Wii Hardware/Drive Interface

The Wii contains a DVD optical disc drive. In early model Wiis (pre-2008), this drive is capable of reading burned DVD-R discs, through a hidden "DVD video" mode that the drive can be set to. Later models removed this functionality. It is interfaced with via the DI (Drive Interface) in the Hollywood chipset.

Compatibility

There is a driver in Wii-Linux known as rvl-di (file path: drivers/block/rvl-di.c) for interfacing with the DVD drive. Older versions of Wii-Linux supported the DVD drive, however support has heavily deteriorated over the years:

• 3.15.10 (stable-v3.x): Full support
• 4.3.6 (experimental-v4.x): Hang trying to read data from the disc.
• 4.4.302-cip80: Can't read any drive response data (even metadata).
• 4.19 (possibly older?): can't even send basic commands to the drive, like a drive reset.
• Mainline: Full support (via new driver, ported from NPLL)

NetBSD has a functional driver for the Wii's DVD drive.