, which is what your statement led me to expect.
I don't think it's worth the huge amount of effort extra compared to a simple trim.