Nintendo Wii

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Setup
The Wii's simple design makes it very easy to hook up. The back panel of the console has only five ports: One for the power adapter, one for the proprietary A/V cable, one for the sensor bar, and two USB ports for future accessories. Just plug in the sensor bar and put it either on top of or under your television, plug the video cable into your TV, and plug the power cable into the wall, and you're ready to go.

Once everything is hooked together, just turn on the Wii to go through the software setup. Settings such as time and username can be easily selected with the remote control's pointer. The only remotely technical setting most users will have to deal with is the network connection, and the menu system practically walks users through the setup. The Wii's Wi-Fi connection can work with secure WEP- and WPA-encrypted Wi-Fi networks, so you don't have to make your network vulnerable just to play online. We had no problem connecting to our open wireless router, though we couldn't test the network connection beyond that. If you don't have Wi-Fi at all, Nintendo is said to be offering an Ethernet adapter that interfaces with one of the USB ports. While Nintendo's servers were not ready at the time of this review, we will update our evaluation of this feature as soon as we can go online.

Once the Wii's network settings are set up, the system is designed to be constantly online through Nintendo's WiiConnect24 service. The Wii can use WiiConnect24 to automatically download system updates, additional game content, and even weather and news.

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