dsreaper says:

Seeing so many people are interested/getting modchips I thought a guide might be useful.
There are other chips but I focus on the Wiikey here because it's the best on the market.

Official Website
www.wiikey.cn
Official website, best place for information. There is a website selling clones of the original chips www.wiikey.com.cn so avoid them. Clones are cheaper but can potentially break upon updating...up to you.

What is a mod chip/Wiikey?
A mod chip is an electronic chip that get attached to the DVD drive to “hack” it and allow it to run games from any country (PAL or NTSC) it can also play backups/downloaded games and emulate old one (like SNES). The Wiikey features “Stealth” mode, which means it works in write only mode, so you can't read the settings on the chip. If there is no response from the chip it can't be detected.

Are these legal? How about the games?
Installing a mod chip is legal in Australia. Doing so however will void your warranty because the case is opened during the process. Importing games is legal, backing up a game is supposedly legal but copying one is illegal...by backing up you're making a copy so I don't know lol, downloading from torrent sites etc is illegal.

04/15/2007 Gold Coast, Queensland

dsreaper says:

Where Can I buy one, how much, who can install?
There are 3 official resellers on the wiikey site, however Ozmodchips are the most popular www.ozmodchips.com For the chip it's $50, chip and installation will cost $110 ($50 for chip, $60 to installer when he does it infront of you).
Even if you haven't bought a chip through them, email and they will let you know where your closest installer is. I had mine installed by them and they were an excellent bunch of people, very helpful, professional and fast.
*note* They can be unsoldered by a skilled person but only should be done in extreme cases so choose carefully before installing a chip.

What's the risk?
There is a chance the soldering/install could go wrong and the console could be “bricked”. Bricked means it no longer works...its dead.
There is a chance Nintendo could find a way to break it, but with Stealth mode it's unlikely they will...it would seriously take a lot of effort.
Recently you would have heard about Paper Mario breaking PAL consoles, that was caused by using the wrong reign NTSC not PAL so it could kill your machine. Apparently it wasn't intentional and Nintendo will work on a fix for future releases, easy way around this is to update the console via the internet before running it.
It is still rather new so unexpected errors are a possibility, do not install a mod chip unless you are prepared...

04/15/2007 Gold Coast, Queensland

dsreaper says:

for the worst case scenario (console dies).

Will I lose all my data when it's installed?
No, the time and date get reset because the battery gets pulled out (like a digital watch). All VC games, save data and internet channels are there after the install. I updated the shop channel and got full version of Opera yesterday after the chip was installed.

Hopefully I've covered all commonly asked questions. If you have others post them here or PM me.
Happy Modding!

04/15/2007 Gold Coast, Queensland

Wii-Fan says:

lol you ran out of space but nice job someone had to make a guide like this and thanks for doing it if I could give out kudos I would give you 250 thanks alot this will save everbody's time

04/15/2007 Yarra Valley ,Melbourne, Victoria

dsreaper says:

haha thanks, happy to do it

04/15/2007 Gold Coast, Queensland

kojiro says:

i have a question: did anyone successfully have a wiikey installed and their everybody votes channel wasn't screwed up? My questions have around 100 days each left, i reset the clock and re-downloaded the channel. any ideas?

04/15/2007 Perth, WA

Cham-balam says:

hey you want me to put it in the guides?

04/15/2007 Behind You....

dsreaper says:

My vote channel is working correctly...I would have suggested redownloading but seeing you've done that i'm not sure, sorry

Cham-balam said: hey you want me to put it in the guides?

04/15/2007 Gold Coast, Queensland

Cham-balam says:

yeh i'll talk with desi as he seems to know so much about this stuff, but yeh if it's not illegal i'll put it in for sure

GOTTA GO OUT, ADD IT FIRST THIGN WHEN I GET BACL

04/15/2007 Behind You....

desi says:

Cham-balam said: yeh i'll talk with desi as he seems to know so much about this stuff, but yeh if it's not illegal i'll put it in for sure

GOTTA GO OUT, ADD IT FIRST THIGN WHEN I GET BACL

dsreaper said: backing up a game is supposedly legal but copying one is illegal...by backing up you're making a copy so I don't know lol

04/15/2007 I'm in your profile, deleting your spams for Great Justice.

bennyr says:

Does the Nintendo work with iso's?

04/15/2007 Melbourne

kolpol9 says:  

yes they do

04/15/2007 Victoria,Teesdale

Cham-balam says:

Guys i have gotten the Guide up and going, it wasn't easy, it uses some wierd form of coding that took me like 20 minutes to work out, but it's there, i gotta fix the thumbnail and the links to, they aren't clickable, but they stand out. Just for the moment.

www.mywii.com.au/

EDIT: one sec guys if it stuffs up dont worry, just let me edit something

04/15/2007 Behind You....