Simple question, I can get my head around IOSes?????

I have hombrew running on 3.4, am I going to have difficulties in running NEW legally bought nintendo games? I heard that they might require an update. Is there a simple way of just running the games? I heard Gecko OS can do this without doing any complicated IOS things (which I dont have a clue about) all I use hombrew for is the Apps on the Browser. I have read the Guides and what does all this 'install IOS 36' or 'IOS 60' mean??? not one guide explain how, why and where you can do this in complete 'Newbie' terms. Any help would be appreciated I dont want to do anything illegal with hombrew just love the emulators and games on there, dowloading them is soooo easy so why is everything else so hard to understand???

Cheers.
J

Well, if you don't want to learn ( [wiibrew.org] ) I'm not going to bother to explain IOSs here.

However I will tell you a few important facts you appear to be unaware of:
1) You can perform the latest Nintendo update and all of your homebrew that you've described will remain unaffected.
2) Yes, you can use GeckoOS to skip disc updates if you want.
3) Alternatively to GeckoOS, you can use a program like startpatch or banana patcher to patch the disc channel to launch games without performing updates.

First, let's explain the Wii's system layout.

The Wii has two chips, an ARM chip and a PPC chip. All games, most homebrew (exceptions basically boil down to Mini and cIOSes), and the System Menu (which is not an operating system) run on the PPC chip. Only one program runs at a time on the PPC, and the running program has full control of it.

The ARM chip runs the actual operating system of the Wii: normally IOS. IOS controls access to most of the Wii's hardware under most circumstances (applications using DVDX v2 can access hardware themselves). PPC applications have to talk to it to install channels, use the network functions, even to get Wii Remote data. Your Wii does not just have one IOS on it at a time, there are many different versions, such as IOS36, IOS60, and IOS9, though only one runs at a time.

Games eventually switch to using newer IOS versions. For example, a lot of third-party games used IOS21 for a period of time, but newer ones use IOS55 and IOS56. If you didn't have IOS55, (for example, because you still had an ancient System Menu) the System Menu would make you update before you play the game. If you tried to force the game to run on a different IOS, it would crash. This is not actually true in every case, but applications will not necessarily work if run on an IOS they are incompatible with. Most games will probably run on System Menu 3.4 through Gecko, but not all will.

To install an IOS, download Dop-IOS MOD v8 from the WiiBrew wiki. Launch that through the Homebrew Channel, and select IOS50 at the first screen. At the second screen, select IOSes. DO NOT TRY TO INSTALL IOS51 ON YOUR WII UNLESS YOU ALSO INSTALL 60, 61, AND THE NEWEST SHOP CHANNEL. Also, installing IOS50 without updating the System Menu will brick your Wii, but if you pick IOS50 at the first screen, you won't be able to install IOS50. Install the IOSes you need, and you are good.

Thank you very much for explaining that, its a bit clearer now. Would it just be easier to update the wii to 4.2 through Nintendo then re-install Using the Hackmii installer or will hombrew remain without needing to uninstall? What functions on homebrew would I not be able to use if I did update my firmware to 4.2? or if that doesnt work How on earth you do find out which is a correct and safe IOS to install then without the risk of bricking? does the Dop-Ios MOD v8 programme tell you?

Quoting you:

''DO NOT TRY TO INSTALL IOS51 ON YOUR WII UNLESS YOU ALSO INSTALL 60, 61, AND THE NEWEST SHOP CHANNEL. Also, installing IOS50 without updating the System Menu will brick your Wii, but if you pick IOS50 at the first screen, you won't be able to install IOS50. Install the IOSes you need, and you are good.''

How the hell did you find this out? it does sound a bit complicated. Sorry, but I'm really thick but am desperate to learn.

The newest versions of IOS50 and IOS51 do nothing. Trying to launch a Shop Channel that uses IOS51 (3.4's) will fail and the Wii will hang at a black screen. System Menu 3.4 uses IOS50, so updating IOS50 would cause the same thing to happen with the System Menu.

If, however, you install a newer System Menu and Shop Channel with their IOSes, you can replace 50 and 51, though there is no reason to.

Thank you very much for explaining Wii System layout, question about downgrading IOS.

I followed guide found on internet to install homebrew channel, executed Banner Bomb to install homebrew and dvdx after this executed CMDVDX34 to downgrade IOS, after installing i realized this step (executing CMDVDX34) is not required for homebrew it is for something else i don't need that.

Question, is this will cause any issue (brick) when i upgrade to new firmware 4.2 (Currently i have 4.1). If this is going to cause any issue is there anyway revert this change.

Please let me know.

Thanks in advance.

When you update all your IOS are updated anyway, so IOS35 will be updated to the latest version. But in future, stay away from any guide mentioning IOS downgrades. The only time its safe to do an IOS downgrade is on a very low numbered IOS, using a particular tool which updates the IOS again afterwards (the tool cannot be named here though)