My knockoff Wiikey modchip proved to be too delicate a soul for this harsh world. $15 isn’t very much to pay for something delivered from Hong Kong, but in retrospect that low price may have contributed to its slightly off-kilter fit over the pads to which I was supposed to solder it. A few worked fine, but I was left trying to make awkward solder bridges for the rest. My soldering skills aren’t all that great by nerd standards, and my Radioshack iron leaves a lot to be desired. I’d already scorched the chip by the time I swooped in with some clippers to remove a misplaced solder strand, had the metal bond to the clippers and proceeded to pull up a sizable trace from the modchip. Whoops.
The good news is that the reassembled Wii seems to be fine despite now containing four fewer screws. But the removed modchip took a solder pad with it, so that’s it for this console: it’s now officially unmoddable — at least by someone with my meager skills. If some incredibly awesome homebrew or emulation project debuts that I can’t live without, I’ll have to buy another Wii. Ah well.