GameCube?

[Louis Dias]

The Wii is the best bet.
It's been fully and easily hacked already and all the hardware already has homebrew api's to hit it directly.

As for OS's...linux is already ported and AROS would be your best bet for legal reasons.

hackmii.com
wiibrew.org

[Louis Dias]

There are 25 million Gamecubes in the wild, I don' think they'll be rare for quite some time.  Used they sell for ~$30USD.  I have 2 myself.  One is hacked.  So I know what I am talking about.  The problem with hacking the Gamecube it that it requires extra hardware.  I sell some of that at www.gameparts.biz, specifically, the SD Gecko which is an SD->memory card adapter.  So again, I know what I am talking about.

With the Wii, all you need is Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess and you download a save file and boom: instant hacked Wii.

The Wii's cpu is based on the 729MHz 740CL where as the GC's is based on the 487.25MHz 750GX.  The Wii has much more memory to work with (88MB vs 24MB+16MB of swap) and has built-in 802.11g.  Try to find a network adapter for the GC these days...

The Wii also has 2 USB 2.0 ports and a built in SD card slot.

Oh, yes, my Wii is "hacked" as well.

[Louis Dias]

The Wii is a GC and more, so I didn't change my tune, I upgraded with the times.

I also stated back then that any work done towards a GC build would carry right over into the Wii.  That is a fact as it's trivial to compile Wii versions of GC software.

Also, Rogue has stated that OS4 could run on the Wii but won't for obvious legal reasons.

A Wii port of AROS is only a bounty away as the entire Wii hardware API in the homebrew community has enabled features of the Wii that Nintendo themselves have not enabled such as SDHC.

Also, the Wii's cpu is more powerful than SAM or EFIKA and we know what those machines are capable of running...