360 Modding

[Carl B]

I guess this thread is more brainstorming than anything else. I'm a big fan of being 'hands on' with the hardware and tweaking some things, and though I'm not a console modder per se, this gen I toyed around several times with the notion of getting an XBox just to turn it into something cool. In the end I ended up doing better with the cash just further upgrading my PC, but...

Anyway since MS' claims a couple of months ago that 360 would be more or less 'mod-proof,' I've been wondering how this would play out. Not having access to the hardware is kind of a shame, afterall. But looks like it's set to be much easier than I previously thought.

Anandtech's article from yesterday, though controversial in some areas, is up to par in the thrust of it's main focus: showing us the internals of the 360 and how to take it apart.

Well the most surprsing thing I came away with was more or less how easy it would be to take apart the drive casign and replace it with your own hard drive. The interface is SATA and the form-factor (as we all know) is 2.5", so drives are a little pricier - but I expect prices on these drives to come down much faster per GB than MS will pass on to the consumer.

Obviously the 360 probably won't recognize the drive on it's own, but only a matter of time before the requisite dsc images start circulating on the net.

Article

Hard drive page

 

[pakpassion]

Xbox 360 will be more popular than PS3 in the tech community because PS3 will be near impossible to mod with its internal chip mod protection

 

[Carl B]

Xbox 360 will be more popular than PS3 in the tech community because PS3 will be near impossible to mod with its internal chip mod protection

Tech community or mod community? They're different afterall. But let's try to keep this on topic two posts into the thread, alright?

 

[Bobbler]

Xbox 360 will be more popular than PS3 in the tech community because PS3 will be near impossible to mod with its internal chip mod protection

You seem to forget the great lengths MS is going to this time around to curb all that -- the Xbox1 was probably the most modded and the biggest pirate factory around, they want to avoid that. If I was to bet, I'd put my chips on X360 being harder to mod than PS3 -- not that its a bad thing or anything, I just think MS is putting more efforts into it this time around.

 

[Titanio]

Xbox 360 will be more popular than PS3 in the tech community because PS3 will be near impossible to mod with its internal chip mod protection

Not sure what that has to do with anything, but I would have thought that if Linux is made available for PS3, that'd kinda offset the need for a hardware mod.

Now, if you're talking about the piracy community..

 

[Alpha_Spartan]

Xbox 360 will be more popular than PS3 in the tech community because PS3 will be near impossible to mod with its internal chip mod protection

There's anti-modding technology at the silicon level in the Xbox 360 as well.

 

[XTrek]

Xbox 360 will be more popular than PS3 in the tech community because PS3 will be near impossible to mod with its internal chip mod protection

I remember discussions just a couple months ago. There is a security company providing security encryption devices for the 360. The 360 will have much more robust security than the wide open xbox1

 

[Powderkeg]

Well the most surprsing thing I came away with was more or less how easy it would be to take apart the drive casign and replace it with your own hard drive. The interface is SATA and the form-factor (as we all know) is 2.5", so drives are a little pricier - but I expect prices on these drives to come down much faster per GB than MS will pass on to the consumer.

It will be a little more difficult than that, but not much.

First, I can assure you that the BIOS will look for specific drive manufacturers and types. It may even already have preset sizes.

Also, while the drive is SATA, the plugs are proprietary. This isn't a huge deal, but it would require splicing in generic plugs since you aren't going to find drives to match.

And finally is the issue of how to format the drive and install all of the 360 software that MS preloads on the system and doesn't provide a backup of, if you want to keep it as a working 360 gaming system.

So, you'll need a mod chip with a new BIOS, new plugs for the drive, and possibly an installation disk of some kind.

 

[Carl B]

It will be a little more difficult than that, but not much.

First, I can assure you that the BIOS will look for specific drive manufacturers and types. It may even already have preset sizes.

Also, while the drive is SATA, the plugs are proprietary. This isn't a huge deal, but it would require splicing in generic plugs since you aren't going to find drives to match.

And finally is the issue of how to format the drive and install all of the 360 software that MS preloads on the system and doesn't provide a backup of, if you want to keep it as a working 360 gaming system.

So, you'll need a mod chip with a new BIOS, new plugs for the drive, and possibly an installation disk of some kind.

The BIOS look-up is a good point, but as for the plugs I don't believe they're proprietary, unless there's something I'm missing.

From the article:

The drive is manufactured by Samsung although it isn't listed on their website as it is an OEM drive for the Xbox 360. The drive itself uses a standard Serial ATA connector (both data cable and power cable) so attaching other drives or the Xbox 360 drive to a computer for data transfer is very possible.

 

[scooby_dooby]

Well that won't work.

With the original XBOX the machine generated a unique 'lock code' for the specific HDD, this lock code was based on the eprom.

When the machine boots up, it uses this code to unlock the HDD, when it boots down, it relocks it. If the HDD has been locked with a code, that does not match the EPROM embedded in the XBOX, the XBOX will be unable to unlock it when it boots up. If the HDD is not locked at all, the XBOX will not boot.

So, the only way currently to swap HDD's is to first mod your xbox(which can be done by anyone who knows DOS, has a spare IDE cable, and a couple torx bits), and retrieve the EEPROM. Once you have that, you can generate a new lock code will match the EPROM on your box and lock your nice new 120GB HDD with that code. Copy over an Image of the original drive, slap it in and it doesn't know the difference.

 

[scooby_dooby]

The guy who originally 'cracked' the XBOX, the infamous 'Bunny', was an MIT student with tons of equipment and alot of spare time.

In his opinion, one of the modding company which have made millions of dolalrs in profit, should be able to affod to hire some enginneers and blueprint the entire box, finding an exploit.

Lets hope!

 

[Carl B]

Well that won't work.

With the original XBOX the machine generated a unique 'lock code' for the specific HDD, this lock code was based on the eprom.

When the machine boots up, it uses this code to unlock the HDD, when it boots down, it relocks it. If the HDD has been locked with a code, that does not match the EPROM embedded in the XBOX, the XBOX will be unable to unlock it when it boots up. If the HDD is not locked at all, the XBOX will not boot.

So, the only way currently to swap HDD's is to first mod your xbox(which can be done by anyone who knows DOS, has a spare IDE cable, and a couple torx bits), and retrieve the EEPROM. Once you have that, you can generate a new lock code will match the EPROM on your box and lock your nice new 120GB HDD with that code. Copy over an Image of the original drive, slap it in and it doesn't know the difference.

120 GB, that's all you're pushin' Scooby?

LOL, anyway just kidding. That EPROM fact is good to know. Figuring that 360 runs on Power rather than x86, I wonder if that'll throw a spanner into the attempts to 'unlock' it then.

 

[scooby_dooby]

lol...hey I bought it back in 2003....HDD's weren't so cheap back then!

 

[Powderkeg]

The BIOS look-up is a good point, but as for the plugs I don't believe they're proprietary, unless there's something I'm missing.

From the article:

I missed reading that. I am surprised if it's true since that is such an easy deterrent to install.

 

[Guden Oden]

In his opinion, one of the modding company which have made millions of dolalrs in profit, should be able to affod to hire some enginneers and blueprint the entire box, finding an exploit.

Someone will do it sooner or later (very likely sooner), but the big question is wether a modchip is going to be manufactureable at an affordable price, and if it can be mounted using less precise means than robotic arm technology.

I'm sure MS has thought of eliminating easily accessible spots to important system I/O signals, and many of the interfaces in x360 are very high speed, and are of a serial, packetized nature with CRCs and stuff calculated in realtime. It will be tough to butt in on a multi-gigabit per second point-to-point link without upsetting the integrity of the data communicated across it for example, and if the needed traces are on an inner layer of the mobo it'll be even harder.

Add to that the additional complication of the difficulty of disassembling the machine, so if the final cost including work time becomes too great, the x360 modchip industry might well die in its infancy. Modchip + installation already runs quite a price today. Assume 100% higher price and interest will be a lot lower. MS knows this.

 

[scooby_dooby]

MS also knows that the mod-scene drove sales of their previous console, and they also watched the mod-scene, what they did, and used those ideas in their next console. So I don't think they want it to dissapear.

With all this built-in windows connectivity, I wouldn't be surprised if the first mod is a soft-mod.

 

[Reznor007]

Someone will do it sooner or later (very likely sooner), but the big question is wether a modchip is going to be manufactureable at an affordable price, and if it can be mounted using less precise means than robotic arm technology.

I'm sure MS has thought of eliminating easily accessible spots to important system I/O signals, and many of the interfaces in x360 are very high speed, and are of a serial, packetized nature with CRCs and stuff calculated in realtime. It will be tough to butt in on a multi-gigabit per second point-to-point link without upsetting the integrity of the data communicated across it for example, and if the needed traces are on an inner layer of the mobo it'll be even harder.

Add to that the additional complication of the difficulty of disassembling the machine, so if the final cost including work time becomes too great, the x360 modchip industry might well die in its infancy. Modchip + installation already runs quite a price today. Assume 100% higher price and interest will be a lot lower. MS knows this.

Current Xbox mod chips aren't hard to install at all. Solder in 7-8 pins, and slide the mod chip on, then solder 1 wire. Takes about 15 minutes for someone doing it the first time that knows how to solder. And this is a $15 US mod chip with dual BIOS support. There are others that are more expensive, but then you get more features and solderless installation.

Xbox 1 even had security in silicon. The MCPX chip had 512 bytes of code planted into it that the BIOS switches to. In those 512 bytes there are 3 independant exploitable bugs...gotta love MS's security programmers

 

[Guden Oden]

MS also knows that the mod-scene drove sales of their previous console, and they also watched the mod-scene, what they did, and used those ideas in their next console. So I don't think they want it to dissapear.

MS was never interested in selling hardware for the sake of it, quite the opposite as they took a financial kick in the goolies each time someone bought a box. What relatively little money they earned back (compared to how much they spent) came in the form of game royalties, and MS is just as aware as everybody else that users with modded consoles are considerably less likely to actually buy their software.

So no, I don't think they're interested in pretending to be against modding, but secretly looking through the fingers and allowing it.

 

[expletive]

MS was never interested in selling hardware for the sake of it, quite the opposite as they took a financial kick in the goolies each time someone bought a box. What relatively little money they earned back (compared to how much they spent) came in the form of game royalties, and MS is just as aware as everybody else that users with modded consoles are considerably less likely to actually buy their software.

So no, I don't think they're interested in pretending to be against modding, but secretly looking through the fingers and allowing it.

Though MS being able to tell developers that they sold XX million units is a good thing for them isnt it? Regardless of what those modders are doing with the consoles? I dont know how big attach rate plays into the equation for a developer but i'm sure installed base figures heavily.

I'm not sure even I agree with what i'm saying but its another way to look at it.

 

[PC-Engine]

Where are the neon and cold cathode tubes?