NetBSD

NetBSD is one of the BSD operating systems, descended from the Berkeley System Distribution. Starting with version 10.0, NetBSD supports the Wii as a first class platform.

Comparison with Wii-Linux

• Wii-Linux is launched from boot2 via Gumboot. While NetBSD has boot2 support in the current branch, as of May 2025, release builds are started via the Homebrew Channel.

• Wii-Linux is able to use part of MEM1 as system RAM, while NetBSD only seems to use MEM2. Hence, a Wii-Linux system has access to more RAM. (This is somewhat mitigated by the NetBSD init system being much simpler than systemd.)

• The Wii-Linux ArchPOWER image has better menu-driven configuration tools. While NetBSD's `sysinst` can be used for tasks like network configuration, it is not as easy to use as tools like `nmtui` or ConfigMii.

• NetBSD's package manager is not included as part of the base system, and has to be installed using `sysinst`.

• USB support in NetBSD seems to be more complete and less buggy. Many common USB networking devices that aren't supported or don't work with the Wii-Linux kernel will operate just fine in NetBSD.

• The framebuffer driver in Wii-Linux emulates RGB colors, so graphical software doesn't have to be rewritten for the Wii's YUV framebuffer. NetBSD's driver does not, preferring to perform the color transformation in the X.org server.
  • As a consequence, the color palette for the text-mode console has many incorrect colors, which makes a lot of text-mode screens hard to read.

• As of May 2025, NetBSD doesn't have drivers for GameCube Controller or the USB Gecko, and the driver for the internal Wi-Fi adapter is not yet available in release builds.