Wii FAQ

FAQ From: Engadget.com

# How loud is the Wii?

We'd say of the next gen consoles, the order of loudness goes: Wii, PS3, and Xbox 360. Though that's not necessarily fair since the Wii and the PS3 are both pretty much completely silent from more than a foot away. To put it in perspective, the only console we can tell whether it was left on is the Xbox.

# Can you connect and play media from a USB hard drive?

Our USB drive turns on when we plug it in -- it's obviously USB -- but nothing happens. Right now there's no support for USB storage, including playback of photos, music, or movies, nor saving channels or games to the device. Bummer.

# Is it possible to attach an external keyboard, mouse, etc. to the USB ports on the back of the Wii?

Yeah, you can attach them, but they don't actually do anything. Kind of a bummer, too, since using that on-screen keyboard of theirs is kind of a pain -- we often aim off our letter when pressing the A button to type.

# Does the Wii upconvert non-Wii games?

If you've got the component cables you can "upscale" old games to 480p / EDTV. Not that it's going to look any better, but the display doesn't change back 480i or anything.

# Which audio / video / image formats work with the Wii?

The manual states it works only with JPEG images, MP3 audio, and motion JPEG movies. We found it worked with all of the above, and unfortunately nothing but. We tested pretty much everything, including BMP, GIF, TIF, PSD, and PNG images; OGG, AAC, AAC lossless, WMA, WMA lossless, MP3, FLAC, AIF, and WAV audio; and XviD, WMA, H.264, and every other variety of movie could think of to throw at it.

# When you insert an SD card into Wii with photos and videos on, do they need to be converted to display/save onto Wii?

Nope, but it does only read JPEG, MP3, and motion JPEG (MOV) files.

# What are the load times for the games?

Nothing at all unusual for a disc-based console. Considering it's loading less data than the PS3 or Xbox 360, we might've liked to see those load times shaved down a bit. But it's nothing unreasonable, and doesn't clock into the minutes territory.

# Is the sensor bar setup tough (does it require a level or anything like that)?

Not at all. Just rest it on top of or below your TV. If it keeps falling off (like ours did) you can use the double-sided tape on the bottom and stick it into place.

# How does the Wii work on a smaller TV?

Very well; we hooked it up to the smallest TV we could possibly find, a 13-incher, and even put the sensor bar way off to the side and it worked beautifully.

# Is it hard to aim on the smaller TV?

Not at all. It's like playing any games on a smaller screen: you're never going to be able to pick up the same level of detail and accuracy as on a larger display, but it still works great.

# How decent is the callibration for the Wii?

Very decent, and extremely easy. In fact, there's no calibration at all, just put the sensor bar on or below your TV, set the option for its location, and you're off.

# Is the sensor bar really that distracting?

Huh? Not really, it's pretty benign; we didn't even notice it. You might pay more attention to it if it's mounted on a wall (if you're using a projector), but it's very low profile and unobtrusive.

# What happens if you put a disc in upside down?

Nothing in the channel page; in the Disc channel, however, you get a simple cannot read disc error message. Our discs came out fine and unscratched.

# In the unboxing video, what were those "decals" plastic things?

That's actually a sensor bar stand and a clear Wii stand support.

# How long do the Wii batteries last? Are they rechargeable? Nunchuck change the battery life much?

They just take AA batteries, so your mileage may vary. They're not rechargeable out of the box, and the nunchuck feeds off the Wiimote's power. We've been playing for a week or more now on the stock batteries with no problems, but who knows if they'll die today, tomorrow, or two months from now.

# What does the Sync button do?

It allows you to sync wireless peripherals (Wiimote, etc.) to your system, like an Xbox 360. Nothing more or less.

# Is the Wii controller REALLY Bluetooth-compliant, or is it simply RF? What happens if you try to pair it with a Bluetooth 2.0EDR capable PC?

It is indeed. And unlike the PS3, since it has that sync button you can make it go into discoverable mode. We tried and found the Wiimote, but we were unable to pair with the device. For those curious, its Bluetooth device name was Nintendo RVL-CNT-01 -- different from its official model number RVL-003.