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Solderless Wii Mod Chip & Wii Version Guide

Thanks to the guys that made Wii-Clip you can now get a wide range of completely solderless Wii mod chip for Wii consoles made up to Sept 2008, for Wii version consoles after that date you can use the solderless mods like DriveKey, WiiKey Fusion & Wode Jukebox, the difference between the chips that use the Wii-Clip and ones like the DriveKey is the Wii-Clip ones clip over a chip on your DVD drive, where chips like the DriveKey connect to the ribbon cable that runs from your Wii motherboard to your DVD drive, both are very easy to install and completely solderless.  The great thing about these Solderless Wii mod chips is that you really do reduce the risk of damaging you Wii when trying to install a chip, as it’s near impossible to stuff up and damage your console. So below we give you a basic guide on which Wii solderless modchip should be used depending on your Wii versions drive type, also each chip will have a little “buyers advice” box which we keep up to date with info on if that chip is outdated now etc. There is pretty much a solderless Wii mod chip for all the different Wii versions on the market, below is a basic run down on what chips are available and what drive types they work in, just below this text is a guide that shows you how to check what Wii version you have and the drive type you have in your Wii console, the first step is to work out what drive type you have in your Wii version and then you can select a chip that best suits your needs and supports your drive type.

Which Drive Type Does My Wii Version Have?


You can use the online Wii version serial checker below to find out what Wii version console you have and the drive type inside such as D2E, D3 or the new D3-2, you just enter the serial number from the back of your Wii into the serial checker and it will tell you which model drive your Wii version has, then you are able to see which of the chips above would best suite your console based on which drive type the serial checker says you have, each chip listed in the guide below has a table that tells you which drive types are supported by that chip, so for example if the Wii version serial checker says you have a D3 drive, your options would be the DriveKey or SunKey lite for example. If the Wii version serial checker does not give you any results, try entering only half of your serial number insetad, also it would be a good idea before you buy any chip to email the store you plan to buy from and just get them to confirm which Wii version you have, most are only to happy to help.The photo below will also show you where the serial number is located on your Wii, the serial numbers will start with an "LU" or "LAH" or "LEH"

If the Wii version serial checker comes up showing anything under a 70% chance of your drive type, you should either open your console and check what is written on the drive controller IC chip or buy a chip that will work with the two Wii version the serial checker believes your console to be. The good news is this serial check is very accurate and it's unlikely you will see anything less than a 90% to 100% match of your Wii version, but like we said above, if the checker comes up with a 60% chance you have a D2C and 40% chance it's a D2B Wii version, you should really open the console to make sure which it really is, or buy a chip like the DriveKey that will works in any Wii version excpet the D3-2 to be safe.

Wii Version Serial Checker

How To Tell Which Wii Version You Have

WARNING

There are two things to know when using the serial checker, first is consoles from Nov 08 to around April 09 have what’s called D2E epoxy drives, the serial checker will refer to them as D2E drives with black glue, so if your Wii version drive type shows up in the Wii serial checker with any chance of it being a D2E covered in black glue (epoxy) you will need to select a chip that supports D2E Epoxy drives such as the DriveKey for example. The other thing to know is since Sept 09 there is another new drive called the D3-2, currently there are no chips that will allow you to play backups of your original games from disk on these new D3-2 drives, there are a couple of solutions for this, the first being that you can swap your D3-2 drive for an older drive such as a D2C for example and then you can use which ever chip you like that supports D2C drives, there are also pre-modded Wii DVD drive packs available from stores that ship with a D2C drive replacement and also a Solderless WiiKey 2, the other solution would be the Wode & WiiKey Fusion, the Wode Jukebox allows you to boot your games from an external USB hard drive, and the WiiKey fusion allows you to boot from SD memory cards, soon the Wode Jukebox will also support external USB DVD Rom drives and then you would be able to connect one of these to the Wode Jukebox and load backups of your original games on the external DVD rom drive if you are a D3-2 Wii version owner.

 

Wii Solderless ModChip Types DMS to D3-2

Totaly solderless WiiKey Mod for DMS D2B Drives

Solderless Wii Mod Chip Wiikey
This package is used for those people that have the old DMS or D2B Wii version consoles without the legs cut off, it’s just a simple install of just clipping on the chip and off you go. You will still need to use the config disk to enable all region, and make sure the chip is running the latest firmware, but these chips really are the safest and best way to chip your DMS or D2B without the legs cut off, the price on these is also quite reasonable. The WiiKey is updated by DVD and you can download the latest firmware update DVD and config disk from the WiiKey homepage link below. Since it’s release the WiiKey has been the chosen chip for these older models over all the other chips in the market, and this is mainly because of their vigilant work with updates and all round compatibility, if you are the owner of an older Wii console like the DMS the solderless WiiKey will the best choice for your console.

Official WiiKey Website

Wii Version Supported DMS D2B D2C D2C2 D2E
Epoxy
D2E
D3
 D3~2
Buyers Advice (Updated Jan 24th 2010)

This chip is no longer sold by most places and is outdated, if you have a DMS or D2B Wii version console the best chip to look at would be the Solderless WiiKey 2.

 

 

 

 

 

 

What was 31 wires is now 0 with this solderless d2ckey

Wii Solderless ModChip D2CKey
Here we have the solderless D2CKey mod chip which is used only in D2C Wii version consoles, the D2CKey was the very first chip released for the D2C console and we believe is still the most stable due to its high wire count. These clips make installing the D2CKey a walk in the park compared to wires, as these chips had a total count of 31-wires including the power and ground, using these Wii mod chip solderless D2CKey turn what would have been a nightmare into a job even a novice could handle. If you are the owner of a D2C wii console we would recommend looking at this before the solderless D2Pro, simply because they are cheaper and will do the same job. Note that the D2CKey is not updatable, but with saying that there will be no real reason to have them updated. Because the D2CKey is so many wires, it means the chip is not doing much emulation onboard and hard patching the Wii controller chip, this is a very stable and compatible way of doing a chip, so unlike the D2Pro or WiiKey which are low wires and do a lot of function emulation on the chip, which can lead to incompatibilities and then an update for the chips needs to be released if a problem occurs with a game, the D2CKey because of it’s method and total hardware patching means that it’s an almost certainty they will never need an update or be incompatible with any game. So for those that have a Wii version D2C console and were worried about the D2CKey not having updates, don’t be, because in reality the D2CKey would never need to be updated anyway.

Official D2CKey Website

Wii Version Supported DMS D2B D2C D2C2 D2E
Epoxy
D2E
D3
 D3~2
Buyers Advice (Updated Jan 24th 2010)

These are still sold by a few places and are quite cheap, but have been known to have issues due to the amount of points used on the Wii-Clip, if you are after a chip for a D2C drive, the next best option for around the same price is the SunKey Lite Solderless D2Sun, and the best solution for a D2C drive is the Solderless WiiKey 2.

 

 

 

D2Pro Solderless For D2C2 Consoles

Solderless D2Pro ModChip
Here we have the very latest solderless D2Pro chip, these bad boys are meant to be used on those nasty new D2C2 Wii version consoles that were found in the US market since late march and have started showing up in other markets around the end of April, they are also used on the latest chipset D2E which came on to the world markets around July, the D2Pro team were the first to release a working solution for both these D2C2 & D2E consoles, and now you can get them in a Wii mod chip solderless version for simple installation. You can use these solderless d2pro in D2C consoles as well, but like we said above, there is not really any difference between the D2CKey and D2Pro when it comes to the D2C consoles, so you might as well save some money if you are a D2C console owner and grab the solderless d2ckey instead. But if you are the owner of one of these new D2C2 or D2E Wii, these solderless D2Pro will be your knight in shining armour. Like the WiiKey the D2Pro now uses DVD updates, so it’s as simple as going to their site and downloading the update DVD burning it and running in your Wii. They other good thing about D2Pro is the fact it has J-Tag upgrade support as well, this means if they ever block the DVD update function, the D2Pro can be updated physically by the J-Tag connection using the D2Prog, so if you’re the owner of one of these new D2C2 or D2E consoles, you can feel secure when buying the D2Pro that if anything goes wrong with DVD update you still will be able to update the chip. This is something the D2Pro defiantly has over the competition such as Wasabi or Wizard.

Official D2Pro Website

Wii Version Supported DMS D2B D2C D2C2 D2E
Epoxy
D2E
D3
 D3~2
Buyers Advice (Updated Jan 24th 2010)

These are still a great chip for the D2C, D2C2, D2E drives, they run pretty much the same firmware as the WiiKey 2 and the price now is pretty much the same, so still a very good chip and has the advanced brick blocker like the Solderless WiiKey 2.

 

 

SunKey Lite v1.3a Solderless D2Sun

Solderless D2Sun SunKey Lite Mod Chip
The solderless D2Sun SunKey Lite v1.3a is one of the latest chips from the D2Sun team, what is great about these chips is that they will work in any single Wii console on the market except the D3-2 just like the DriveKey, that's right you can use them in the old DMS models or even the new D3 consoles, they are also now compatible with the New Super Mario Bros game as well. Another new featured added to the SunKey Lite v1.3a is a basic form of the Brick Blocker, this means your console is protected from games outside your consoles region trying to update the Wii firmware which can result in a brick. The installation for the SunKey Lite v1.3a is extremely simple, admittedly you do need to set the 2 switches to your consoles region before install, such as PAL or NTSC, but this is very simple to do and takes a few seconds and only has to be done once when installing. From tests done on the SunKey Lite v1.3a chips they have proven to be just as good as chips like the DriveKey and have the same high compatibility levels with games as well, just make sure you are using Verbatim DVD –R brand media, the other upside is they can be found a little cheaper than the DriveKey if you’re on a budget, and since their performance is pretty much on par with the DriveKey it makes these chips a very viable solution for people with the DMS to D3 Wii consoles. The only real downside to this SunKey Lite v1.3a is the fact they are not upgradeable where the DriveKey is, so that means that if for any reason the chip needs an update to work around a problem, it is not possible to update the chip and it will need to be replaced. With saying that most chips only ever seen one or two updates in their life time and it’s only usually to fix compatibility with one game, so it’s not a major worry.

Official D2Sun Website

Wii Version Supported DMS D2B D2C D2C2 D2E
Epoxy
D2E
D3
 D3~2
Buyers Advice (Updated Jan 24th 2010)

These are one of the best budget chips around, while they do lack the DVD update function other chips have, the price is very good and work great from DMS to D3 drives.

 

 

 

Solderless WiiKey 2 For D2C to D2E Consoles

Solderless WiiKey 2 Mod Chip
The Solderless WiiKey 2 is the very latest Wii solderless mod chip to be released, the WiiKey brand is possibly the most famous out of any Wii chip and once again they have delivered a top quality product with more features than other chips on the market. The Solderless WiiKey 2 now comes with an advanced brick blocker, this blocker will stop you from being able to accept Wii system updates from games out side of your consoles region, the best part is the blocker will still allow updates from games inside your consoles region, the blocker on the first version of the WiiKey would block all updates from games, this could be a slight pain and you would need to disable it to run an update from a game in your consoles region, so this new advanced brick blocker means that you won’t ever have to worry again about playing games from outside your consoles region and updating issues. The good news is D2Pro owners will have access to this same brick blocker for their chips and an update was just released on the official site. The Solderless WiiKey 2 is compatible with DMS to non epoxy D2E drives, but they are sold in two versions, one for DMS / D2B and another for D2C /D2C2 / D2E Wii version DVD drives, they are extremely stable and reliable just like all the other chips released from this company, so if you are in the market for a solderless Wii mod chip for your console we can highly recommend the Solderless WiiKey 2. Note they have already released the second config disk v1.2 which is what added the brick blocker and updated the firmware on the chip, you can be sure when buying the Solderless WiiKey 2 that there will be support from the team and future updates adding handy new features and addressing any issues found with the chips function. If you decide to buy the Solderless WiiKey 2 you will not be disappointed in any way.

Official WiiKey 2 Website

Wii Version Supported DMS D2B D2C D2C2 D2E
Epoxy
D2E
D3
 D3~2
Which drives will work with the solderless WiiKey 2
Buyers Advice (Updated Jan 24th 2010)

These are still the very best chip you can use for DMS to D2E drives, the price is good and has the advanced brickblocker function, they also have the full 6x read rate and are our no.1 recommendation for DMS to D2E drives.

 

 

 

 

The DriveKey Wii Mod Chip Is Totally Solderless And Works On All Wii Consoles

DriveKey Wii Mod Chip
The DriveKey is a next generation solderless mod chip for Wii consoles, it will work on any drive no matter the type or region of the console except the new Wii version with D3-2 drives which only started showing in consoles from Sept 09 on-wards, The DriveKey does not connect to the same place as other solderless chips and connects to the ribbon cable that runs into the DVD drive, this is heaven sent to those that have the Epoxy D2E drives which are not able to use traditional Wii solderless mod chip such as the Solderless WiiKey 2 & D2Pro etc. For those that don’t already know there was a newer drive than the D2E released called the D3 or also known as the D2Nothing, the DriveKey was the first chip in the world to support these D3 drives, these D3 drives started showing up in consoles from March 09, there are another two chips out that work like the DriveKey called Wasabi DX and the SunKey Lite, these chips will also work on the D3 drives. The DriveKey supports flash updates via DVD and has a built on J-Tag connector for an external programmer if ever the DVD update function is blocked by a Wii system update, so you can be assured when buying a DriveKey that if ever needed the firmware on the chip can be updated to fix bugs or add improvements to the chips function. The DriveKey mod chip also has the brick blocker function which has fast become a popular feature in Wii chips, the brick blocker will stop your Wii console from accepting Wii system updates from games outside your consoles region which can damage the console. There is only two real downsides to using a chip such as the DriveKey, the first is they are not able to read any faster than 3x, this means games will load slightly slower than traditional chips such as the WiiKey 2, the other downside is that they don’t have the GameCube audio fix and are really not designed to support GameCube games properly, but apart from that they are an ideal solution to enable your console to play all region games and also allow you to play backups of your original games.

Official DriveKey Website

Wii Version Supported DMS D2B D2C D2C2 D2E
Epoxy
D2E
D3
 D3~2
The DriveKey Supports All Wii Drives
Buyers Advice (Updated Jan 24th 2010)

The DriveKey was conceived to be used on the D3 drive which previous Wii Solderless mod chip do not work with, they are also perfect for people that have those nasty epoxy D2E drives, so you would buy this chip if you have an Epoxy D2E or D3 drive.

 

 

 

 

The WiiKey Fusion for Wii is the latest chip from Team WiiKey, SD memory support!

WiiKey Fusion Wii Mod Chip
The WiiKey Fusion is the latest chip from team WiiKey, it was mainly designed for people that bought consoles after Sept 09 which have those new D3-2 drives that are not able to read backups from disk with any chip, the WiiKey Fusions solution to this is to allow the user to load their games from an external SD memory card no matter which Wii version, this is not a bad feature and can also be used on all other Wii drives from DMS to D3 as well as the new D3-2, the good thing is on a DMS to D3 drive you will be able to boot backups from disk and also use the SD loading function. Loading from SD memory has some advantages over using disc, first is you won’t have issues with bad burns, you also won’t have to worry about getting the right brand of disk to avoid read errors, with all chips for Wii you need to buy the right disks to make sure you don’t get read issues, brands like Verbatim DVD –R for example, loading from SD won’t have the same problem and almost all brands of SD memory will be compatible. SD memory can’t be scratched like a disc can as well, so you won’t need to re-burn titles because they have been scratched too much to work, also SD memory can be a lot neater than having a bunch of disks laying around, as you can just have a nice little SD memory case next to your Wii, also you will be able to store a few titles on the single SD memory card depending on your size, we recommend using a 16GB or 32GB card. So if you are the owner of a D3-2 drive and loading from SD memory sounds good to you, the WiiKey Fusion wii solderless mod chip will be your chip, also if you are a DMS to D3 user and would like the SD memory function, the WiiKey Fusion would be better than looking at something like the Solderless WiiKey 2 or DriveKey for example.

Official WiiKey Fusion WebSite

Wii Version & Media Supported DMS D2B D2C D2C2 D2E Epoxy
D2E		 D3 D3~2
DVD Media
SD Memory Card
Buyers Advice (Updated Jan 24th 2010)

The WiiKey Fusion was mainly produced to tackle the new D3-2 drives where it is no longer possible to boot backups of your original games on disk, their solution to these new D3-2 drives is to allow people with them to load their games from an SD memory card, so if you have one of these latest D3-2 drives and you like the sound of booting from SD memory, this chip will be for you, also note they will work in all other Wii drive types loading from SD memory, and can also load from DVD media on DMS to D3 drives.

 

The Wode Jukebox is a mod / USB loader for the Wii console

Wii Wode Jukebox USB Loader
The Wode Jukebox like the WiiKey Fusion is a working solution for people that bought their consoles after Sept 09 and have the D3-2 drive that can’t load backup media from disk, the way the Wii Wode Jukebox tackles this is by allowing the use of an external USB hard drive to be connected to the Wii and you can load backups of your original games straight from the HDD, this is a very cool feature and the cost of USB hard drives is a fair bit less than SD memory in comparison to size, for example the cost of a 32GB SD memory card would be roughly the same price as an external 250GB USB hard drive, the Wode Jukebox also has a built in LCD screen which allows you to navigate what titles you have on the hard drive then select which you wish to play and then load up. The Wode Jukebox is a little bit more than just a solderless mod chip for Wii, it’s more of an add-on device, as it runs off a Linux kernel and it will be possible to port over applications that you will be able to load on Wii, for example the Wode team have already made a port of the Wii media player MPlayer CE, which you are then able to load and play media from your HDD, also the first planned firmware update will add support to backup your original games to your hard drive. The Wii Wode will end up being much more than just a mod to play legitimate backups of your original games and games from other regions, it will be a gateway to some great homebrew software without having the hassle of installing the homebrew channel. The Wii Wode Jukebox is able to load media on a D3-2 drive from an external hard drive like we said above, but it’s also compatible with DMS to D3 drives and you can load from disk on those drive models as well as loading from an external hard drive.

Official Wode Jukebox Website

Wii Version & Media Supported DMS D2B D2C D2C2 D2E Epoxy
D2E		 D3 D3~2
DVD Media
USB HardDisk
Buyers Advice (Updated Jan 24th 2010)

Like the WiiKey Fusion, the Wode Jukebox was mainly conceived to load games on a console with a D3-2 drive, the same thing applies, the Wode will not be able to load games from disk on a console with a D3-2 drive, but the Wii Wode gives you the ability to load from an external USB hard drive, so if you like the idea of an external hard drive more than loading from SD memory, the Wode will be for you. Note the Wode works on DMS to D3 consoles as well, and will allow the use of loading backups of your originals from disk on DMS to D3 drives as well as having external hard drive support.

 

 

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