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[sondrex]

[kent-ru]

Totally awesome tutorial! Never modded before and I did it in a couple hours!!

Thanks!!!

[Tashi]

*noob alert*

i have no software on my xbox right now. but it seems to use this i have to be able to unlock/lock the HD. is there anyway to lock/unlock the drive without the eeprom? i was reading another thread and it looked like you could make your xbox unlock it for you by unplugging the dvd drive. did i read that correctly?

i dont have the money for a memory card and the game. so im hoping i can use this program.
and well, im not really a gamer, so i mostly use my xbox as a paperweight right now. *hopes to turn it into a media center with the Xbox Media Center*
thanks,
Tashi

[Danny Mosquito]

Can someone maybe shed some light on my following problem...  It happens whenever I try to unlock a locked harddrive using linux lock/unlock tools...
Basically after I lock a harddrive using the auto option in lock/unlock tools then whenever I use the lock/unlock tools to unlock the harddrive again (automatically using the same eeprom key) it always comes up with "harddrive error" "drive not ready" then complains that there is no Primary Master connected (I have the correct jumpers set)...  Has anyone ever unlocked a harddrive using the linux lock/unlock tools on xboxhdm.  Does anyone know what I might be doing wrong...


Thanks Dan....

[jsd]

QUOTE(Tashi @ Dec 9 2005, 09:52 AM)

*noob alert*

i have no software on my xbox right now. but it seems to use this i have to be able to unlock/lock the HD. is there anyway to lock/unlock the drive without the eeprom? i was reading another thread and it looked like you could make your xbox unlock it for you by unplugging the dvd drive. did i read that correctly?

i dont have the money for a memory card and the game. so im hoping i can use this program.
and well, im not really a gamer, so i mostly use my xbox as a paperweight right now. *hopes to turn it into a media center with the Xbox Media Center*
thanks,
Tashi

tashi - you need to unlock the HD somehow before you can do anything with it.  if ou stick a locked HD in your PC, it will not work at all.  you can either unlock it using the hotswap method (basically you boot the xbox and yank the IDE cable out at a certain point in the boot sequence - search these forums for more details) or by running a savegame exploit.  i personally would recommend the latter path.  you will need an action replay and a copy of an exploitable game.  i picked up a used copy of splinter cell at a gamestop this weekend for $5.  using krayzie's ndure i was able to get my eeprom in 5 minutes.  this lets you build a xboxhdm cd that will lock drives for your xbox.

basically you are after the eeprom data which is unique to your xbox.

even if you are able to hotswap the drive, i'm not sure what good that would be, since you still don't have the eeprom which is needed to relock.

[ilmickeyli]

well it looks like i'm screwed... i have my girlfriends xbox.. softmodded with retail hd.. was unplugged and now gets error 16.. does not boot games..

i think the softmod package i used might have backed up the eeprom and hddkey on the c:\ drive but im not sure.. either way its locked and i have no way in



*sigh*

time to buy her a new box i suppose

[kricker]

I am having trouble rebuilding a retail xboxHD v1.1. I have xboxhdm v1.9 and SlaYers_EvoX_Auto-Installer_v2.6FINAL. I placed the proper files from the slayers disc into c and e and I also placed the eeprom.bin file from configmagic into the eeprom folder. I changed the "isolinux.boot" file to "boot.cat" to match the "make-iso-win.bat" file. I attached the drive to the pc primary master using the cable swap method. I ran xboxhd and 1st did option 6 then 7 to get the floppy made. Then I ran option 5 to wipe the partitions and start from scratch. All these steps seemed to work just fine. When I run option 1 to rebuild the drive, nothing seems to happen. The screen says

CODE

Building an Xbox HD from scratch is a two step
procedure. First the partition table is built.
Then the partitions are formated.
We will now search /dev/hda for an Xbox partition table...

no xbox-partition table found on /dev/hda

drive is not locked but locking is enabled
Don't reboot until you have built a working xbox HDD
since rebooting will relock the drive
Press any key to abort the operation...

with a blinking cursor. It just sits ther forever. Any ideas?

[gtrman00]

Tried using this tool and couldn't seem to get it to restart without freezing.  I partitioned the drive and it then counted down to restart, sent the kill all command and then beeped a few times and froze.  Restarted with ctrl+alt+del and went to move on to the next step and found it didn't save the partition...  Not sure what is going on, any ideas?

P.S. - Xbox is a softmodded v1.0, trying to format a new WD 160G drive

[mrp04]

What ever happened to ldots?  He has not been active since april 2005, did he say anything before becoming inactive?

[nat]

Ok, i will say i am a bit of a n00b as of right now because i havent had to mess with the guts of an xbox in a while, but my stepbrother bought a modded xbox from a guy at his work and asked me if i would put in a bigger hdd so that he can do the same things as i can do (mine is modded with an xecuter 2 mod and i used slayers to upgrade the hdd, everything was cake).  Then as soon as i opened up his box i realized that it was a softmod and i hadnt had to deal with that before.  Fast forward to about a week later and the past few days i have been trying everything i know how to do to get this larger hdd to work in the soft modded xbox and i just cant quite seem to get it.  This program looked promising but in using the first option to build an HD from scratch it started about an hour ago and is just streaking "y"'s down the screen i assumed it was just doing its thing at first but now im not sure.

So basically my first question is how long should it take to build a hd from scratch if i had about a full cd-r (702mb) when i made the boot disk.

and secondly, am i wasting my time with this because there is a much easier way considering i have a modded box that is upgraded and a softmodded box that needs upgrading.  If so a link would be wonderful.

Thanks in advance
Natey

[Exorph]

Newbie here..
I'm going to softmod my Xbox as soon as I get my current one with a malfunctioning disk drive replaced.
I don't think I'll be using this cd until I run into problems and I'm not planning on upgrading my HD just yet, but I was just wondering if building a HD from scratch means making a HD instantly compatible with the Xbox, meaning I just have to get a hard drive, run the builder, and then plug it into my Xbox?
Just making sure for future reference..

[Exorph]

I believe you get an Error 7 when the IDE cable isn't properly plugged into the HD (Or maybe simply when the Xbox can't detect the HD). I'm not 100% sure, but that was the reason I got it the first time I tried hotswapping.

[computerguy69]

I read on this site that it is and HDD time out error.  Is there a way to salvage or access the eeprom.bin file with the utilities on this disk?  I checked that the cable is plugged in correctly.

[litspliff]

hey!

my friend gave me a newer xbox (june, 2005), i think it is a 1.6.
i did a hotswap, then got into the hda in linux using xbrowser.
instead of the error 11, i got error 12...this i thought seemed wierd, but it worked anyhow.
i made a backup copy of every file on the system on the E: drive as i was about to patch using UXE softmod.

E:\old\C\*.*
E:\old\E\*.*
i always do this at the start of a softmod in case the patcher fails.

i shut it down as i normally do (exit xbrowser, shut down PC, then shut down HD with xbox power).
however i didn't use the poweroff command, because after forgetting to use it once a long time ago, i discovered the HD locks fine and no wierd results have ever occurred before.

i turned the xbox back on with everything put back together (except the cover) to make sure everything still functioned normal. everything worked fine. loaded game disc from M$ dash and boot.

now i can not access the HD with XBOXHDM.
the HD always gets assigned as hdb instead of hda now. the jumper has not moved from cable select, but when i saw another XBOXHD do this, moving the jumper to master would force it to hda. the end result however, is the same. what this 1.6 HD does that this other (past experience) one didn't, is that linux also detects something on hde and says "assuming 33MHZ bus" or something like that on hde initialization where it normally lists the model number of the drive!?

for both HD's--->
when the actual XHD, hdb (or hda, if forced to master with jumper) initializes it reads something back like:
resetting HD....
{read failure 00000000000x0 -------------00000000000000x0}
{read failure 00000000000x0 -------------00000000000000x0}
{read failure 00000000000x0 -------------00000000000000x0}
{read failure 00000000000x0 -------------00000000000000x0}
resetting HD....
{read failure 00000000000x0 -------------00000000000000x0}
{read failure 00000000000x0 -------------00000000000000x0}
{read failure 00000000000x0 -------------00000000000000x0}
{read failure 00000000000x0 -------------00000000000000x0}
reset....

you get the point.
it does this for about 10 seconds on hdb, and about 5 seconds on hda, and it practically fills the screen horizontally, then vertically as it scrolls on and on. after, it continues to boot linux as normal, and it can't find an xbox partition table on the HD. i've tried all kinds of things on this, and the other one like it, and i can't get into the hd. nothing seems to affect it....
swap from error code, swap from M$, swap from halo: same thing.

the older box i had that did this with the stock HD came off of ebay as a broken one with a bad DVD. i swapped the DVD with a known good one, and it got the same disc read error! after chipping it, i put a slayer installer disc in it with the original DVD drive it came with. works great now!

in the end, this 1.6 xbox still appears to be completely functional as an xbox, but seems unhackable without rebuilding the LPC. i may trade for an older one that i can hack easier if i can't figure it out. i already gave the guy another softmod box i had laying around, so that's not an issue. it's my box now, but i can't figure it out still.


the meat of the post (questions):
# should i have ran the softmod before shutting down?
# is it possible that M$ detected changes to the filesystem and will no longer unlock the HD on boot?
# how many other people have had this problem?
# is there anyone out there who will try to take this on yet?
# is this too long of a post? i try to be descriptive

this is mostly from a day ago's memory (returned errors and stuff), so i may be a bit inaccurate.
it would be a major hassle to rebuild an LPC, as my soldering skills have weakened over the years.
i guess i'm a little to shaky or something, because i killed a couple xboxes in a row a couple months ago and proceeded to freaked out.
blamed everything but myself.
what an idiot anger can make you.


thanks to anyone, i mean anyone who can help or just make an intelligent comment.
sorry if this post takes up a whole page on the topic.

also,

 now accepting: criticism.
just make it good!

[litspliff]

QUOTE

QUOTE

thanks to anyone, i mean anyone who can help or just make an intelligent comment.

from you sig it looks like you have done a lot's of xbox's and you in the US
why not use a gamesave to install your softmods (using FTP from a standardized image of C:\ and E:\)
and your chiped xbox to create new HDD for others
using xboxHDM just seems like the hard way (or for someone that can't find one of the needed games)

well, i go with what works i guess....
i've done alot of mods to fix broken systems.
it is sometimes not possible to get into a game.
if you can get the box to turn on, it unlocks your HD at multiple error codes, games, M$ dash, etc.
most cases, if you get power, you can unlock the HD and swap it.
as you can see, i've done many softmods.
every one of them completed has not failed.
also, it's convenient for me.


step 1
i just create the XBOXHDM iso with either a copy of the new xbox file system to put on the HD, or whatever softmod or linux tools i may need, then burn the boot disc iso to a DVD (4 GIGS OF GOOD STUFF TO PLAY WITH!).

step 2
boot the xbox and PC(with boot disc i just created), then do the hotswap at the right time(it's easy!), then i'm in a powerfull OS with complete control of the XBOXHD.

step 3
however you want to do it....HACK!

many great options at this point.
when i started modding boxes a couple months ago (i learn quickly with computers) i would just move all the old shtuff to an "old" folder on C: or E:, then replace with files i got off eMule(my personal "usual places"). then one day i found out this didn't always work, so i decided to quit being lazy and spent a whole day reading threads about the installers/patchers/exploits available for XBOXHDM.
there are alot of them.


as far as savegames, it is my understanding that you can just create your ISO with the savegame on it, then copy it to the appropriate place (maybe replace savegame files?) with xbrowser. i'm not sure..i've never tried it.
i have seen softmod modules for XBOXHDM that use the savegame exploits. this is handy as it can be a bit more forgiving if you make a mistake. you can most likely just get back to xbrowser and fix your blunder (or your download's blunder), which brings up another reason to give props to ldots.
i have found this to be the number 1 tool in my mod arsenal for repairing softmods or just xboxes in general. it's often just a matter of putting the right file(s) in the right place with xbrowser. I should ad my repair stats to my sig...if only i had counted. if worst comes to worst, or you want to actually sell it or trade it in, you can find the correct M$ files for your system and recover your stock XBOX.

people say softmods are unreliable and incomplete and blah blah blah.
fck 'em. they are biased in their ways.
this is a pointless argument. every method has its +'s and -'s, and i've found the XBOXHDMethod to be huge in +'s.
as long as you are reasonably confident with your download (it helps to not be downloading 100 files at the same time, found this out the hard way), confident with your burn disc, and confident with the PC you use, it's the most versatile, reliable way that i've found. it hasn't failed me yet. it has been not helpful at times, but never failing me.

ldots is the $hit.
give it up for XBOXHDM and the softmod.

i forgot to mention the core of it all...(full set of locking/unlocking features, fatX tools, fresh drive creation,......)

all this on a disc that you can create once and use all you need.
fck, i could go on forever.

now, does anyone want to tackle my original post?
this is the third forum i've tried.
everyone said to try here.
i am here.
are y'all with me?