Well, as many other people here I bought an Xbox recentely and was thinking about moding it. I spent 2-3 researching about thison different forums, sites, every I could find. Here are my conclusions (If some of these information are incorrect please tell):
* It is difficult to find the last updated information.
* What all chip do: allowing you to run a custom BIOS on them, and at the end that is what really matters.
* What not all chip do:
- large BIOS support: some chip are limited to 256k, even though it is large enough for most BIOS
- multiple BIOSs support: If you want to run Linux AND homebrew applications, this is a requirement. It is also more secure to be able to boot on a 'safe' BIOS in case you did a bad flash.
- upgradable OS: only 4th generation chip run upgradable/configurable OS. OS's function enables you to control many low level parameters without having to use external homebrew applications. Examples of functions: save/flash xbox/modchip BIOS on HD/modchip flash, save HD, Lock/Unlock HD, NTSC/PAL switching, Zone switching ...
- recovery BIOS: in case of BIOS corruption, nice to think you can boot on something at least.
- LAN/USB flash (USB flash can be very usefull if your xbox refuses to boot I suppose)
- Disable mode
- Solderless installation
- Support 1.X Xbox version (not all chip support all xbox version)
Depending on your needs, a very simple chip might do the job for you.
* The Aladdin 64 for example, with its 512k flash looks good if you only need one BIOS and no fancy function.
* X-ecuter 2.3
-lite will offer you 1M Flash and 2 BIOS banks
-lite+ same but solderless
-pro will give you 1M Flash with multiple banks and is flashable via LPT
* The Xbit provides 2M Flash with multiple banks, is flashable via USB and offer the only solderless system I would really trust.
I am not going to talk about the other generation 3 chips since I havn't studied them enough.
In the generation 4, the X-ecuter 3 is not released yet, but is looks a bit less advanced than the already realsed Xenium and SmartXX. These last 2 chips actually are two branches of the same initial project. SmartXX looks more appealing to me, however I wonder what the Xenium OSv2 will bring.
About the installation I am a bit distrustfull towards solderless adapters. I read and heard many people saying they can disconnect if the xbox is moved around a little bit. The Xbit one looks like the best quality in my opinion, but again, it is only from reading forums and looking at the pictures.
Personnally I ordered 2 SmartXX because I wanted the functionality of the 4th gen chips since I may play around with Linux, adding RAM and some other hardware mods.
Feel free to comment my post, I am a newbie too afterall
Alystan