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[Xbox-Scene]

More on LIVE Bans, HDD Crippling, Possible Ban Causes Posted by XanTium | November 7 12:07 EST | News Category: Xbox360

Kushan wrote a nice little article on #FW@EFnet summarizing all kinda info we have about the current (still ongoing) Console Live Ban Wave: - What does this mean for you and what can you do about it? Firstly, and most obviously, you cannot connect to Xbox Live on this console any more. This means no more game updates (aka title updates), XBLA games, marketplace content, netflix/sky player and so on. There is no way around this, all online capabilities are now disabled PERMANENTLY. In all likelihood, your gamertag has NOT BEEN BANNED. When your gamertag gets banned, Microsoft sends you an email detailing why, if you have not recieved this email then your profile should be ok, to a certain extent. Hard Drive installs are now disabled on the banned console. This means any disk-based games you have will no longer play off of the hard drive. If you attempt to play a game, it will tell you that it was installed on a different 360 and needs to be deleted/installed again. When you delete the game and attempt to install it, you are given a message telling you that it is not supported. There is no way to fix this, that functionality is simply gone from the banned 360. The hard drive itself is left untouched - you can place it in another 360, even an unbanned one, and it will still work just fine. You do NOT need to reformat it to regain any kind of functionality. Any installed games will need to be reinstalled for the console you want to play them on. This is normal behaviour and happens when swapping HDDs on unbanned/legit 360's. Windows Media Centre functionality is disabled. It is still possible to stream video/music content via the video library. Your Gamertag may be corrupted. This does not mean your gamertag has been banned, you can recover it using any live-capable 360, however ANY ACHIVEMENTS YOU HAVE EARNED SINCE BEING BANNED WILL BE LOST. Your gamertag will be corrupted EVERY SINGLE TIME it is used on a banned console. This means you cannot use your banned console to play backups offline just to get achievements - it wont work, the second you put your profile back on a good 360, it will be corrupted and all progress lost. There is no way around this. The same applies to game saves - if you access a game save on a banned 360, it too will be corrupted when accessed on a legit/unbanned 360! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! There is no way around this, either. Your XBLA games and DLC will still be valid, however to play them on a different 360 you will need to be signed into Xbox Live. This is normal behaviour on unbanned/legit 360's as well. They may be corrupted and have to be re-downloaded if you attempt to access them on a banned 360. You can transfer all of your downloaded content to a new 360 here: http://www.xbox.com/en-US/support/systemuse/xbox360/licensemigration/default.htm however note that you can only do it once every 12 months. So, in summary: Your Banned 360: * Cannot go on Xbox Live * Cannot install games to the HDD * Cannot use Windows Media Centre extender * Cannot be used to get achievements from backups without corrupting your profile You cannot do anything about this, short of buying a new 360. There may be more functionality disabled than mentioned here, things are still being discovered. - So what caused my ban? There are MANY theories as to what is causing so many consoles to get banned this time, however as of yet there is nothing concrete, just a lot of circumstantial evidence and speculation. Please do not add to this, a full investigation is under-way. c4eva, the main guy behind iXtreme, had this to say: <+c4eva> fw itself not detectable <+c4eva> suspect they are going hard on warez releases and incorrect use of abgx! He also added the following: <+c4eva> just to let you know that im looking into the current ban wave. I am currently running several brand new xboxs on live! These xboxs are in various configs. All are running ixtreme 1.61 <+c4eva> One is running original discs, another is running on xbl (no discs) , another is running a backup from my region! <+c4eva> until tests are completed, no eta on liteon fw! When we know more, YOU'LL no more, so please do not ask for updates! A full transcript is available here - http://pastebin.ca/1660777 Remember, if you really want to blame someone, blame the person that decided to modify your 360 in the first place - most likey, that would be you ;

[CocoaPistolero]

The whole corruption deal is bullshit if you ask me. In before the obvious "it's your fault; take responsibility for your actions, etc." response, but honestly.  How does messing up my data somehow protect Xbox LIVE?

It seems like MS simply wants you to enjoy your banned console as little as legally possible.

I'm not upset about being banned from LIVE, but disabling HDD installs and so on was just a dick move.  Saving data and installing to the HDD isn't tethered to LIVE, so why would they disable it other than to stick it to us?  It's rather cruel.

[K1LLERHORNET]

QUOTE(CocoaPistolero @ Nov 7 2009, 05:15 PM)

The whole corruption deal is bullshit if you ask me. In before the obvious "it's your fault; take responsibility for your actions, etc." response, but honestly.  How does messing up my data somehow protect Xbox LIVE?

It seems like MS simply wants you to enjoy your banned console as little as legally possible.

I'm not upset about being banned from LIVE, but disabling HDD installs and so on was just a dick move.  Saving data and installing to the HDD isn't tethered to LIVE, so why would they disable it other than to stick it to us?  It's rather cruel.

I agree.

So the only thing the banned 360 would be useful for is playing questionable game releases & spare parts...

I'm glad C4Eva is running various tests with several 360's + different parameters. It's the only real way to find out what's causing the bans.

I guess i'll have to wait i little longer for iXtreme 1.61 for Liteon's - no big deal.

Thank You C4Eva + Team HyperX (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Mastodontz]

Do you guys think it will be possible to make xbox "forget" it has been banned, to make it able to install games to HDD again? It surely is some offline thing, there must be some kind of trigger in xbox's memory that says "banned = 1". So maybe if we tracked it down, we could just change it to default (unbanned) and return xbox's functionality... well at least until it tries to connect to live again and becomes banned again.

[ccfman2004]

What is the purpose of disabling a bunch a functionality?

Corrupting your Gamertag and savefies so you can't use them on an unbanned xbox.  That's BS plain and simple.

Not allowing you to install your games to the hard drive.  Again more BS.

They really are trying to make more money by crippling your banned box as much as possible to force you to get a new one.

Yes I understand that the live rules were broken but come on, at least let us enjoy our banned xbox.

[punkerman]

For game saves and profiles couldn't it be possible to get the data to your comp then apply serial from your other console then transfer back all these to the HDD again? I think I heard it somewhere.

[erod550]

The profile and gamesave corruption has been around for at least a month. I used to play offline on my launch console which got banned 2 years ago and then every once in a while sign into live on my good box to upload the achievements.  Right after the system update before this newest one, I went to do that like I have done for 2 years and my profile was corrupted and I lost every gamesave since launch. 4 years of saves.  I've been playing on the newer box since to avoid this as this is way worse than just getting banned from Live, but unfortunately it got banned too in this latest wave.  Microsoft has every right to do this and it's actually kind of funny that they finally found a way to screw us after 4 years, but it certainly does suck.  You pretty much have to choose whether to give up achievements forever and just play the games for fun offline (never been the same for me since I started getting achievements. I can't enjoy a game without feeling like I'm making some sort of "progress" by getting achievements now), or go legit and either shell out the money and buy games or just don't play hardly any games if money is an issue.

This post has been edited by erod550: Nov 7 2009, 06:43 PM

[Reaper527]

misuse of abgx? i'd be curious to see what he means by that. i'm glad to see that figuring out this banwave is taking a higher priority than getting the new liteon firmware out. liteon users have their activate.iso, so the bannings are definitely more important

[royeee]

I'd rather M$ ban my console than to go after me with a lawsuit.

[215XboxMods]

So if we recover just our profile on a new 360 everything is OK? Thanks

[ca102455]

suspect they are going hard on warez releases and incorrect use of abgx!

I suspect that to be the most logical explanation for this ban wave.

[hawkeye06]

Great update! Very interesting.

[erod550]

QUOTE(royeee @ Nov 7 2009, 11:50 AM)

I'd rather M$ ban my console than to go after me with a lawsuit.

What exactly do they have on you that they could sue you for?  They have no evidence whatsoever that anyone played an illegal backup. All they have evidence of is that you modified the console which justifies a ban from Live.  It is legal to make a backup of a game you own, and they'd have to prove that someone that played a backup didn't own an original copy in order to bring any kind of lawsuit, and there's no way for them to prove that.

[Ranger72]

QUOTE(ca102455 @ Nov 7 2009, 12:52 PM)

suspect they are going hard on warez releases and incorrect use of abgx!

I suspect that to be the most logical explanation for this ban wave.

I would agree but some of us got banned with only using our own rips and not using abgx.

[yer maw blows]

yeah it sucks about things they have disabled,i modded my console and got banned,fair enough but i didnt mod the hard drive or the profile.got 5 more consoles ready to go.
the console that got banned was acrade pack with 256 mb,1.51 firmware on liteon 7xxxx series,no games played early,games installed on hdd,originals played halo odst,nfs shift.non originals cod 4/5 forza 3 all agbx verified.
now got super elite f.o.c

thanks for the firmware over the last 3 years saved plenty money