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[mariotwo]

I posted this over at maxconsole and afterdawn but i'm not getting much help... do you guys have any suggestions?

QUOTE

Well after hours of struggling with my flashed system i finally got it to restore to factory state by using an OLD (1.2/3v3?)version of Ixtreme restore (right click, commandpowertoy here etc). For some reason the new Ixtreme(s) doesnt like my drive at all. I had the older firmware right before the 1.4 which allows you to select drive speed... all my backups are verbatim 2.x burned, i've been running it for a loooong time without ban.

But now that i've returned it to its original state, i can't flash over it with new firmwares!

My drive is slowly stopping being able to read burned discs... it can read retail fine, and most burned discs fine... but i have recently noticed that it is trying MUCH harder to read some games, and stuff that streams like Burnout Paradise give me in-game pauses where i freeze in the air while things around me continue... so irritating. A few won't even load at all! Only the retail version does... so i thought hey maybe i could load 8x firmware and it would help...?

Anyway, after banging my head against the wall trying to restore my drive and finally succeeding, i now cant flash Ixtreme 1.4/v1.

It's in ModeB, it is recognized in windows... but wont frickin flash! I've tried doing it directly from the Ixtreme firmware itself and then i also tried it in Toolbox.

When i try to open toolbox it tells me that smartsound quicktracks.msi hasnt been installed and i have to cancel out of that installation to get Toolbox to open at all.

Once i'm in Toolbox i can't RAW dump... its a Hitachi so i have to use the "press eject 3 times" trick to get the drive to stay shut. Even if i do that Toolbox tells me it cant read from the drive via RAW. If i use classic dump that works fine... i can dump the firmware, patch the firmware, but when i go to flash the firmware it gives me a runtime error and immediately freezes and doesnt move and i have to ctrl/alt/dlt to get out of it.

I got sick of trying and put my 360 back together... it still reads retail discs fine but not burned discs. It says to insert a 360 game, not "unplayable disc" like when i was on the older hacked firmware.

Anybody have any ideas? It's driving me mad... i am planning on getting a new 360 soon because i have a new TV on the way and i want HDMI, but i would still like to get this 360 back to reading burned discs even as backup. Then again i am worried i will get the 79 Hitachi in a new system and don't want to mess with that... ahhhhhh

Help!

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[dazv6]

Easy fix... buy a new drive off ebay and put your drives key into it.. problem solved. I just did this with a friends 360 that was unmodded, it would read dvd's fine but would not read retail games, bought a new ms25 drive and flashed ixtreme 1.4 into it with his key, its now booting everything first time. New drive will cost upto £30.

[podger]

Sound like your Laser is starting to ware out.... You could try tweaking the laser....  

Moda.pdf

This post has been edited by podger: May 11 2008, 01:08 PM

[mariotwo]

Well i would prefer not to spend too much money on this system as it is very old and i will be buying a new one w/ HDMI anyway. But still, i'd much rather just get the Hitachi drive in it working if i could instead of buying a Samsung for it. As for tweaking the POT, i don't have any of those tools available to me nor do i know how to use them. If i could, i would just reflash with Ixtreme 1.4 8x and see if it helps but the Flashix.bat and Toolbox don't seem to want to work. Another poster suggested i just modify and insert my original BIN FW into the drive but i don't know how to do that... any suggestions?

[mariotwo]

Anybody?

[mariotwo]

Got it to work! w00t!

Put the Ixtreme 1.4 v1 in the root of C and it flashed first try... yay

[mariotwo]

well it was working fine since the day i got it to flash... then last night it froze while playing online matches of Gears of War.

This morning i watched a couple movies streaming from my PC no problem but then i tried to play some online matches of COD4 and it keeps freezing... all of a sudden it makes some weird noise like atari sound effects and then i get white scrolling vertical numbers and symbols like the matrix hahah its so weird... like a half inch thick, all across the screen like 6 inches apart, it looks like i'm running some sort of code. I took a video of it with my cell phone.

This sort of stuff started happening to my last 360 and then i got RROD... so i guess it's only a matter of time.

Lame!

Why can i watch movies on it fine but not play games? Is my drive dying? Is it cause i flashed it with 8x firmware?

Any ideas?

This post has been edited by mariotwo: May 27 2008, 03:19 AM

[Ranger72]

Movies don't use nearly as much system recourses as playing a game.

[zoomerman]

nothing to do with the speed of the fw flash i guess your box is on its last legs why not just open it and follow the tut for replacing the xclamp as it sounds like it is overheating gotta be worth a try if you are not able to do this i offer a service to do this for you i am listed in the installers by region page hope this helps

[mariotwo]

It seems like after i mod my systems they only last a year or 2 before they die... is that normal? I don't abuse them and i am very careful during the mod process... is there something i could be doing wrong that shortens the lifespan? Or is it just because these systems are prone to failure?

Also, Oblivion and Gears seem to be extra hard on the machines and they were the games i played most on my first system last year when it died... and now my GF started playing Oblivion on my new system and i played Gears over the weekend and it died! haha coincidence..? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

This post has been edited by mariotwo: May 27 2008, 07:31 PM

[mariotwo]

I'm considering sending this in to MS and crossing my fingers... i suppose it's a given that i'll need to carefully open it one last time and revert the FW to factory state, eh?

[Havok]

You can't send it to Microsoft if its already been opened, they wont accept it and your warranty is void.

[mariotwo]

I went to circuit city today to look for a new 360, i didn't know that the new Pro consoles don't come with HDMI cables... that is retarded!

I found Pro/Elite with new 0809 lot numbers which means they have the falcon chipset and probably have BENQ drives, but i decided to come home and do some research first.

Are Benq drives good? I know that they're more quiet, but i've also read that they have problems running GTA IV... now i'm a little worried.

Input?

[mariotwo]

Crap now i see that there are liteon drives out and about... wonder what lot numbers have em? I should go buy a 360 while they're still moddable (IMG:style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

[mariotwo]

Sorry, i looked for a way to edit my previous post to include new info but didn't see a way...

I went to circuit city and got a 360 pro, Lot # 0809, 175PW(Falcon?), and i confirmed an actual Benq drive and not a Lite-On.

I did notice however when i opened the drive to check the tray, that it felt a bit flimsier than the hitachi tray... is that normal? I kind of pushed it side to side a little bit and it gives way much more to the left than the older hitachi does. I am only concerned about this because my 2 year old son sometimes likes to open and mess w the drives... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)