Be Excellent To Each Other

Bah...My Xbox1 dvd drive seems to have packed up.

Was working fine yesterday (I watched a dvd film on it last night).

Bought a couple of used games today and tried to load one of them.
When I put the disc in I could hear the Xbox trying to read it. It made some unusual clicking sounds then went to the clock/time page.

Tried some of my other games and a couple of dvd films. Same result.
I don't get the "disc error" message, it just doesn't read the discs at all.

Put in a dvd/cd laser cleaner disc, but it wouldn't read that either....

I'm very non-technical (I can wire a plug and that's about it) so I guess I'm buggered unless anyone has any non-technical solutions that might help ?

If not, does anyone have a chipped/soft-modded Xbox with a decent-sized hard drive they fancy selling for a fair price ?

I've always fancied doing this myself (mainly to run MAME and install my "proper" game collection on the HD), but never dared trying to do it myself.
Since it now looks like I need a replacement machine, I guess a pre modded/chipped one would be a good idea.

If it's soft modded, you can do everything with FTP anyway.

Except watching films off DVD but I'm surprised people use the box for that.

I might be making this up, but doesn't an unmodded xbox throw you to the date/time screen if it's lost the settings?
This may not happen if there's a disc in there, and you can obviously disregard if your clock is set correctly.

There's cheap Xboxes all around this place.

I wouldn't mind buying one, modding it, and sending it flying off to you, but I don't know how much postage on that would be as it's a heavy brute.

I think it was Game who were selling pre-owned Xbox 1s for a tenner the other week.

You might also want to try here. Their 360 stuff is quite ogod, thoug hI don't know about the original funsquare stuff, and it appears that their site is down (or my connection is fucked, which is also very likely as it is bloody terrible 40% of the time) at the moment. Try them later in the day and see.

Cheers for the offer. I'll certainly consider it.
Bear in mind that I'd also want a decent-sized hard drive fitting in it (say 120-200 GB).
Obviously, I'd pay for everything up-front (including extra for your services).




Couple of general questions about modded Xbox's :

Are there any advantages to hard-modding over soft-modding ?

What's the process for getting my original games on the HD ? I assume it's the same as when I had a PS2 with an internal HD (put each disc in the console, choose relevant "covert" or "transfer" option, then wait about 20 mins while the game is copied over) but I just wanted to check.

Is it the same process for emulators (ie. download emulator and games, burn to cd, then follow the same process above to get it on the hard drive) ?

Cheers.

These days? Not really. It's marginally easier to fit a new hard drive I think, that's about it.



That's certainly valid, you can also upload them from your PC.



No because they're not proper games (although it might work), better is to upload it from the PC rather than waste a disk.

Cheers Dudley.

When you talk using the PC to put emulators on, how does the PC connect to the Xbox ?

There's an un-used port on the back of my Xbox and I have no idea what it's for. Is that where you connect the PC
Or do you have to open up the Xbox and run a lead from the Xbox HD to the PC ?

Edit : Just found this : http://www.tutorialguide.net/connecting ... orial.html
So presumably you have to follow those instructions ?

The xbox 1 has a network port like any other PC. Thus it can be wired into your home network just like it indeed says in that linked tutorial.

The softmodded dashboard includes a server program for what they call FTP (apologies if I'm heading for patronising here), it's what people use to upload stuff to websites and it works just as well here. You simply get an FTP program, connect to the Xbox's network address (which is on the main screen of the softmodded dashboard on mine) and simply drag and drop to the right folder just as you do in windows explorer.

There's plenty of programs that will make it even easier, you enter the xbox's details, give it a ripped image from an xbox disk and it'll sort out the rest. It can also do the process in reverse, allowing you to back your real xbox games up to a PC.

I'll have a look around for Xboxes on Monday for you. Do you already have the controllers, vid cables and everything?

I can fit a new hard drive as well. If you have a preference for a specific brand or size, let me know. I'll be using this chart to test for compatibility (it needs to be listed as LOCKING: YES, and preferably RPM: 5400 (there's no benefit to going faster)), so if you know of a good place to order hard drives, you could try to find the hard drive yourself if you want.

I'm not certain if a softmodded Xbox can handle more than 137GB. (The drive works, but the extra space disappears.) I'm looking that up now.

If you've uploaded to a web site using FTP before, then uploading applications and games is just like that. There's a few rules you have to follow though.

It can, and the extra space does not disappear.

Which softmod were you using there, and what reformatting program? I was going to use SID and xboxhdm. Does hdm just say 'you have more space, want a G?' after youve done C E and F?

Er.. well in my personal case I used a 160 drive, so it was after the obliged ones it was all one partition anyway. From memory there's no problem having an F >137gb.

WELL I FEEL BLOODY STUPID NOW !!

I noticed Joans' comment :

"I might be making this up, but doesn't an unmodded xbox throw you to the date/time screen if it's lost the settings?
This may not happen if there's a disc in there, and you can obviously disregard if your clock is set correctly."

I sort of ignored it at first, particularly the comment about the clock being setting correctly (the Xbox clock resets every time you power it on - at least mine does, so I've never really understood the point of it having a clock at all).

Still, I decided to try a couple of things and I found out that all I needed to do was press "A" on the controller (from the clock screen) and the disc in the Xbox then loaded immediately.
Now it's back to normal again.

No idea what settings I might have lost (my game saves are still there), or why this might have happened.
I just know that for the 18 months I've had the Xbox, games and dvds have always loaded automically as soon as I've put them in the drive (or as soon as I switched the Xbox on with a disc already in the drive).

When that didn't happen, I just assumed the drive had broken. I feel pretty daft now for not even trying to press a few buttons....actually, "pretty daft" is a bit of an understatement. "A complete tit" is probably more accurate.

Still, thanks for all the replies since I've learned quite a bit using a modded Xbox and am pretty sure now that I want mine modded.

MrD : I might still consider your offer of modding and fitting an HD for me (I'd send you my machine along with payment to cover the HD, return postage, and your time), though if I can find someone local to do it that would obviously be more practical now that I don't need another Xbox.
I'll PM you if I need your services. Thanks again for offering.

Do you keep your Xbox plugged in at all times?

Yep, don't think it's been unplugged once since I got it.
The plug socket it's in though gets switched off every night - it's plugged into a 4-way adaptor along with the TV, freeview box etc. - and the adaptor goes into a wall socket that has an on-off switch that I switch off when I go to bed - it's quicker than turning everything off individually (so I suppose that's the equivalent of un-plugging it, and presumably why the clock resets ?)

Yes.

Yeah it's got a battery, that's dead apparently.

*Bows*

4 hours for a clock battery to run down? What sort of insanity is that?

4 hours?

Several years more like, it's not a rechargeable.

Four hours is what I get out of it.

Is it really not rechargeable?

I really didn't think so, it's a CR2032 derivative, like every PC ever, the Saturn, the Dreamcast controllers....

But the FAQ says otherwise...

Strange. I'm-a go time it again.