The Wii was a relatively small console when it released, but it packed a big punch when it came to its game library and the impact it had on the industry. [Bringus Studios] wanted a Wii that physically matched the grandeur of one of Nintendo’s greatest successes, and built the Wii XL.
Basing the scale of this console around an 80 mm case fan, the final product has twelve times the volume of the original Wii. This leaves plenty of room for an unmodified original Wii, its power brick, and all the various cables and adapters necessary to bring the ports to the exterior of the case. To power the fan, [Bringus Studios] designed his first PCB to leach power off one of the USB connectors while still allowing data to pass through.
Given the size constraints of his 3D printers, he used melamine MDF for the sides and had to print the other panels in multiple pieces, resulting in some gapping in the front panel where the prints peeled off the print bed. We really love the use of a modular design that leaves room for future improvements, since no project is ever truly done.
Power is routed through a figure eight power connector on the outside to a female two prong plug on the inside while USB and HDMI are routed out the back via a combination panel connector intended for RV and boat use. If you don’t remember the Wii having HDMI out, that’s because it didn’t, but HDMI adapters are easy to come by for the machine.
In case you want to see more supersized projects checkout this giant XBox Series X or ponder if it would’ve been better with an enormous 555.
Cool. I guess you can even store frozenhot-dogs in it. Very useful.
This is how I’m measuring space from now on
I’m confused…
If it is twice as high, twice as wide and twice as thick, isn’t it 2x2x2 = 8 times bigger?
That would have made a much bigger impact for a YouTube or Hackaday title, wouldn’t it?
Regarding the project, fun project. Nice to see the PSU inside the device itself, although this might have been a shortcut to keep the project “smaller” and it would have caused problems with the power plug too I guess.
The article also states that it has 12x the volume. So not sure how 2x bigger in each dimension became 12x the volume.
Because it´s not 2x scale as the sloppy editing from HaD mentions, but 2.3x scale, as shown in big fonts on the title of the printable. But likely the blogger digested only the video before dumping erroneous information here. As usual, sloppy editing.
It says more about you than the publication if you keep coming back despite it’s “sloppiness”.
Because we always pump up the volume.
The volume goes to 11 because it’s one better…
Dance dance
If you click trough on the website, its says 2.3. So 2.3 times 2.3 times 2.3 ~= 12
Does it take games on LaserDisc?
My Wii is bigger than yours!
Feels like this really should be a Mini-itx case, perhaps still coupled with a real Wii rather than an emulator, seems like there would be enough space. And it would mean an interesting hometheater PC and good Nintendo console…
“To power the fan, [Bringus Studios] designed his first PCB to leach power off one of the USB connectors while still allowing data to pass through.”
Why would you need a PCB to do that? The Wii used USB 2.0, there’s only 4 pins on the connector. You can cut open any old USB cable and connect to the 5V and ground.
Or you could tap into the same 5V source that powers the Wii’s internal fan if you’re willing to disassemble the console. Or just buy an off the shelf 80mm USB fan like a regular person.
Or just don’t use an external fan, because the Wii’s internal fan cools just fine on its own. This wasn’t a powerful console back in its heyday.
This is clearly explained in the video. He needed data pass-through, wanted something more elegant than a spliced cable, and it was a good opportunity to teach himself PCB design tools.
I would have found a better and more creative excuse to learn PCB design tools. Say like for creating a sensor bar that puts out more IR than the factory bar.
It’s really strange to put so much effort into the USB port when practically none of the Wii games used them. The only time I used my USB ports was for loading homebrew content off an external HDD. Other than that the ports were practically useless.
With a wii that big their is more that can be done. E.g. fit charging docks on top for 4 controllers instead of needing a separate charging dock. A USB hub to make more USB ports at the back so e.g. the wireless sensor bar can be powered by USB. That is if such a sensor bar exists. I don’t think their is any progress in going from a sensor bar you plug in to one that requires 4 aa batteries that have to be disposed of and replaced or must be removed to recharge therfore actually needing 8 because you cannot use it while the other 4 are charging.