such use may lead to injury of you and others

[Sharkbyte]

LOL. I was curious of how software may lead to injury. So i did something dumb and emailed nintendo.
first this is what they wrote and i put it in a quote on their site.

Your Wii Console and the Wii Network Service are not designed for use with unauthorized software, services, or devices or non-licensed accessories, and you may not use any of these with your Wii Console or the Wii Network Service. Such use may be illegal, voids any warranty, and is a breach of this agreement. Such use may also lead to injury to you or others or cause performance issues or damage to your Wii Console or the Wii Network Service.

this is what I said

I am curious of how software may lead to injury

This is what nintendo wrote back.

Thank you for writing.  The quote states software, services, devices, and non-licensed accessories.  We can't foresee all the ways in which a system can be modified or changed.  That said, when you're dealing with an electronic device that has been altered from the manufacturer’s specifications there is a potential risk of shock or fire.

I guess our usb geckos can cause shock and/or fire because they are not authorized. what a bunch of bs. LOL

[goemon_guy]

This would probably be the case if people were actually modifying the innerworkings of the Wii.

But not with Soft Mods. Which only modify the internal memory... Thats what I see.

[dcx2]

It's just standard multi-national company PR speak.  I don't know why you'd bother emailing them about it...have you ever heard "let sleeping dogs lie"?  There's no reason to draw attention to yourself.

[James0x57]

There's a topic about someone's Gecko melting here, actually.

[Link]

The melting Gecko is obviously some kind of hardware failure.. which could also happen to the Wii itself

[James0x57]

I know, I was responding just to the last line in the first post =P


I wish I had another USB Gecko.. Just in case. :<

[James0x57]

*shrugs* I dunno. I was just spreading fud for the lulz.

[matt123337]

*shrugs* I dunno. I was just spreading fud for the lulz.

[dcx2]

now what would be mean is if they purposly designed on newer wiis to purposely cause shock or injury or "failure to function" from all non- licensed accessories.  >:D Such as modchips and usb geckos.

EDIT: @James0x57 wasn't that a problem with a new computer? The computer caused his gecko to melt?

I will promise you that there is a 0% chance that Nintendo will make their engineers design new Wiis to shock or injure anyone who uses unlicensed accessories.  That would be corporate suicide.  You never, ever want your things to shock or hurt anyone because that's how you get sued, which is why you issue disclaimers about unlicensed accessories.

If anything, they would make the Wii refuse to acknowledge unlicensed accessories...and that is getting perilously close to anti-competitive behavior that will get you sued in the US and/or the EU.

Regarding the melted Gecko...I'm not really sure how that happened.  Maybe a power surge or something.  But the USB Gecko is a very small PCB, and I highly doubt it was designed to meet UL safety specifications.  That is exactly why Nintendo issues the disclaimers about shock or injury...they don't want sued if your USB Gecko burns your house down.

...I, too, fear the loss of my USB Gecko, but fortunately I am capable of building one from scratch if necessary, because I once grabbed a copy of the schematic/PCB files.

[dcx2]

I don't have the resources or desire to mass produce USB Geckos.  But I know how to take the PCB files, turn them into Gerber files, send them off to a shop to be fabbed, and how to populate SMT parts.

The hard part is really populating the board.  The USB Gecko PCB is so small that you could panelize the hell out of it and get a lot of PCBs for relatively cheap.  Soldering the parts on, though, either requires an oven or a lot of patience.

The problem is that it's quite time consuming to do that.  I spend enough time developing Gecko.NET and hacks here and there...the only thing that might motivate me to make one is losing the one I have *and* being unable to order a new one from anywhere (even shady overseas outlets)