Opened A Xbox To Find A Hitachi-lg Dvdrom, **MERGED TOPICS** Options

[menelik]

moreover we should use a 10M resistor and a 100 nF (0.1 uF) as they are cheaper and easier to get. 10uF capacitors arent easy to get.

the place is fine because there are no movements and the cables are fixed to that they dont disturb the laser. im open to any better positions, just put it in there and didnt look for other places.


This post has been edited by menelik: Mar 27 2005, 07:14 PM

[menelik]

add:
we could stay on SMD then too, correct me if i'm wrong?

[Tiros]

If ppl are interested, I can post a signal trace of the original thompson dvd drive I have tested.

Specifically, you know the path from Ready signal throughout the original xdrive?
I would like to take a look if it is possible.
I still believe it may be possible to eliminate the chip.

To save space, bend all IC legs flat, cut off points, solder to stubs.
As someone said earlier, connect all unused CMOS inputs to GND or VCC.
VCC should be pin 14, should be 3.3 volt as menlik said.
In this circuit, the HC(t)14 is a MUCH better choice than the HC(t)04.

Congrats on the results!

This post has been edited by Tiros: Mar 27 2005, 07:47 PM

[menelik]

@tiros
i took a look on the hc14 and couldnt see an imrpovement for this case as we have constant voltages of aorund 0 and 3,3. the hysteresis should have no affect here. it even could make some probs because the bigger hysteresis could make the on/off inaccurately.

?

This post has been edited by menelik: Mar 27 2005, 08:38 PM

[menelik]

@truBB

forget about my post about the capacitor and resistor ratings, prices are almost the same and we have enough space for elkos.

[truBB]

Specifically, you know the path from Ready signal throughout the original xdrive?
I would like to take a look if it is possible.
I still believe it may be possible to eliminate the chip.

Yeah, you might be able to eliminate the chip. But looking at the images from my post #445, the resistors runing in series coming from pin 5,6&7 are 1k ohm (ie. R228), which I didn't find on the GDR-8163b at all. So when you find these points on the LG xdrive, you may still need these parts. I hope you can get one of these xdrive, as I'm curious as to where these connections go.


menelik,
I popped in a 74HC14 & used a diode to drop the input voltage, and tested away. I found that I needed to increase the resistor-cap values to get it to work (270Kohm & 10uF worked great) . Then I went back to my 74HCT14, tried different dvd-Rs, ritek G04, ritek G05, maxell, princo dvd-rw, verbatim cdrw, with this resistor-cap values. It worked very well with all the disks.

I'm going to change my pictures to use this resistor-cap combo now. I believe its a more robust solution to the problem.

I also tried some original game disks and could only get it to say "game" in eVox after the first eject. THis is really not a problem since you can still play the game apon boot-up & rip the dvd within dvd2xbox. My solution is really a hack to get this drive to work. We found it to be the simplest solution for the problem. Looking back at all the data read from my original thompson, it would require a uController or a more complex circuit to give the xbox the signals it wants. Basically, what I have works, but it is definitely not perfect.

[bourke]

Do you think the Dangerous Brothers could patch the firmware to read at 16X rather than 4X?

They seemed to have patched RPC1 on the 8163B last July; do you really think that it would be that difficult a change to unlock the drive speed?

Is it likely to be just a couple of bytes/bits in the firmware that limits the drive speed?


cheers,
Bourkie

[LenteSubigo]

Do you think the Dangerous Brothers could patch the firmware to read at 16X rather than 4X?

They seemed to have patched RPC1 on the 8163B last July; do you really think that it would be that difficult a change to unlock the drive speed?

Is it likely to be just a couple of bytes/bits in the firmware that limits the drive speed?
cheers,
Bourkie

First, it would be much harder to change the speed than to change the region locks. The reason is that the xbox firmware is encrypted, and regular dvd-rom firmware is not.

Second, most firmware hackers, including the Dangerous Brothers don't want to get on M$'s bad side. They don't want to be sued. So,you would have to find a firmware hacker with encryption experience who is willing to put a few hundred man hours into hacking the firmware with no pay for their services, and the risk of being sued by M$.

[bourke]

First, it would be much harder to change the speed than to change the region locks.  The reason is that the xbox firmware is encrypted, and regular dvd-rom firmware is not.

Second, most firmware hackers, including the Dangerous Brothers don't want to get on M$'s bad side.  They don't want to be sued.  So,you would have to find a firmware hacker with encryption experience who is willing to put a few hundred man hours into hacking the firmware with no pay for their services, and the risk of being sued by M$.

Are we 100% sure it is encrypted? Is the binary completely difference to the one in the 8163B?

If it is encrypted is has to be hardware encrypted (e.g. SHA1) does it not?

I am sure the firmware encryption is slightly easier than the 2048-bit RSA key used for the games!

I am willing to have a crack at decrypting it if anyone else cares to join in?!

After all decryption for the purpose of inter-operability is perfectly legal here in Australia, and I believe that is also the case for the US - see Lexmark vs Static Control Components (SCC)!


cheers,
Bourkie

This post has been edited by bourke: Mar 28 2005, 07:44 AM

[wenid]

Yes, I'm back for one last post. Yes, I made some mistakes -- I am human after all. Yes, Tiros, the mod can be done without an inverter or anything. Yes, menelik, I was wrong about the 5V (in my defense, a lot less was known about any of this then than is known now, so it was easier to get confused about exactly what was what).
Feel free to point at me and laugh or whatever if it makes you feel better somehow, just don't expect me to give a crap. Personally, I only ever viewed my earlier work as prototypical, investigative probing. I don't know why it has been taken as if it was a finished (or even nearly finished) product. Sorry if I seemed to represent it as such.
Now, however, I am finished. Here are the points. All but eject, which I'm assuming everyone agrees is fine as per the markings on the circuit board itself (most recently illustrated by truBB in post 489 and kind of incidentally by menelik in 491).

Recent experience has led me to believe that our naming of these signals is a bit misleading, but I'll stick with it for want of anything better, except that I can't remember which is which of the tray signals anymore (or at least not right now). Pin numbers are based on looking into the socket on an Xbox DVD drive and counting from left to right, top row then bottom row
1 2 3 4 5 6
7 8 9 10 11 12
From left to right in the pic, the points are "ready" (pink circle, pin 9), tray signal 1(in? out? who knows? pin 3 anyway, yellow circle), unconnected pin in SD-616T mod that I'll call "valid" (pin 10, blue circle), tray signal 2 (pin 4, red circle).
On the 8050L, all these have a 1k resistor between the connector for the yellow wires cable and the controller chip. Those resistors aren't present on the 8163B (presumably because these signals aren't connected to the outside world in an unmodified 8163B). I installed my own 1k resistors by tacking one end of the resistor to each point and then connecting the signal wire to the other end of the resistor. I'm pretty sure it will work without them, but I wouldn't recommend leaving them out -- they must be there for good reason in the 8050L.
Finally, here are the pins on the controller chip that each of these points is connected to
ready/pink - pin 50
tray 1/yellow - pin 49
valid/blue - pin 52
tray 2/red - pin 65

[menelik]

wenid did the first step, trubb the second and so on....the only mistake is to talk about mistakes.

[bourke]

Congratulations wenid,

I have 4 8163Bs here ready to test this all out... off to Jaycar for some cheap 1k0s :-)

cheers,
Bourkie

P.S. I reckon these will fetch AUS$90 each here in Melbourne ($55 + old Xbox drive profit for 15 mins work!)

[bourke]

On the 8050L, all these have a 1k resistor between the connector for the yellow wires cable and the controller chip. Those resistors aren't present on the 8163B (presumably because these signals aren't connected to the outside world in an unmodified 8163B). I installed my own 1k resistors by tacking one end of the resistor to each point and then connecting the signal wire to the other end of the resistor. I'm pretty sure it will work without them, but I wouldn't recommend leaving them out -- they must be there for good reason in the 8050L.

All perfect, however one last question:

On the 8050L, does the eject signal also have a 1k0 resistor between the connector and the point on the board?


cheers,
Bourkie

[Tiros]

Now that's what I'm talkin about!
Great work, wenid!

Those 1k resistors are there to protect against the (possible) voltage mismatch between the 3.3 drive supply and the 3.3 xbox logic supply. As long as the supplies are within .6 volts of each other (and they really oughta or something is wrong), they will not forward bias protection diodes on xbox main board and are unnecessary. They can't hurt though.


Menlik,
I was suggesting the HC(t)14 would be better due to the long rise time on the "created" ready signal. Since the true signal is now found it doesn't matter.

This post has been edited by Tiros: Mar 28 2005, 06:44 PM

[menelik]

can anyone confirm that the ready signal from wenids image works right? tried that before and got no response, maybe my drive is broken.