Sorry to post in the wrong spot. Seems I've made some... mind you some... progress.
I was using the X2 Bios, but it was an old one. After visiting "the usual places" I grabbed X2 4983. This seems to have straightened out the bad button configuration, however I've got a new problem. The box is a 1.6 xbox and now I get all kinds of crazy video output and I can't make heads or tails out of what's on the display.
I tried grabbing a different (later) version of the bios but it seems they aren't BFM bioses. Since i'm using a softmod I must use BFM. So I grabbed XBtool and tried to open one of these newer bioses and make it BFM... unfortunately it seems that 4982 is the last version of X2 bios that XBtool can operate on.
HELP... I'm so close.