Wii Repair in Kildare

Rabidlamb

My 2 year old son put coins in the optical drive.
I managed to remove them but when the drive now spins up it comes back with a read error.
I reckon that the lens got scratched & will need to be replaced.

Is there anyone around the Kildare region who specialise in repairing Wii consoles.
I did find this listing but they don't seem to answer their phone if you know what I mean.
http://www.cobblersden.ie/console-repairs.htm

batari

Hi, can't find anyone in the area repairing them, I think that Company you had have stopped repairing them; tried them a while back and got the engaged tone.
I have the screwdriver that's used to open the Wii if you want to have a look at it yourself?
I'm in the Clane/Naas area.:pac:

Rabidlamb

atariman wrote: »

Hi, can't find anyone in the area repairing them, I think that Company you had have stopped repairing them; tried them a while back and got the engaged tone.
I have the screwdriver that's used to open the Wii if you want to have a look at it yourself?
I'm in the Clane/Naas area.:pac:

PM sent.

I'm suprised more people aren't doing repairs.
Plenty of ads for modding but none for drive replacement.
Business start-up idea maybe.

Banjo

Modding components are cheap. Replacement drives aren't. And I don't think you can get new stock. However, far as I know it's not difficult to do - you can order the drive and a $2 screwdriver from Deal Extreme. Thing is that the lead times from the HK guys who sell the parts are massive so if you were serious about trying to run a repair business you'd need a decent amount of stock to start with.... Anyhoo, I'm in Celbridge, I have a Trigram screwdriver, I could have a crack at replacing it if you buy the part and really don't want to do it yourself.

Just thought - if you have a line on someone who mods the Wii in your area, they might have a drive for you, some of the later drives were tougher to mod than the original, so a quick way of modding them is to replace the drive with the easier to mod version then stick your chip on the replacment drive - they might be able to sort you out with either a modded old drive or an unsused new drive.

Rabidlamb

Banjo wrote: »

Just thought - if you have a line on someone who mods the Wii in your area, they might have a drive for you, some of the later drives were tougher to mod than the original, so a quick way of modding them is to replace the drive with the easier to mod version then stick your chip on the replacment drive - they might be able to sort you out with either a modded old drive or an unsused new drive.

Thanks for the tip.
I went through the list of people in the modding forum yesterday but it never dawned on me to ask them.
I'm going to open up the Wii first just to make sure there are no other foreign bodies in the way.
I checked on ebay aswell & you'll end up paying €35-€55 for a replacement drive with a 20 day lead time.

Nintendo now offer a Fast Track repair service for Ireland:
http://www.nintendoservicecentre.co.uk/

It claims a 10-15 day turn around with a max charge of €66.
If I don't find a foreign body myself I think I'll send it off to the professionals.

witnessmenow

If you'd like to Pm me I can fix your wii. Im based in Limerick during the week and Athlone at weekends.

Price for worst case scenario (replacing drive) would be €50 not inc Postage, I have one in stock. Best case scenario (something still in it) would be €15-20.

Rabidlamb

Atariman got me the tri-wing screwdriver & the small magnetic Philips which was very handy.
Watched a video on Youtube showing how to remove all the screws.
Took about 10 minutes to undo everything & expose the drive.
Low & behold a 2c coing lying on top of the the optics eye.
Removed coin & now games back loading perfectly.:D:D:D

Many thanks again to Atariman & witnessmenow for their assistance.

witnessmenow

I didnt do alot :P Fair play atariman

GenghisCon

just PMed you witness.

Confusedhannah

HI Witnessmenow, do you repair wiis that are whirring and clicking but only with some games and then plays others perfectly?
Thanks

Banjo

While we're waiting for the professionals to show up :
1. Do the whirring-clicking games load at all (eg, they freeze on certain levels or when loading the opening video but they do start) or do they crash out on launch? Also, can you give examples of the games - are they new/old/mixed? (note, if the games that fail are Smash Bros and Metroid Prime Trilogy, you might be having trouble reading dual layer disks)
2. Is your Wii modded?

Reason I ask is that I soft modded mine, and later found that I couldn't play certain games but other games were fine. I thought it was the laser. Turns out it was caused by an IOS that I hadn't updated (one of the side-effects of updating manually). The affected games would crap out on launch with a black screen, whirring & clicking and then a read error.

The other reason modding status is important is if it's done it gives you the ability to launch a media player that can play DVDs, which in turn gives you the ability to run a DVD lens cleaner through it. I used to have fierce trouble with Guitar Hero 3 (but not the sequels, oddly) until I cleaned the lens. There's a dedicated Wii lens cleaning disk available that does not require modding, but costs a bit more than your average DVD cleaner.

Confusedhannah

Hey Banjo, cheers for reply! I dunno is its modded, bought it secondhand but all games were working perfectly! We stopped using it for about a year and now won't play certain games. Wii play, batman - lego version, wii sports all won't work but others are fine???
Major prob is that it is my sons bday on Sun and his granny has bought skylanders and im afraid it won't work!!!

Confusedhannah

Oh, and the error ones don't load at all. Insert disk - whirr, click - error message!

Banjo

OK, proper full on read error.
WiiPlay and WiiSports are launch titles so they're pretty old, and Batman is no spring chicken either. Don't think any of them use a weird IOS to load so forget about modding for now. Could just be the disks. Have you had the Wii long? How old is your son? Old enough to have manhandled the Wii discs over the last few years? Or inserted a piece of toast into the drive? Do you have any way of testing these disks in another Wii - even if you took them to a shop, explain the situation and act like you purchased Skylanders there? As long as they're not busy, I can't see them objecting too strenuously to the desperate mother card. Can you just sneakily pop the Skylanders disk into the drive and test it or does Granny live too far away?

Confusedhannah

Good idea, I play the desperate mother sooo well! Ha ha! Batman is another friends game and it works in their house. It could be that something was posted into it, we have a poster (a kid that posts), would it work for some games if something was in it?!

Mr E

Please don't bump threads that are over 2 years old.

Thread closed.