notice: Wii U linux is not production ready! Proceed at your own risk. Written on 2/3/18
Quarktheawesome and rw-r-r_0644 have released an early version of Linux for Wii U!
The PowerPC side of the Wii U requires a custom linux kernel, which can be found here. The ARM side of the Wii U requires a custom fw.img file to load that kernel, which can be found here.
Once the kernel is up and running, the first repo is configured to automatically try to load programs from /dev/sda1 in an inserted usb. The first partition of an ext4 USB stick should contain a root filesystem for a linux distribution. See here for more information on a prebuilt PowerPC image
The below instructions do not cover any compiling, and all use prebuilt images. You can feel free follow the readme's in the above two repositories to compile your own installation, but if you just want to see linux running on the wii u you can follow the below steps instead.
- an SD card (FAT32, MBR)
- ≥1GB USB stick (will be erased)
- USB Keyboard
- access to HBL or CBHC (see guide)
- Wii U!
- Wii U linux kernel (dtbImage.wiiu)
- linux loader fw.img
- wiiu-debian rootfs
You should put the kernel file on your SD card in the following folder: SD:/linux/. You should create this folder if it doesn't exist.
You should put the fw.img file directly on your SD card (SD:/).
The SD card cannot be named "wiiu". If you don't use CBHC, you should also have HBL and cfwbooter on there (in SD:/wiiu/apps/).
For the rootfs image, you should unzip the debian-wiiu-2018-02-03.zip file to get a .img file out of it. This file must be flashed to your USB stick. Doing so will completely erase any data on your USB stick. The stick must be at least 1GB.
To flash the USB (replace X in /dev/sdX with your USB drive's letter):
dd if=debian-wiiu-2018-02-03.img of=/dev/SDX bs=512M
To flash the USB (replace X in /dev/rdiskX with your USB drive's number (found in Disk Utility)):
dd if=debian-wiiu-2018-02-03.img of=/dev/rdiskX bs=512m
To flash the USB on Windows, you can use a third party program such as Win32 Disk Imager.
Once the files are set up, insert the USB stick into one of the back USB ports of the Wii U, and insert a USB keyboard into the other back port. Then boot HBL and run cfwbooter, or choose "Boot fw.img from SD" in the CBHC menu.
If all goes well, you should see "Wii U menu" displayed on a white screen while the IOSU exploit runs, followed by the linux kernel booting (with the penguin tux onscreen), and finally debian should boot off the USB and a login prompt should be displayed.
The gamepad will not display the login prompt, you should use a TV output over HDMI to see the linux prompt.
The login information is as follows:
- User: root
- Password: root
The wifi driver does not work, but you may be able to get internet access through usb/bluetooth tethering or usb ethernet. You should also be able to mount other USB drives that are inserted (may need a USB splitter, the front ports don't work) in order to install other PowerPC-compiled linux programs.