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Nintendo has no plans for an external hard drive for the Wii

bakfromon | June 27, 2007 | News | Wii 
With the Wii only supporting 512 MB's of flash memory, and the announcement of the original content some of you might be thinking that the Wii's rumored external hard dive may be unveiled soon. Well Nintendo has finally put the rumors to rest with two letters, "no".
Your Wii's small 512MBs of internal Flash memory may be approaching its limits with all the VC games available (ours is), and Nintendo has today announced Wii Software (WiiWare), which will bring with it even more downloadable content for Wii.

So surely the rumours suggesting a Wii hard drive is in the works are true, right?

Nope. We posed the question to Nintendo after the Wii Software announcement, and the answer was definitive.

"No," a Nintendo UK correspondent told us, trashing hopes of an E3 revelation with a single word.

Oh well. Best stock up on some meaty SD cards, then. Read the our exclusive Wii Software Q&A with Nintendo discussing the ins and outs of the new download service to launch next year.
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  • 0 thumbs!
    skittles07 | June 27, 2007
    That is pretty stupid. If the system cant hold the memory then they should make the Hard Drive bigger.
  • 0 thumbs!
    Final Blade | June 27, 2007
    LOL hahahaha sucks for them.
    Perhaps they need to make the thing bigger. But if they did that it would jump there price to $400. Whats that saying pick you poison.
  • 0 thumbs!
    FRoGBuster | June 28, 2007
    why make hardrives when people can just buy SD cards? Sounds like good enough reasoning to me.
  • 1 thumbs!
    bbb7002004 | June 28, 2007
    Many people, especially the causal gamer Nintendo hopes to attract will never use up the internal memory. An external hard drive can be bought by those who need it, and is not a waste of money for those who don't.

    This doesn't really make sense. Nintendo has contracted a hard drive developer, and is preparing to release VC (Neo Geo) games that exceed the flash memory in one fell swoop. I just wonder if this is another one of those miscommunications between the Nintendo branches, just like that whole region free Wii thing that Kaplan started at release. Either that, or Nintendo is going to add a firmware update so that we can use any generic USB hard drive, but I doubt Nintendo would miss out on the opportunity to put their name on something and sell it for twice the price, like the SD cards.
  • 0 thumbs!
    Ultimega | June 28, 2007
    A hard drive? What use will it be on a wii? This is dumb and i'm glad i don't have a wii. Doesn't the wii have enough memory, I mean there is like only 5 good (worth playing) games on wii, so you dont need that much memory right.
  • 0 thumbs!
    bbb7002004 | June 28, 2007
    The hard drive wouldn't be all that useful for save files, it is more for downloading Virtual Console/ Wiiware games, as well as allowing demos to be downloaded.
  • 0 thumbs!
    Gogetenks | June 28, 2007
    Well, Nintendo doesn't need to work on an external hard drive. In fact, I'd rather them not do it, seeing their overpriced SD cards. However, they completely need to release a firmware update. That's it. Let us use third party hard drives, just like we can use third party SD cards. It's impossible for Nintendo to actually accomplish everything they have promised without a hard drive, looking at the size of NeoGeo games(some are well over 700MB), the size downloadable content tends to have and the fact that it is hardly enough without any of this.

    They don't need to work on an external hard drive. I'm confident that they are working for some firmware update, however. They already contracted a company that works entirely with HDDs.
  • 1 thumbs!
    Redemption | June 28, 2007
    Gogetenks: The NeoGeo system didn't use MB(megabytes) to quantify its cart size. Instead it used megabits. There's 0.125MB per megabit, so 700megabits is only 87.5MB for a larger game, which is still a hefty size for a harddrive less Wii and pretty much MASSIVE by the standards of the day.

    Anyway, I think I'm with the camp wondering what Nintendo is thinking not allowing external HD's for the Wii. The Virtual Console practically begs for such an addon.
  • 0 thumbs!
    Rinkydink | June 28, 2007
    Argh, I guess that we will have to make do with SD cards for now until Nintendo do something about it (I'm guessing a firmware update). I still have a good half of the memory left on my Wii, but with the exclusive Wii software coming out soon, that may quickly drop.
  • 0 thumbs!
    Evanster 69 | June 28, 2007
    Wii want WiiWare! But can you put memory cards in a Wii? Or is that something you can only do with playstations and GameCubes?
  • 0 thumbs!
    Final Blade | June 28, 2007
    Even if they do decide to make a harddrive it will only jack up the price of the console. Unless they make an external optional hard-drive then no. But they will turn into MS by making you spend money on an add-on. Thus my saying pick your poison
  • 0 thumbs!
    Gogetenks | June 28, 2007
    I see, Redemption. That is significantly lower, then. However, it is true that it is still extremely large for only 512MB.

    Finalblade, the most likely option for them at the moment is to allow external hard drives. Also, seeing as they have no plans on actually releasing an external hard drive, they won't be doing what Microsoft is doing and forcing you to use their overpriced drives. However, there is still the option of simply allowing third party hard drives. Again, like I have said earlier, they already contracted a company that works exclusively with hard drives and hard drive software. All they need to do is allow the USB ports for memory storage, and that's all. They wouldn't need to have an external hard drive in the works to do that.

    I'd just like to remind people of the DS. On January 26th, 2006, David Yarton, from Nintendo of Europe, said that he doesn't know of a DS redesign. On January 27th, 2006, Nintendo of Japan announced the DS Lite. And, let's face it, Nintendo of Europe isn't a big focus for them at the moment(which, in my opinion, isn't a good idea). Even Nintendo of America is often less informed than Nintendo of Japan. The company is way too secretive, even among themselves. I just hope this situation is like the DS Lite one.
  • 0 thumbs!
    Deis | June 28, 2007
    It wouldn't be exactly economical, or, frankly, like Nintendo considering the Wii billiard cue, not to produce a helpful add on for the Wii, especially something as practical as an external hard drive.
  • 0 thumbs!
    Subtle Demise | June 28, 2007
    Nintendo is kind of being silly about this. Even a 10GB HD for like $60 or something would be better than spending $50 apiece on multiple SD cards. A helpful hint: Don't buy the Wii-branded SD cards when you can go one aisle over to the digital camera section and get the same exact card for $5-10 less.

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