Well, I have been using the Mechassualt font exploit for all the X-mods I've done for my friends... I always tell them about the possibility of the clock loop, and how I find that having mine plugged into my home network worked to break it out everytime... When I do someone's Xbox for them, I always do three things:
1) Make a virgin backup of the both their C and E drives via Emergency Linux.
2) Use Slayer's Evox Autoinstall CD w/ the same configuration for all Xboxes.
3) Run the handy little backup program so we have their HDPW and EEPROM saved.
Last one I did, he was in a hurry to get it back (I'll let him share some of the blame, ok?), and I forgot to run Backup from Evox. Ooops.
A few days ago, his breaker tripped on his entertainment center overnight (or his brother got drunk and screwed something up perhaps. Let's spread the blame around as much as possible, shall we?) His Xbox goes into a clock loop. Audio CD doesn't break it. Waiting for hours on end doesn't break it. Ooops turns into Uh-oh.
I tell him bring it over to my house and we'll plug it into my netwrok, and it'll break out, no sweat. Every other Xbox has broken out doing this method. He and his girlfriend come over (She's to blame somehow, I just know it!) and we plug it in and wait for it to break. And wait. And wait. And wait. Uh-oh turns into holy s***!
So, I frantically start to peruse the boards here at Xbox Scene (in this story it only you kind folks who remain completly and utterly blameless) and find this info on hot swapping. Being the lazy bastard that I am (move my computer over there? find a free outlet over here?) I opted to try the hot swap to modded Xbox, seeing as how my Xbox still has it's cover off from my HD upgrade. (Please refer to lazy bastard note above...). And bless all you sinners, for it worked! I managed to use my strictly soft modded Xbox in to hot swap in the clock looped Xbox HD.
Now that I have gotten my long winded intro out of the way, (I love a good story. Next time I'll try to tell one...) here are the exact steps that I did in the hopes that it will help some other poor lost soul such a myself.
1) Turned on my soft modded Xbox.
2) Loaded Evox from the M$ dashboard.
3) Once the skin was loaded, I unplugged my HD from the IDE cable.
4) Turned on the clock looped Xbox.
5) Once the M$ logo appeared beneath the giant "X", I unplugged the HD from the IDE cable, and plugged in the IDE cable from my Xbox.
6) Ran an application that I knew was installed in the same location on both hard drives (ie, E:/Applications). In this instance, I ran Complex Tools.
7) Exit out of Complex Tools by choosing "Exit Complex Tools and Return To Dashboard"
Viola! The clock looped HD is then loaded, and can be accessed via Evox FTP.
At this point, how you proceed is of course of your own choosing, but to play it safe, I wiped the C drive, and restored the virgin copy I had backed up. I then powered down my Xbox, removed (formerly) clock looped drive and installed it back into it's orginal Xbox and booted like nothing was ever wrong.
Maybe I got lucky. Maybe I half way know what I'm doing. Maybe next time I'll tell people to chill, not to be so impatient, it'll be done when it's done. ("You want done, or do you want it done RIGHT?") But I do know two things for sure.
1) I don't have to buy someone a replacement Xbox.
2) His is getting the UDE now.
