Xbox 360 Hack Summary

[del_piero_3]

Yesterday I bought a brand new Xbox 360 premium. I’m from Dbox scene so Xbox 360 hacking/modding is completely new to me. Anyway like others I too want to play backup/copied games, so been reading a lot and getting little confused along the way too.

Below is a summary of my understanding, please correct me if am wrong.

1) I don’t have SATA connection on motherboard so I will get PCI card or a USB converter so that Xbox drive can be hooked up to PC.

2) I have Samsung drive in my Xbox 360. I need to backup the original firmware (store it in safe place) and then flash with a hacked version (patched with original firmware). Not sure which is the best hacked firmware to use? i.e. extreme.bin

3) To make game backups I will need to buy a Samsung (SH-D162C) 16x DVDROM drive and flash it with firmware. The firmware to be used here is Kreon? Can it be any DVD drive or does it has to be the above?

4) I have Lite-On DVDRW (SHOW-1693S) drive that I will use to burn my games. Will this do or would I need to get another burner?

5) The media I will be using is going to be verbatim 8.5gb double layer +R x8.

6) Have I missed anything or any other equipment I might need?

Thanks for the help

[f1kid]

do you know what drive is in your 360 ie ms25 ms28

[Mario87]

Yesterday I bought a brand new Xbox 360 premium. I’m from Dbox scene so Xbox 360 hacking/modding is completely new to me. Anyway like others I too want to play backup/copied games, so been reading a lot and getting little confused along the way too.

Below is a summary of my understanding, please correct me if am wrong.

1) I don’t have SATA connection on motherboard so I will get PCI card or a USB converter so that Xbox drive can be hooked up to PC.

2) I have Samsung drive in my Xbox 360. I need to backup the original firmware (store it in safe place) and then flash with a hacked version (patched with original firmware). Not sure which is the best hacked firmware to use? i.e. extreme.bin

3) To make game backups I will need to buy a Samsung (SH-D162C) 16x DVDROM drive and flash it with firmware. The firmware to be used here is Kreon? Can it be any DVD drive or does it has to be the above?

4) I have Lite-On DVDRW (SHOW-1693S) drive that I will use to burn my games. Will this do or would I need to get another burner?

5) The media I will be using is going to be verbatim 8.5gb double layer +R x8.

6) Have I missed anything or any other equipment I might need?

Thanks for the help

1) Buy a PCI SATA card with the VIA 6421 chipset if you have a sammy, one here.

2) Yes, you need to make a backup of your original FW, then patch the hacked FW with your drives key (extracted from your original FW), then put the hacked FW onto the drive! The best FW to use for the sammy is Commador4eva's Xtreme 3.3 FW.

3) You dont have to buy one of those DVD drives, you can connect your 360's drive to your PC and use it to make game backups, but owning one of these drives save you opening up the 360 every time! And no it can not be any drive that you flash with the FW you mentioned, only the drive you mentioned should be flashed with that FW!

4) Im not sure if your burner automatically sets booktype to DVD-ROM, if it doesn't you'll need to get hold of a program called "DVDInfo Pro", so that you can get your drive to set the booktype of DVD+R DL media to DVD-ROM.

Alternatively you could buy a pioneer 111D that automatically sets booktype and is the best writer for burning 360 games!

5) Very good choice of media to use, but I would also try some cheaper discs (try out a pack of 10), like Ridisc Xtreme, Rivision, and Traxdata (VERY GOOD discs!), your 360 might play them happily! and you'll save a few quid!

6) As f1kid said, is your sammy an MS25 or an MS28?

[del_piero_3]

6) As f1kid said, is your sammy an MS25 or an MS28?

Thanks guys for the quick reply. Special thanks to Domain28 for answering my 101 questions

The reason I was going buy new DVD drive was because I dont want to keep opening the Xbox again and again and risk the original Xbox drive becoming fried.

I am not sure if my sammy is an MS25 or a MS28, I guess this should be on the xbox drive sticker? I should have this info tomorow when I open the xbox.

Find attached printshot of the DVDInfo Pro info for my lite-on drive.

[f1kid]

befor you can do anything you need that info as that depends on what and how you flash your drive ms25 easy ms28 fffffffffing pig to do

[del_piero_3]

befor you can do anything you need that info as that depends on what and how you flash your drive ms25 easy ms28 fffffffffing pig to do

Will have my fingers crossed and praying that its ms25 will check this out after work today.

[del_piero_3]

befor you can do anything you need that info as that depends on what and how you flash your drive ms25 easy ms28 fffffffffing pig to do

Just managed to open the xbox up, the drive is F/W=ms25, I guess thats good news.

[Mario87]

Good to hear! Will make flashing a whole lot easier!

And as for your DVDInfo pro attachment, click on the "+RW" icon along the top, if your writer supports bit settings, make sure you can set it to DVD-ROM for DVD+R DL discs.

If you cant do this, you can check if your writer does it automatically by putting a game that you've burnt with your Lite-On into the drive, then opening up DVD Decrypter, and looking at the disc information on the right hand side, and check to see if the booktype is DVD-ROM, and NOT DVD+R DL, if it is DVD+R DL and you can not change it, then you cant use this drive to burn your 360 games!

And also check the "status" of the disc, make sure it says "Completed", iv had a couple that say "Incomplete" or "Empty", and they are the ones that don't work in any 360!

[pizza-man]

i would just buy a pioneer 111
no setting nowt and work fine

[BFG]

AND you can flash the writer's FW to 1.29 to write 8x on 6x verbs! I've got two of these on the go now - double trouble! 2 copies of clone writing an image to each drive once.

[Waka]

AND you can flash the writer's FW to 1.29 to write 8x on 6x verbs! I've got two of these on the go now - double trouble! 2 copies of clone writing an image to each drive once.

I've got a 111D with f/w v1.23 and I've just burned my first Verbatim DL+R 2.4x with ImgBurn v2.1 (phew!).

I left the write speed setting on Max. thinking it would just burn at 2.4x - the stats. at the end said 'Av. 6.0x Max 8.1x'

I haven't been able to test it yet as I'm waiting for my order from mrmodchips - but do you think this will work in my Hitachi X360?

Thanks,
W.

[pizza-man]

no reason why it shouldnt work m8
i burn mine at 6x
and same as BFG 2x pioneer 111's
i can burn 2 diff games at same time from usb hdd

[del_piero_3]

pioneer 111

Know any good links where they are doing this drive for a decent price?

[BFG]

Check the ShopNEO link on the forum

Know any good links where they are doing this drive for a decent price?

[Epiphany]

So is everything hunky dorey with these drive flashes now?

Might be time to buy a 360 soon if they play back-ups

I read something a while back that microsoft were checking through xbox live if the drives had been flashed (sounded like bollox to me at the time though). Was that true? Are there any knock on effects of flashing the drives?

[pizza-man]

no one been banned on xbox live yet
who knows when and if they can

[BFG]

it's cat and mouse - if they block it, another FW will be released to counter it - and so on...

[Epiphany]

Excellent. Is it only the Samsung Drives that can be flashed?

[BFG]

Nope, all of em.

[Epiphany]

Sweet. I take it the Samsungs the more common drive. Is it easier to flash that the other one? (not sure what make it is)