Wii Startup Disc (found Wii software disc; 2006)

The Wii Startup Disc was a disc containing a system update for the Nintendo Wii console, seemingly intended to be shipped with the first released Wii units. While there exist large amounts of evidence for its existence, the physical disc has not been found, nor has a rip of it been found.

The error message that shows upon boot on consoles that require the disc

Status: Lost

Status

While the Wii Startup Disc was rumored to be required for the console's initial startup in pre-release rumors, and the disc was shown on the initial versions of the Wii box, it was never shipped to consumers.

According to an old blog post on a now abandoned Wii hacking blog called HackMii, a developer discovered that a very few early Nintendo Wii units shipped to customers required the disc, even though no such disc was provided. Apparently, said units that required the disc were accidentally shipped to customers, and had to be sent back to Nintendo to be fixed. As most of the very few purchased by customers were sent back, there exist very few, possibly less than a thousand, Wii units that require it.

Also according to the HackMii post, the final version of the Wii firmware (Wii Menu) has a check built in that checks any disc inserted to insure its internal disc ID does not match the one of the Startup Disc. If it does, the firmware will refuse to boot the disc- this was most likely implemented to prevent people from using the disc twice to downgrade. The disc ID in question is "RAAE"- it is known that this is the ID of the startup disc as a Wii with the error message will boot discs modified to have their ID as RAAE.

Back of early Wii box with "Wii Startup Disc" listed

While very, very few Wii units that required the disc were shipped to customers, a substantially higher amount were shipped to retailers to be used for kiosk demos- there are reports of sightings of the screen on store kiosks in late 2006. According to Bushing, the developer who wrote the blog post on HackMii, there are reports from retail workers seeing the physical disc, indicating that it was shipped with kiosk units.

Blurry photo of startup disc prompt on kiosk unit

While the Wii Startup Disc error message is not lost and has been thoroughly documented, the disc itself is lost. While it is known that the disc was just a software system update, the specific content of the disc is unknown as the disc did not ship with any systems that were purchased by consumers (as far as is known), and it is unknown if any retailers are still in possession of the disc. No concrete info, physical copy, or digital rip of the disc has surfaced, although it is likely that Nintendo is still in possession of copies of the disc.

Update:

"Excalibur0123" on Reddit claims to remember owning the disc, however neither him nor his family worked in retail and he does not remember seeing the error screen. However, this claim has not been backed up, so it is uncertain if he actually did own the disc. If he did, this would be a case of the disc being shipped to customers, possibly in a mixup of some sort.

Update 2:

Another account of the disc has surfaced, from a forum in 2006. However, it seems rather fake and cannot be verified, although it is possible that it is legitimate. The account reads:

"Alright guys i think i got it, i have a source who works at a retail warehouse for a major distributor (lets call this individual Wii-man)

And what wii-man and his compondrays managed to do was "borrow" a few wii's They took them back to headquarters, set them up and offered this tid-bit of info.

"I have a Nintendo Wii and the wii startup disc is true. All it does is setup your wii account. It also prevents theft because the CD has a unique code that only works on your console. Even though I have the Wii console, I have no idea what the final secret is but I am guessing it is about portability because why would they give theft protection…Also I just wanted to add that, it does update your console with this disk. I checked the manual and it says that… "

There you go im working on getting scans of the manual"

If this account is legitimate (somewhat unlikely) this would indicate that:

The original version of the Wii Manual, although possibly a version not shipped to customers, mentioned the Startup Disc (one of the Startup Disc screens mentions consulting the manual, so this is very likely even if this account is fake)

There was some sort of "theft protection" in the disc that made it console-exclusive for an unknown reason

The disc also "sets up your wii account", although it is unclear what this actually means, possibly related to online features or initial settings (both of which are handled without any disc in final Wiis)

While this account is not likely to be legitimate, it is noteworthy as it may contain valuable info on the disc if it is.

Video of the startup disc error message