Completly installing new software on the Wii U gamepad

[Graff Films]

Ok so this might sound like some crazy idea or maybe not even possible, but I've always wondered if you could make the Wii U actually portable and run something like MAME on it. All other "portable" Wii U mods are not really mods just putting the console in your backpack with battery. But what if it is possible to completely hard hack the Wii U game pad. Deleting the original software off of it and adding something new, like a emulator or maybe even something like Linux, making it a solid device without the need of console connection. I know this sounds really crazy and as far as I know there is no explanation of how to do it.

The main reason I want to do this is because I don't care about my Wii U and is going to be sold or thrown in the trash. So having my personal urge to want to find new uses for items I don't want, I really want to figure this out.

so I'm just asking for any ideas or if its possible or not, but either way i'm going to do something to it.

 

[Stitches]

Unfortunately the backpack thing as about as good as you get with the U. It simply uses far too much power to be viable for portablising, and the board is too complex and spread out for any viable trimming effort. You could make an arcade cabinet out of it and a pro controller, but that's about it AFAIK. Several people have had the same idea before, but sadly nothing's come of it.

As for the software, you can do a thing called Cold Boot HaxChi, which allows you to boot the system into Mocha redNAND, which lets you install any kind of modded channels you want. Could put a MAME emulator on the first square and pretty much go straight into it on boot, but that's your lot AFAIK.

 

[Graff Films]

Ok Thanks for the ideas! is Cold Boot HaxChi open source? if so I might to try to work with it a little bit and figure something out.

 

[Stitches]

I'm unsure of that, you could try checking Github?

 

[cheese]

Ok Thanks for the ideas! is Cold Boot HaxChi open source? if so I might to try to work with it a little bit and figure something out.

google says yes
https://github.com/FIX94/haxchi/commit/d29e796167cda64ae9515dab3c7926fc046b1797