Im am actually researching this right now. If you insert a SD Card it will allow Wii and VC games to be saved to it.
Key Details on Wii U Storage Solutions
Nintendo talks more on hard drives, USB drives and more.
by Richard George
November 17, 2012
UPDATE:
Since our original story, Nintendo has released more details on what types of drives will be supported by Wii U. It's worth emphasizing that there is still a degree of uncertainty at this point, and the best way of knowing whether your particular hardware will work with the system is to test it.
Even so, here's what's new:
Bus-Powered vs. Self-Powered vs. USB 3.0
Perhaps the most important detail concerning Wii U and hard drives is this - self-powered drives (i.e. ones that you not only connect by USB but also power through an AC adapter plugged into an outlet) will definitely work with the system.
Of course, there's always direct information from Nintendo:
"To ensure maximum performance between your Wii U and an external storage device, we recommend using a hard-disc drive (HDD) with a dedicated power source (i.e., using an A/C adapter)."
Some drives are able to be powered through USB 3.0. As we noted in our original story (below), 3.0 drives are not promised to work, though Nintendo has clarified these devices will effectively operate at USB 2.0.
Specifically with regards to bus-powered drives, Nintendo has said the following:
"Some bus-powered hard disc drives draw more current than the USB 2.0 specification and might not run stably, so we cannot guarantee that such devices will run properly on Wii U without the use of a supplemental power cable called a y-cable that draws power from two USB ports. For best results, we recommend using a hard drive with its own power supply that connects to the Wii U system via the USB port on the console."
On Flash and Thumb Drives
From Nintendo:
"Because these devices have a limited number of rewrites and are not suited to long-term storage of important game data, we do not recommend the use of Flash/thumb drives as an external storage device solution. For best results, we recommend using a hard drive with its own power supply that connects to the Wii U via the USB port on the console."
Moving Your Drives
When you connect a drive to Wii U, you will have to format that drive for the system. Unless you partition, your entire drive will be dedicated to your Wii U. What's important to note is the system will format the drive for itself - not all Wii Us. In other words, if you try to relocate your HDD to another Wii U, that new system will want to format the drive again. All data will be erased.
ORIGINAL STORY:
For months we've known that Wii U will support various storage solutions in addition to the variable internal storage that comes with different system bundles (8GB and 32GB at launch). Nintendo has now provided more details on SD card and hard drive support, plus even shed some light on how much space the system's OS will take and more. Thanks to NeoGAF user cvxfreak for translating all of the details from the last second Japanese broadcast.
The OS Space
When buying a Wii U, gamers will be able to choose between the Basic bundle, which comes with 8GB of internal storage, and the Deluxe bundle, which comes with 32GB of space. By default, due to formatting, the Basic system will have 7.2GB of free memory and the Deluxe will have 29GB. From there, though, the Wii U's OS will take 4.2GB of space. That's about half of the Basic's storage, not counting any expansion through hard drives or SD cards.
Nintendo also specified that New Super Mario Bros. U is approximately a 2GB download. Nintendo Land ranks around 3.2GB. That means Basic system owners can't download both Mario and Nintendo Land to their internal storage without running out of space. Something to keep in mind.
USB Hard Drives
By default, and barring an update that Nintendo says is coming in the future, Wii U will only allow one USB drive to be connected at a time. These drives cannot be disconnected while Wii U is powered on, and the system will support and read up to 2TB of storage.
Drives that will be used by Wii U must be formatted by the system's Data Management system, meaning you can't use the drive with a PC without partitioning. However all data can be moved internally and externally through Wii U's OS.
Drives that require more than USB 2.0 connections might not work properly with Wii U. Drives that have two USB connectors will work, however.
SD Cards
Wii U will accept SD cards, but their use is limited. PC, Wii Virtual Console, WiiWare and Wii saves can be stored on these cards, but Wii U save data cannot.
