Comments | sieuesie: Wii Assistance Please

sieuesie

Wii Assistance Please

Apr 16, 2007 14:02

I have a "friend", no really I do, who has bought her son a Wii for his birthday. They would now like to connect it to t'internet to access the online content. I did a bit of a search and discovered a Nintendo USB wifi connector (at £28) but would any USB wifi adapter work?

Is there anything else my "friend" should know? As she is almost computer ( Read more... )

Comments 5

fba April 16 2007, 13:20:05 UTC

Do they already have Wireless access to the internet? If they do they don't need to do anything - the Wii has wireless integrated.

If they only have wired internet they will need to buy a Wii wired adaptor (which I think is USB). The Nintendo wireless USB device that you mention is designed to share a host PC's internet access with a DS (so that you can play Mario Kart online for example). I would imagine that it would be the most painless way to connect to the Wii too if she has a USB broadband modem connected directly to her PC rather than a router.

snowking April 16 2007, 13:51:05 UTC

The Nintendo USB thingy works with Wiis.

sieuesie April 16 2007, 21:42:24 UTC

I'm under the impression she has NTL cable broadband via the wee cable modem. She has only one PC in the house. She doesn't have a home network so I think relies only on the cable modem for internet (which doesn't come with WLAN).

As her son has a DS as well as the Wii my feeling is that she is just as well buying the Nintendo branded USB dongle just for ease of use. As far as I can see the Nintendo branded and the one teh Hoog linked to are about the same price (and do the same thing). The only way of bringing the price down would be to buy a generic USB access point, but I don't know if that would lose the functionality of being able to connect the DS.

snowking April 16 2007, 13:45:50 UTC

Hmm, I would have assumed so but all the customer support stuff refers to using wireless routers or the specific Nintendo USB connector.

I imagine setting up any USB dongle to make the PC act as an access point will be fine. Hence people selling stuff like this.

I've had no problem connecting through my airport thingy to get to the internet proper but the actual Nintendo shop times out all the time.

sieuesie April 16 2007, 21:44:36 UTC

I pointed her towards the Nintendo support page/bulletin board thingy and the sticky post regarding what you need to connect. It makes sense that the Nintendo website only recommends their own product but there were a few posts where people had problems using another USB access points/routers. She wouldn't be skilled enough to work her way out of problems, and I don't really want a phone call when it doesn't work, so I'm sticking with the Nintendo product as my recommendation.