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[steffenj]

About the speculations on how MS actually does the bannings ... i believe the last thing MS wants is us to pinpoint the bannings to a specific thing or behavior. Behind this all there's maybe some very simple process/detection mechanisms, but the way MS is banning is to purposefully make them seem "random". They may even keep some sole survivors with old firmwares on purpose.

Also i don't think they ever would ban all of the modders even if they could. The modders are a community of typically hardcore xbox fans. Our word of mouth is worth more than any ad campaign so MS is, as i see it, just trying to keep things in balance. Eg. keep developers/publishers happy and the amount of (known) modded consoles to an acceptable level while at the same time not p...ing off the community (even if they don't endorse the modding).

Also, we drive hardware sales just a little. Got banned? Get a new one! Fried your console while soldering? Get a new one! Bricked your drive while flashing? Get a new one! Currently the 360 is the only next-gen console that's easily moddable (Wii is hardly nextgen, has a different audience and has no software-only solution, don't know the status of PS3 modding but at any rate Blue-Ray burners and discs are hard to come by and are veeeery expensive).

[martsmall]

QUOTE(steffenj @ Dec 13 2007, 12:47 PM)

About the speculations on how MS actually does the bannings ... i believe the last thing MS wants is us to pinpoint the bannings to a specific thing or behavior. Behind this all there's maybe some very simple process/detection mechanisms, but the way MS is banning is to purposefully make them seem "random". They may even keep some sole survivors with old firmwares on purpose.

Also i don't think they ever would ban all of the modders even if they could. The modders are a community of typically hardcore xbox fans. Our word of mouth is worth more than any ad campaign so MS is, as i see it, just trying to keep things in balance. Eg. keep developers/publishers happy and the amount of (known) modded consoles to an acceptable level while at the same time not p...ing off the community (even if they don't endorse the modding).

Also, we drive hardware sales just a little. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) Got banned? Get a new one! Fried your console while soldering? Get a new one! Bricked your drive while flashing? Get a new one! Currently the 360 is the only next-gen console that's easily moddable (Wii is hardly nextgen, has a different audience and has no software-only solution, don't know the status of PS3 modding but at any rate Blue-Ray burners and discs are hard to come by and are veeeery expensive).

totally agree with you on this, its good business sense from them as much as i h8 to say it, if they banned every modded console  then a lot of ppl would be put off buying a 360 but if they do it bit by bit most of them ppl will buy another 1 thinking  other ppl have got away without being banned maybe i wont this time, thier timing is great with the key xmas shopping time, come january thier sales figures over xmas will only b helped by some of those who were banned in nov getting a new shiny 360 to mod

[mickey797]

Wow, so many people getting banned again. Although a lot of people here are reportedly using firmware < iXtreme1.4 so that will explain a bit of it.

I'm still a(live), luckily I hadn't played any of those reported 'bad' games. I think I've only been playing Medal of Honor Airborne, Naruto & Transformers for the last month or so - and I don't play backups online - so that's why perhaps I survived. Don't know. Also flashed to iXtreme1.4 within the hour it came out.

Not sure what's going on... but very curious.

This post has been edited by mickey797: Dec 13 2007, 02:24 PM

[BoNg420]

QUOTE(mickey797 @ Dec 13 2007, 08:24 AM)

Wow, so many people getting banned again. Although a lot of people here are reportedly using firmware < iXtreme1.4 so that will explain a bit of it.

I'm still a(live), luckily I hadn't played any of those reported 'bad' games. I think I've only been playing Medal of Honor Airborne, Naruto & Transformers for the last month or so - and I don't play backups online - so that's why perhaps I survived. Don't know. Also flashed to iXtreme1.4 within the hour it came out.

Not sure what's going on... but very curious.

I dont think it matters even if they have 1.4 FW.  MS could of been recording bannings for months and just one day decide to ban people.  They could probably do this so people cant figure out what they did wrong.

[mickey797]

QUOTE(BoNg420 @ Dec 13 2007, 02:31 PM)

I dont think it matters even if they have 1.4 FW.  MS could of been recording bannings for months and just one day decide to ban people.  They could probably do this so people cant figure out what they did wrong.

So you mean like a log of people 'flagged' for banning before they updated to iXtreme1.4 ... and just ban in stages? Hmm. Makes senses.

The people who haven't been 'flagged' (assuming this is what is going on) and who updated to iXtreme1.4 ... I'm assuming they are safer, for now.

[seven5]

I just flashed my 360 for the first time last night, so my cage is getting a bit rattled at the moment. I flashed my hitachi 59 with iXtreme 1.4.

The first thing i did was tell my 360 to NOT log onto live automatically. I was pretty weary last night about being on live, so i made a new local gamertag just for offline games (Captain Offline).

So what exactly is risky? Playing an offline game with my gamertag logged into live? Full blown live game? What are the standard do's and dont's.

[pat_morita]

QUOTE(seven5 @ Dec 13 2007, 06:23 PM)

So what exactly is risky? Playing an offline game with my gamertag logged into live? Full blown live game? What are the standard do's and dont's.

As long as we don't know exactly how M$ figures out u'r using modded hardware, no one can really say whats safe or not. But experience shows that you should

1. Stay up to date with FW
2. Check ur Backups (stealth mode -> dvdmulleter and GOOD SS.bin -> extract with mulleter, check with Kreonchecker)
3. Do backups from (your) originals. Don't use online backups

What CAN happen is:

If u play a "bad" game, M$ can flag you, putting you on a list for further bans. This theory allows the thought, that it doesn't matter if you play it ON or OFFLINE because the software itself sets the flag and sends it to MS next time ur online. So NEVER USE BAD GAMES. it should be the best hint you'll get with modded hardware atm afaik.

This post has been edited by pat_morita: Dec 13 2007, 06:42 PM

[Devedander]

QUOTE(seven5 @ Dec 13 2007, 06:23 PM)

The first thing i did was tell my 360 to NOT log onto live automatically. I was pretty weary last night about being on live, so i made a new local gamertag just for offline games (Captain Offline).

I have wondered about this...  it's pretty well established that being connected to live but not actually playing against people on live still counts as being online, but does having the ethernet cable in and not signing in mean you are safe?  I would think technically MS could still do things in the background but it toes the line of what's acceptable access to your property while you are not signed in... after all if you are not signed in you can't be violating TOS agreements or compromising their online gaming environment in any way...

QUOTE(BoNg420 @ Dec 13 2007, 02:31 PM)

I dont think it matters even if they have 1.4 FW.  MS could of been recording bannings for months and just one day decide to ban people.  They could probably do this so people cant figure out what they did wrong.

While many people here think MS is not flagging consoles I personally think it would be very reasonable for them to do so for so many reasons... the biggest obviously to keep fear running in the community of what exactly you might get banned for... that kind of fear keeps those on the edge, those who can't afford a second console and what not, from getting into the mod game and probably limits those who do get into the mod game from just straight up pirating as much (buy actual retail games to go online with).

One reason (and this is admittedly a bit of a stretch) to leave people unbanned is because they have an eye in the scene so to speak.  Leave some people unbanned and you can watch what's going on in the wild knowing you are watching a modded box.  Now certainly MS has a room full of modded xboxes and copied games that they are running tests on, certainly they have our latest modded firmwares and are watching the IRC rooms all the time... so the value of that is questionable, but it never hurts to have more feelers out there and see what the real Joes are doing with their stuff...

[markyk1974]

Maybe i've missed this conversation somewhere else, but with the new wave of bans and the speculation being that MS are detecting this 360 timing thing from bad backups, i would have thought that people would be talking about what kind of media they are using for their backups.  

I have a Hitachi 47dj drive which now has ixtreme 1.4 do i need to re check my backups with the kreon checker or will the 1.4 firmware save me from that.  Really don't like the thought of having to make my backups again.

Peace out

[martsmall]

QUOTE(markyk1974 @ Dec 13 2007, 11:04 PM)

Maybe i've missed this conversation somewhere else, but with the new wave of bans and the speculation being that MS are detecting this 360 timing thing from bad backups, i would have thought that people would be talking about what kind of media they are using for their backups.  

I have a Hitachi 47dj drive which now has ixtreme 1.4 do i need to re check my backups with the kreon checker or will the 1.4 firmware save me from that.  Really don't like the thought of having to make my backups again.

Peace out

  cause its nothing to do with what media is used @ all, u can use whatever media u like/ works for you.

[user112]

QUOTE(pat_morita @ Dec 13 2007, 06:37 PM)

If u play a "bad" game, M$ can flag you, putting you on a list for further bans. This theory allows the thought, that it doesn't matter if you play it ON or OFFLINE because the software itself sets the flag and sends it to MS next time ur online. So NEVER USE BAD GAMES. it should be the best hint you'll get with modded hardware atm afaik.

That seems like BS to me ,because if you'd take over a modded console's HD and update it with someone else's 360 he/she could get banned.

[Devedander]

Those who know have tested both the hard drive and the built in memory of the 360 and decided it's pretty much impossible any flags are being set on the console to report back later... so it's considered pretty safe to play backups offline.

[DuBob4432]

ok, now i have tested my backups of my originals and all came back as "good kreon rip".

here was my method - lmk if i did it correctly -
i tried to do it directly from mulleter from the disc but couldn't get it to work, so i made isos of my originals w/ imgburn to the hdd (not many so not a big deal), then i used mulleter 10.2 beta to extract the ss.bin and then used kreon checker to check the ss.bin.

all came back as ok.

i was banned using a 5.2c ms28 drive and have never used anything but my originals or backups of my originals - i have played my backups signed in but i have not ever d/l a game from the internet - these are all my own - i controlled everything - flashing the 360, flashing the sh-d162c - flashing the pioneer.  i used a kreon sh-d162c drive and burned them onto verbatim media w/ a pioneer 111d w/ tdb 1.29 firmware.

hope this helps some people out - if i didn't check them the correct way, lmk and i will redo it to whatever the correct way is.

[DonnyRockDude]

Dammit....!  The inevitable happened. Banned as from 13/12/07, was using an MS25 w/  IExtreme 1.3 FW. I think it was probably down to some kind of CRC check/flagging system set up by M$ as most people believe. Shame as have been modded for a year! :/

What are people doing with their banned consoles; Selling them, keeping them for off-line use or what?


Also - I would like to know if people who got banned would consider modding again with their new console? Sounds pretty stupid as it seems a matter of time before M$ catch up with us....



Chris

[Devedander]

Dubo I think there was a possibility of even originals spitting back the 360 read angle because they might come back 359 and the firmware would have bumped to 360... I think the real test will be if someone has only ever used 1.4 and see if they get banned (I will soon be in that category as soon as parts for my drive flashing come in...)

Donny, if you have a banned console... why would you flash your new one?  You have one that will play backups already and is already banned so what more could go wrong for it?  If you really HAVE to play backups on Live then you don't really have a choice but to mod your new one, but other than that use the banned one for backups and the new one for retail live play.

I keep seeing people getting banned with older firmware... why are people not upgrading their firmware?  It would seem that it's well worth the time and trouble to do it... I mean we see posts of bannings all over the place here and there is a known issue with pre 1.4 firmwares so why are people not upgrading?  It seems silly... I mean you might already be on a list and it's too late, but then you might not, but not upgrading means you increase your chance of being banned... it just doesn't make sense... $350 console and you don't upgrade to the new firmware when a problem is identified with the old one?