Xbox 360 Experiments: swap DVD/TSOP, 360 without EEPROM?, ... Options

[XanTium]

Xbox 360 Experiments: swap DVD/TSOP, 360 without EEPROM?, ... -- Posted by XanTium on December 4 21:00 EST
CrackerJack (cjack) of darkmoon.org bought a core and premium Xbox 360 system and sent us an email with some info. He also posted several comments in this thread on our forums.

He noticed that while his core system has the EEPROM chip near the CPU, his premium Xbox 360 does not have this chip. However it does not seem to be core/premium related as my (XanTium's) premium Xbox 360 has this eeprom chip. On the images below you can see cjack's premium 360 without eeprom on the left and mine with eeprom on the right.

Some other interesting stuff he tried:
* He desoldered the TSOP of his 2 consoles and inverted them. The TSOP of Premium soldered in the Core console did not work. The 'ring of light' blinked red ... black screen. He resoldered both TSOPs in correct consoles ... and everything worked fine again.

* He also desoldered the eeprom from his Core Xbox 360 and, a bit unexpectedly, the console worked fine without the eeprom chip! Dashboard version and Kernel versions (backup version too) were the same then when there was the eeprom. Everything worked fine, games boot without problems, Xbox LIVE worked too...
* He checked the DVD player labels: they are almost the same but 2 different ROM versions:
-Core: DVD PLAYER model: GDR3120L (X800475-008), Rom version: 0046DH
-Premium: DVD PLAYER model: GDR3120L (X800475-009), Rom version: 0047DJ
He tried to swap the DVD players too and ... the games wouldn't boot. The Xbox 360 gave the same error screen then when you put the DVD in a PC DVD-ROM: "To play this disc, put it in an xbox 360 console". CrackerJack thinks that the Xbox 360 might have some kind of signature of the DVD player or that the ROM versions are not compatible.

More pictures of his adventures with the Xbox 360 are available here[darkmoon.org].
You can see his posts on our forums here[forums.xbox-scene.com].

[luther349]

thats just strange. if the tosp in unused why is it there.

[Satan00]

sounds like windows xp device signature activation thing all over again
you could definately expect to see something like that from MS lol

[aepuppetmaster]

maybe he should try to put in a memory card and/or a flash device and seee what happens (maybe it hold something to do with the protcetion for those).

[downlowfunk]

Im no Expert, but would say maybe the EEPROM is the red herring people have been speculating about. as for swapping the drives and getting errors, YUCK!!!!!. Its going to suck in the future when youve got a stack of dead 360s from the dump and your trying to build one good one. Kinda like my stack of dead Xbox 1's ( Bad flashes, poor soldering, lifted traces (dont ask ).


Peace

- D

This post has been edited by downlowfunk: Dec 5 2005, 03:44 AM

[Stripes]

The Xbox 360 gave the same error screen then when you put the DVD in a PC DVD-ROM: "To play this disc, put it in an xbox 360 console".

just wanted to point out.. i think u were trying to type " when you put the dvd in an XBOX dvd-rom"

This post has been edited by Stripes: Dec 5 2005, 04:56 AM

[ukanndewit]

I'll bet there is more than one CPU design being shipped. You know when there is a cheaper way to make these 360s they will do it. Can you check manufacturing dates of the boxes or decode from the CPU stamping any info?

[PCBUILDERCHRIS]

well it looks like since bunny isnt up to it cjack is leading us out of darknes

this is so cool how it boots up without the eeprom i have to tell my fellow 360 geeks who have opened there box imma see if well follow and mimic cjack everystep for fun well have some sort of mod in no time

[lordvader129]

just wanted to point out.. i think u were trying to type " when you put the dvd in an XBOX dvd-rom"

its the same error either way, also with a set top dvd-player

thats just strange. if the tosp in unused why is it there.

it wasnt the TSOP thats apparently unused, its an eeprom near the cpu, it could be a vestigial component from development days, or perhaps it does have a use and we just havent noticied it yet

[Stripes]

its the same error either way, also with a set top dvd-player
it wasnt the TSOP thats apparently unused, its an eeprom near the cpu, it could be a vestigial component from development days, or perhaps it does have a use and we just havent noticied it yet

sorry lord vada

[PCBUILDERCHRIS]

1 ms is cheap
2 they said better security so itll be somewhere we least expect it

un-ha found it its in the psu cords box just kidding but watch out for this stuff

[rocarmy4life]

He tried to swap the DVD players too and ... the games wouldn't boot. The Xbox 360 gave the same error screen then when you put the DVD in a PC DVD-ROM: "To play this disc, put it in an xbox 360 console". CrackerJack thinks that the Xbox 360 might have some kind of signature of the DVD player or that the ROM versions are not compatible.

The 360 will have security built directly into the hardware, said Xbox engineer Chris Satchell.

this is probably one of the "hardware" security checkpoints...

[Alkane]

thats just strange. if the tosp in unused why is it there.

I think you're a little confused. Its the EEPROM that appears unused. The TSOP has been proven to NOT be interchangeable between Xbox 360s. If you were to do this between two like Xbox 1s, two v1.0s for instance, it should work. On the original Xbox, the EEPROM was used to store settings and specifics about that particular Xbox. On the Xbox 360...?

On Xbox 1 the TSOP was used to store the BIOS. On the Xbox 360 it appears to hold the dashboard and possiblely other things. The contents appear to be encrypted using a key unique to each Xbox 360.

sounds like windows xp device signature activation thing all over again
you could definately expect to see something like that from MS lol

Im no Expert, but would say maybe the EEPROM is the red herring people have been speculating about. as for swapping the drives and getting errors, YUCK!!!!!. Its going to suck in the future when youve got a stack of dead 360s from the dump and your trying to build one good one. Kinda like my stack of dead Xbox 1's ( Bad flashes, poor soldering, lifted traces (dont ask ).
Peace

- D

This could very well be some sort of marrying. This may have something to do with their approved hardware peripherals system, marrying, or could be more like what is seen on PS2 consoles. PS2s require that the laser replacing the original be the same model unless you reprogram an EEPROM on the PS2. PS2 service techs have access to a utility for this. Until recently it wasn't available to the modding community, lucky for us replacement parts are fairly easy to find. Recently the modding community was able to make a similar program as used by their service techs to enable use of different lasers.

As for the EEPROM appearing to do nothing, makes me remember some MS guy saying, "what works for some people may not work for everyone else" (not an exact quote, but close). May end up being part of a bigger picture.

just wanted to point out.. i think u were trying to type " when you put the dvd in an XBOX dvd-rom"

Let me elaborate a little. When you put an Xbox 360 game into a PC DVD-ROM, or set-top, you are going to get that message. He's saying that he receives that message when he puts the disc into the swapped Xbox 360 DVD drive. The drive being from a second Xbox 360 being used in the first. That particular Xbox 360 may not have support for that ROM version programmed into it, thus access to the special firmware features cannot be accessed.

Hope this clears some stuff up for the little less tech savvy.
-alkane

This post has been edited by Alkane: Dec 5 2005, 05:27 AM

[lilbplaya3406]

Ms is just trying to confuse us with putting in stuff that doesnt need to be there, it will just take us longer to mod it.

[jeks]

Maybe the EEPROM store information about the dvd ROM version? If not the same, it doesnt work?