XBox Modding

[Keyser Soze]

The chip I bought was the Xecuter 2.3B Lite from ModChipMan.com

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.modchipman.com/catalog....2845a48">http://www.modchipman.com/catalog....2845a48</a><!-- m -->

It doesnt make sense for me to repost pics and instructions, why reinvent the wheel, I followed, but I can add some helpful hints.

Here is the tutorial I followed to do the chip install...

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://images.xodus-chip.com/adaptor_manual.zip">http://images.xodus-chip.com/adaptor_manual.zip</a><!-- m -->

Funny part is, they show the chameleon chip even though mine looks slighly different, the install is basically the same.

I bought a solderless one, which I regretted cause it was tougher to set the d0 wire. It would have been easier to glue that sucker down with solder, which I can still do. I honestly have never soldered a thing in my life, so this would be my first time. I definitely recommend going with the soldered ones, they're cheaper too. i also could have unscrewed the whole board and taken it out and taped the d0 wire to the back which may have been easier in hindsight.

once my hardware was in place. i created a bios flash disk, which is needed to install a dashboard to the xbox, which is basically a GUI to do all sorts of cool things like install apps, put in new peripherals like a larger HD, ftp, etc...

i used Cromwell to flash my bios with this tutorial...

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.teamxecuter.com/cromwell.htm">http://www.teamxecuter.com/cromwell.htm</a><!-- m -->

I have a samsung dvd-rom drive in my xbox which seemed to not have a problem with CD-R discs. some people complain that their drive only reads CD-RW or DVD-R but mine worked just fine.

Once cromwell was installed, I created a boot disk. You only need the boot disk the first time, then you can upload the files so XBox runs them from the HD. Now I could have, with a little more configuration, made XBox Media Center my default dashboard, but there are some utilities that i like that are part of another dashboard called Avalaunch. So I made Avalaunch my default and if I want to run XBMC, I can just click it off the top of my menu.

Now to get some of this software, you need to get on IRC. There might be other ways, but thats how I got it. I logged on to DALnet and room #xbins and followed the instructions in the topic.

To create my Avalaunch boot disk, I used this...

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.teamavalaunch.com/docs/manualv2.2.pdf">http://www.teamavalaunch.com/docs/manualv2.2.pdf</a><!-- m -->

You can actually make Avalaunch your dash without flashing your bios.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.teamavalaunch.com/docs/replace_evox.html">http://www.teamavalaunch.com/docs/replace_evox.html</a><!-- m -->

Once installed, I was able to FTP to my XBox, your XBox IP will be on your Avalaunch screen. The UN/PW is xbox/xbox by default.

I downloaded XBMC, uploaded it to my F drive on my XBox, went to File Manager on Avalaunch, found the XBMC folder, ran the default.xbc file and viola! Media Center!

I've only begun to scratch the surface, but so far it is amazing.

My next step is to "backup" some games and trying playing them. ;-) If anyone can help me with that, i'd appreciate it!

BTW, This all took my about 6 hours, but I am not the most tech savvy person, your results may vary.