Retro Preservation: New Blu-ray Drive Firmware Rips Wii And Xbox 360 Discs On PC

OmniDrive is custom firmware for select Blu-Ray drives powered by the MediaTek MT1959 chipset that allows for numerous proprietary game disc formats to be read or ripped for backups and emulation. One of the more sought after uses for OmniDrive include creating backups for Nintendo GameCube and Wii console games, as well as Microsoft Xbox and Xbox 360 consoles, since OmniDrive can create decrypted dumps for those games. Other game discs, like those for PlayStations 3, 4, and 5, as well as Xbox One/Series consoles and Nintendo Wii U, can also be extracted by OmniDrive, but remain encrypted, limiting their use without separate decryption tools. RPCS3, for example, still recommends different tools for creating playable PS3 backups.

OmniDrive is a game-changer for more legally-defensible emulation and backup efforts. Traditionally, creating backups from game discs requires a jailbroken console, which obviously violate existing terms of service and can lead to hardware or account bans. Not only is OmniDrive available for more common, cheap Blu Ray drives (here's a full list,) it makes emulation efforts for existing collectors as easy as ripping a standard DVD. It's a major step up in convenience for enthusiasts, especially those who want to play legitimate copies without the original consoles, or on extremely modified versions of those consoles that can't be used for making backups.


In addition to some initial coverage in the tech media, YouTuber Archades Game shas uploaded OmniDrive tutorials to help those wanted to get started. Archades' video tutorials will tell you everything you need to know about flashing OmniDrive firmware and creating game backups, so if you're interested in using it for yourself with a compatible Blu-Ray drive, Archades' tutorials are worth a watch.

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