Why can we suddenly not connect two guitars and drums to Rock Band on Wii?

So, we've had Rock Band 3 for the Wii for about a month, and it's been working fine. We've got two guitars (one rock band 2 vintage, one newer), plus the pro drumset.

Everything was working fine, but suddenly, we can't get all three of these instruments to connect at the same time. It seems like any two work, but if we connect a third, the blue light goes on but none of the four controller LEDs lights. We've resynced, unplugged, replugged and so on.

I don't think we changed anything, but maybe we did and I don't know what it was.

Solution 1:

I'm presuming you're talking about the wireless instruments with the little USB dongles that plug into the Wii. I moved to xbox a while back, but I played RB on Wii so I'll try to dredge up some advice...

I'd guess that your most likely problem is a lack of enough power to the dongles. Are you chaining the dongles together (bass plugged into guitar plugged into drums plugged into console)? If so, you might want to play with the order of the chain, or see if you can break it and plug the dongles into multiple USB ports (I think the Wii has a couple, but my memory's fuzzy).

Even if the order makes a difference, you might want to invest in a powered USB hub and plug all three dongles directly into the hub (make sure you get a powered model with an adapter that plugs into the wall, not one of the super-cheap "self-powered" ones). This will ensure that all your dongles are getting plenty of juice so they can communicate with your instruments.