Wii Startup Discs

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The Wii Startup Disc from the Wii Startup Error Screen.

The Wii Startup Disc is a disc which was used to install the initial retail version of the Wii System Menu and various channels and IOS versions onto an early Wii system which did not have this software pre-installed with 122E.

The disc has not resurfaced since its initial release in 2006, however its contents can be partially assumed from available evidence, particularly a uid.sys file listing showing titles which were installed by the disc.

Origin

The final version of the Wii System Menu had not yet been created as of August 2006, and by the time it was scheduled to be ready in October 2006, it would be too late to preinstall it on newly produced Wii consoles for shipment to retail stores for use in demo kiosks as well as early retail units, as these units would have needed to start the firmware flashing phase of their production earlier in order to meet demand. As such, the Startup Disc Menu was created and preinstalled on all Wiis being produced at that time, until the backlog was caught up with. This menu would only accept this disc and certain other repair discs; further information is available on its page. While this menu was originally intended to be deployed to all launch day Wii consoles, ultimately production scaled as such that the vast majority of consoles which had the menu installed were shipped as store kiosk demo consoles, either along with the disc or to have the disc installed on them by a Nintendo representative. (It is theorized, but not known, that the disc was only included with the system package for store kiosks in rural areas, such as central Indiana.)

However, this plan did not go completely as written; many consoles were shipped at launch day with the menu installed but without the disc, and a very small subset of consoles were shipped both with the menu and the disc. It is from the former of these types of consoles that the NAND dump containing the Startup Disc Menu has been obtained from, and the latter where the uid.sys listing has been obtained from.

It is also notable that early versions of the retail Wii box listed the Startup Disc on their contents; certain launch day Wii boxes listed it, others did not and listed the Wii Sports Disc instead. This appears to have no relation to the actual contents of the box.

Wii Startup Discs

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