No, I don't believe any of that means anything practical if users can just replace the drive. It may be too early to tell, but from what I can see, the drive is a big enough loophole that it should be further abuseable.
You assume Microsoft don't check any form of serial number on the drive? This could easily be burnt into their TPM chip which verifies the hardware on boot is what it was previously. Many of the loopholes have been closed thanks to a very low tech solution,
epoxy resin (also used in many security systems to encase sensitive components, you also add fine wire mesh circuits which trip when you attempt to etch it away too).
Further, in the context of this thread, I don't believe there is a difference between cracked and modded to play pirated games. In fact, I don't see the point of bringing up the former in the context of running unsigned code, as it wasn't even in the original post.
It is important, you won't be able to run code which degrades the security without getting it signed. Also you can't exploit things like stack overflows because of the way the Power architecture structures its stack.
I'm not even sure if this is a counterpoint to me or a counterpoint to itself. All I can say is that as long as you have only one person with one copy of the game online at a time, its already a pretty good deterent from piracy in the case that piracy is already rampant (ie. you can't play with your group of friends unless if you have a real copy.).
It's neither. I am merely highlighting the issues of trying to tie games to users during offline play. The only time you can tie a game down is to restrict one user (on one Xbox with a certain unique ID) to play an instance of one game (with a separate unique ID per disc) at once. This prevents people all playing together simultaneously online with a duplicated copy, it does not stop people playing at separate times with that pirate copy.
Overall, my point is that you claimed Microsoft had intentionally made the 360 easily hackable - it's not. It's extremely difficult because they have introduced techniques, which have been designed over several years for future PCs (and thankfully haven't made the jump, we are starting to see Fritz chips appearing though), with well understood security principles.
Dizzy said:
Pirating is never good for a console. Every console sold to a pirate is money lost since they will not buy any games. It will also lower game/console ratio. The money is in the software not the hardware. I think this is a myth pirates use to justify their actions. Pirating helps to sell consoles that is just plain BS.
I agree entirely. The only place where pirating can claim to have any position in strengthening a product is those that rely on network effects. Take Office as an example, the only reason everyone uses Office is because everyone else uses Office. Unfortunately, the barrier to entry is high (about 400 quid) so piracy of Office is rampant because there are many people who cannot overcome the barrier (or don't want to spend quite that much for simple actions) but need to use Office. This strengthens the brand because now pirates produce Office files so their associates must either pirate/buy Office to interact. Thankfully, many of these people will purchase a legitimate copy. This is the joy of lock-in.
