Cutting the wires or leaving unhooked didn't work at all.

You can do the switch to the Auto ecu. Make sure you check base timing, but set your dist, by total advance. The auto ecu will put in too much advance if you just set by base timing. You'll want to choose a safe degree of total advance (you might look some where around 30-35 degrees - check the manual) - at something like 4-5k rpm - choose an RPM just far enough to have the full advance.

The JWT is an easy way to go - but keep in mind they just opened up the ecu to other options as well.

Cheers,
Jason.