Fixing modded X-box

[gulag picture radio]

Hiya,

 

I got an X-box from a friend that was a little flakey loading games. He's a whiz at computers and figured that it was a BIOS problem, and that replacing the BIOS by chipping the unit would probably solve the problem. I actually want the X-box for emulation and for playing DIVX video files without having to burn DVD's, so chipping it sounded like a good idea.

 

I got out the soldering iron and got an Xecuter 3, and installed it without much incident (might be the nicest job I ever did of soldering ). While there were plenty of great tutorials for the hardware install, installing the BIOS etc. is scant. Much of the info is either dated, for other models, or is contradictory with other online tutorials.

 

Here's the problem(s)... the machine starts up, plays back the "flubber" animation (tinted blue), then the X-box logo screen comes up - also tinted blue. The screen also features the chip's logo, so I assume that it's working. The problem is, that's where it stops. It won't load new games, won't load the dashboard, nor will it load disks for me to install a new dashboard from. It also sounds like the DVD-ROM is having difficulty reading the discs; speeding up and slowing down.

 

I tried a whole bunch of things, including reinstalls of the BIOS, trying some generic BIOS files, older versions of the X3 BIOS, to no avail. What's supposed to happen after the opening logo on a chipped machine? Does it go to the default MS dash? Do I have to have another one installed on the HD?

 

When I boot to the default BIOS, games seem to work again - so perhaps I did something right...

 

WOuld be aweosme to get this working sometime soon, and I hope that some of you experts might be able to lend a hand. Thanks for considering it!

[jay2068]

Normally it goes to the dashboard. I would reccomend replacing the MS dashboard with another third part (I like unleash). Then again it should boot to the BIOS generic dashboard. Have you tried holding down the white button? This should make it boot to the default Xecuter Dashboard.

 

Also did the BIOS file successfully load each time? I use the lateset build and have had no problems with it.

[Starscream]

It could be many little things.

 

What Bios did you use?

What hacked dash is the Bios set to boot to? (evox, avalaunch, XBMC, unleashed X?)

 

The DVD drive is reading but can't do anything because it has nowhere to load info yet.

 

Dash files could be missing. If you are missing the skins folder, a hacked dash will not boot. If the dash was there, if nothing else, it would boot to the default dashboard (regular Xbox dash) if the hacked dash the Bios was setup to boot to was not there. Of course, depending on HOW or where you got the hacked Bios, it may be set up half-assed. An XML file could be wrong, etc.

 

If it is an X3 chip, IIRC, it has it's own OS. You should be able to boot to the OS screen (white button as stated above). From there, I believe it should give you a boot order option. For shits and giggles, you could change it to boot to xboxdash (or whatever it's called. The original Xbox dash) and see if it boots. Not the shutoff chip and boot option, just have it look for the xboxdash file on C. If that works, half the battle is over.

 

Or do it the lazy way and PM me

[gulag picture radio]

I think that what it boils down to finally is that I have a bum X-box. It eventually stopped loading anything from the DVD-drive altogether. With X-boxes getting cheaper and cheaper on the used market, I think that I'll wait until there's a glut on them and pick one up for next to nothing.

 

Then I'll probably be right back here looking for help because I'm still a doofus.