Well,

In short: PaiGeWong and neogeocdz pretty much sums up everything regarding mod-chip & Software mod.

My Wii is a Korea Set. I had been struggled very hard to either spend more money on a US set or just get a Korea Set and use the installed English Firmware. I go for the latter of course.

Anyway, my mod-chip is a D2C chip. At first, I lacked confidence on that chip and is researching on the Wiikey. After using for a week or two, I found it quite OK, in fact, it is quite impressive. No matter what, Wiikey / Wiikey2 is always the most famous and most reliable one.

For the price, yes, the mod-chip Wii will be more expensive than the software mod one. One particular reason is that Software mod takes lesser time, effort and tools and subsequently less labor fee. Plus, software mod doesn't always work. One statistic shows that only 75 - 80% of the game recognized software mod. And, the kicker is, almost all of the famous games are not recognized by software mod.

Sidetrack a bit, Xbox360 is a good console. There is no denying that. However, I got a feel that Xbox360 is more famous in Malaysia because it can be modded, hence lesser money invested to the console. I am pretty sure that once PS3 can be modded + Internet speed is faster, the fan will come right back. Maybe I am biased, because I am a staunch and devoted Playstation fan.