Making an ISO without a Wii?

[JudgedCurtis]

I have a few wii games about and wish to turn them into ISO files for use with the Dolphin emulator. The problem is, I don't have a wii to use it on and am having trouble following the guide that's at the top of the Support fourms.

[TurboK]

There are _few_ DVD drives that can rip Wii game discs. The models are not generally sold in stores anymore, someone might find them on Ebay, though.
Personally I'd say the most solid (by far) and probably cheapest way to convert your games to images is to buy an used Wii (40-50$/€?) and use Cleanrip. Softmodding a Wii will require some attention and a SD card, sure.
Used Wii's have also more value than out-of-date DVD drives, as you can also play the games with it and you should be getting about the same amount of money if you sell it again (I won't )

[JudgedCurtis]

There are _few_ DVD drives that can rip Wii game discs. The models are not generally sold in stores anymore, someone might find them on Ebay, though.
Personally I'd say the most solid (by far) and probably cheapest way to convert your games to images is to buy an used Wii (40-50$/€?) and use Cleanrip. Used Wii's have also more value than out-of-date DVD drives, as you can also play the games with it and you should be getting about the same amount of money if you sell it again (I won't )

I'm in UK, so does it have to be a US wii? If so, then are there any alternatives?

[JudgedCurtis]

Also, i frogot to mention, I have a Wii U, would it work on there?

[TurboK]

About regionality, AFAIK the disc does not need to be the same region as the Wii that rips it, but I have not tested this, someone here knows for sure (?)

You have a Wii U, that's great!
Ripping Wii game discs with Wii U -> possible. After softmod the procedure should be the same as with Wii. You will need to softmod the virtual Wii on your Wii U to do this. There are two caveats to this:
1) Wii can be sofmodded with Letterbomb, which does not require any additional software etc. Wii U can NOT be softmodded without a suitable game (Super Smash Bros Brawl, Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures, LEGO Batman and some others, see WiiBrew for additional information). So getting your hands on one of these is the way to go.
2) Softmodding will void your warranty. Used Wii's won't have so much of these anyway, but your Wii U might. Some might consider this a dealbreaker for doing the softmod, some not.

If I were you, I'd be searching eBay for used SSBB's or Indiana Jones's and gathering information about HomeBrew Channel installation, but it's up to you.

[JudgedCurtis]

About regionality, AFAIK the disc does not need to be the same region as the Wii that rips it, but I have not tested this, someone here knows for sure (?)

You have a Wii U, that's great!
Ripping Wii game discs with Wii U -> possible. After softmod the procedure should be the same as with Wii. You will need to softmod the virtual Wii on your Wii U to do this. There are two caveats to this:
1) Wii can be sofmodded with Letterbomb, which does not require any additional software etc. Wii U can NOT be softmodded without a suitable game (Super Smash Bros Brawl, Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures, LEGO Batman and some others, see WiiBrew for additional information). So getting your hands on one of these is the way to go.
2) Softmodding will void your warranty. Used Wii's won't have so much of these anyway, but your Wii U might. Some might consider this a dealbreaker for doing the softmod, some not.

If I were you, I'd be searching eBay for used SSBB's or Indiana Jones's and gathering information about HomeBrew Channel installation, but it's up to you.

I have the PAL version of SSBB, will that do?

[TurboK]

You have everything you need, then! (plus a SD card (NOT SDHC). See Wiibrew.org , there are very maticulate instructions for installing HomeBrew Channel. Smash Stack is the hack you'll need, the Korean/European version. After that, adding CleanRip and actually ripping the games is easier.
CleanRip has instructions on it's own. The last step is to combine the 1-3 Gb parts of the discs as one .iso, that can be done in command line with "copy /b *.part0.iso+*.part1.iso+*.part2.iso+*.part3.iso+*.part4.iso fulliso.iso" Sounds fiddly but it works. NTFS should be able to rip a full iso, but I have not tried myself.

You asked for something and ended up getting another possible solution for the task, I hope this was helpful

[TurboK]

As a side note, the procedure described above is not only "a way" to start using Dolphin, it's _the_ way for legal usage for all new users, come to think of it.

I mean, if someone with no Wii, no Wii U and no Wii games wants to start playing Wii games on PC and is wants to do it legally and using only stuff that _can be bought from retail stores as of June 2015_ should:
-buy a Wii U (as new Wii's (Wii Mini doesn't cut it) are no longer sold)
-buy Super Smash Bros Brawl (as it is still sold, even as "Selects" edition) or a LEGO Game (IF you con find one in a retail store?)
-softmod the vWii, install Cleanrip
-dump his/hers own games (starting with newly bought SSBB/LEGO games/Yu Gi * )

Although most users do own a Wii and are otherwise tangled and willing to find second hand stuff, but in the future...
Right?

[envisaged0ne]

I found used Wii's sold for $20.00 at some local stores.  Ended up buying 2 of them.  They had a whole bunch.  My guess is that people are pawning there old Wii's since the Wii-u came out and you can get them really cheap now a days

[tueidj]

They were pawning them long before the WiiU came out. A lot of people bought wiis on impulse after playing wii sports somewhere, then hardly ever touched them.