Wiimote Project

 I have been trying to connect a wiimote to my computer the last few weeks, but it has only summed up to be a completely futile effort. The most frustrating part of it all is that it seems to half work, yet nothing I do completes the puzzle. Here is my setup.
 
I am running windows vista 32-bit on an iMac in bootcamp. I have a Belkin F8T017 bluetooth USB adapter. I have a Logitech mouse and keyboard that are wirelessly connected to a separate bluetooth dongle (which I wonder is causing any problems).
 
Here is what I have done. At first I thought my problem was with my internal bluetooth adapter, believeing it to be incompatible with the wiimote. This was after struggling to get the controller recognized at all. I therefore purchased a bluetooth USB dongle that uses WIDCOMM version 6.0.1.6300. The dongle works fine. I followed the entire self help guide. I uninstalled anything that said bluetooth from my program list and renamed bth.inf to bth.bak (although under properties it still identifies it as a inf file). I cleaned my registry using ccleaner and then reinstalled the WIDCOMM software that came with my Belkin F8T017.
 
After all this I am still having the same issues I had even before I bought the dongle. I have downloaded GlovePIE029, Smoothboard, Wiinremote, and wiimotewhiteboard. None of them work with one exception...
 
Here is the nagging issue. I can connect my wiimote to the computer. The wiimote is listed in the devices as Nintendo RVL-CNT-01. When I first installed the adapter it actually connected to Wiinremote and I was able to interface with the computer! However, a little box said I needed to restart because of the drivers that installed with the wiimote, so I did. It has never worked again. I can still connect and have the device displayed in My Bluetooth Devices. I get an error from both smoothboard and wiiwhiteboard that asks if my wiimote is connected, even though is shows up in My Bluetooth Devices. The only thing I can deduce is that communication is only one way. I can run certain scripts in GlovePie that work. For example Clyon.PIE. This makes the LEDs on my wiimote blink in a certain order forever repeating. So it appears I can send information to my wiimote. However the connection is not two-ways. Whenever I try a script that requires input, e.g. LedLighter.PIE. I cannot do anything. No button I hit on the wiimote creates a response.
 
I am completely lost on this and have noticed you are very big on the forum. Please, if you know how to solve this problem and have time to tell me I would be very grateful. I really appreciate your time.

P.S. You are a very awesome dude, Ben!

Hey Ben,

Further sleuthing has led me to this discovery (I still don't having it working, but)...

I spent the entire afternoon and evening today installing and uninstalling all sorts of WIDCOMM packages. I discovered two major factors contributing to my complications.

1. When I changed the extension on the btw.inf file to btw.bak, Vista only renamed in btw.bak.inf and was somehow still recognizing this file. It was not until I physically moved the file into a backup folder in my documents did it become nonfunctional, thus removing the incompatibility or conflict.

2. WIDCOMM v6 (the one made for Vista) is not a fully independent stack. It actually uses the MS stack as a core and adds additional functionality onto it; Wiimote functionality NOT included I cannot install WICOMM v6 without btw.inf present and functional.

I then tested out the wiimote in Mac OSX and it worked on the first try! My mind exploded. I can't believe how difficult Microsoft has made things. I want to play Left 4 Dead on my computer, this is the whole incentive to get it running in Vista.

I returned to the Vista environment and attempted to install an earlier, complete, version of WIDCOMM, version 5. This worked smoothly and I thought I had it all figured out until I went to connect the wiimote to the computer. There is no option to skip entering a passkey. It forces me to enter a passkey! For crying out loud this is a never ending maze of compatibility madness. If there is an answer to this hurdle I would joyously employ it. I did look into a passkey work around and saw a post that said the wiimote actually does have a passkey, it is just not necessary to use. The pass key is the MAC address of the Bluetooth host network. I worked on a solution to this, but I don't know if there is a viable work around available. The problem is the MAC address is a set of hexadecimal numbers and the passkey is ASCII. The hexadecimal numbers of the MAC address don't map into any numbers or letters you could enter in as the passkey. I downloaded a MAC spoofer by Technitium and attempted to mask the MAC address of the bluetooth dongle to 30:30:30:30:30:30 translating to a passkey of 000000, but the address is only spoofed if the dongle is not plugged in. As soon as I plug it in the hardcoded MAC address overrides the fake one. I don't dare go any further than this, because I don't want to be manually messing around with the registry.

So... I am on the verge of completely giving up. Unless there is a way to get WIDCOMM v5 to stop mandating a passkey of some kind I don't think there is anything I can do. Is there an even earlier version of WIDCOMM that does not have this problem?

I hope there is a solution. Is there anyone else running into this much trouble?

I have unistalled all things WIDCOMM and reinstalled the drivers from Bootcamp. Awaiting further instruction...