I live in Tampa Bay Florida and during the summer there are a lot of thunderstorms; it happens so often that a “spat” storm (meaning one that lasts a half-hour or lses) happens pretty much every other day all summer long. That being the case, it’s totally normal in these parts that the power kicks off for anywhere from 5 seconds to 5 minutes several times a month.

Ordinarily, the Nintendo Wii is pretty good at not having any problems, but there’s one particularly annoying issue that’s happened to me twice because of how often the power kicks off in this area.

The Wii’s power adapter is an external brick, and it does have a trip switch in it. This switch is not something you can see as it’s sealed inside the unit.

When the Wii’s brick detects a surge, spike, blackout, brownout or what-have-you, it shuts off.

The problem? Your Wii console won’t power on after the power goes back to normal. You will literally think your Wii console is broken because it won’t power on, but it most likely isn’t. The brick itself needs to be reset.

Nintendo instructs to unplug the brick from everything (wall and Wii), let it sit for two minutes, and the brick will auto-reset itself, allowing it to power a Wii console again.

Does this work? Yes, it does. I’ve personally had to do this twice and both times the console powered right back up afterward.

I do consider this to be a flaw in Nintendo design, because there should be a light on the brick to let you know it’s either working or not working. Alas, the brick has no such light.

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