Softmod Trouble, blank screen with orange light after restart Options

[hyfall381]

whats up guys. okay... so a buddy brought me his old xbox. it has a solderless chip in it that keeps coming loose. hes gonna sell the xbox, but wants the chip out of it and everything either restored or softmodded.

he forgot about this.. but turns out hes got a 160gb hdd in it. i know he'll want it back. so i backed up his eeprom, got a hold of an old 10gb hdd from someone, and used xboxhdm 1.9 to build a drive. the problem is, this drive cannot be locked.
its the only extra drive we can find!

so i put the drive in the xbox, and with the chip, everything boots fine to the ms dash. (the chip must have a bios that supports unlocked drives). i can boot a evox dvd and ftp. so i tried softmodding with krayzies ntsc ndure sc installer 1.0, and 1.1. for both, everthing seemed fine until the part where it says to press ok to power off, take out the game, power on to continue. after i restart the xbox, it says 'xbox' then goes to a black screen, and the ring is orange.

it does this everytime. and so i have to use xboxhdm to rebuild the drive again, and try again. i also tried
ndure 3.1, where you do everything on the pc and then ftp the created files to the xbox. same result with the blank screen and orange light.

so.. is this because the drive is unlocked? or because there is still a modchip in the xbox?

is there a way to use a softmod bios that supports unlocked drives?

or is it something else im missing? im sorry for the lengthy post. id really appreciate a hand here. thanks.

This post has been edited by hyfall381: Jun 12 2010, 02:51 AM

[xman954]

because there is still a modchip in the xbox

yes, only the oldest and very few hacked bios will work with a softmod (NKpatcher)

This post has been edited by xman954: Jun 12 2010, 03:15 AM

[steveo1978]

see if the 160gb hdd can be locked if it can then try this. install the stock dash then lock the hdd and remove the chip boot the xbox and get the kernel version then check back and I can help you with the rest. Also what bersion xbox is it?

[hyfall381]

hey whats up. thanks for the replies.

i was able to use xboxhdm 1.9 to create a stock drive, using the 160gb drive. im also able to lock it. so now, without the mod chip, the xbox boots just fine.

kernel is 3944 and dash is 5960. its a v1.0 xbox.

i really appreciate any help.

[steveo1978]

ok get the eeprom for the xbox and use xboxhdm along with kingroach's ndure installer to softmod the xbox. After you do that ten you can tsop the xbox and it will be able to use the unlocked 10gb hdd

[hyfall381]

hey thanks again Steveo.

to use xboxhdm along with kingroach's ndure installer, i would just go through the ndure steps, selecting what i want, including my kernel. then i would use xboxhdm to make a bootable iso, just like before. only this time, the c and e folders would be the ones kingroach's ndure installer made, correct?

also, last time i used kingroachs, i had the wrong kernel checked! so maybe thatll help fix it too.

im gonna try this out. ill post back.

edit - wait, do you mean to softmod it with the locked 160gb drive in it, then tsop the xbox, and then put the 10gb drive in it? and what should i use for the tsop?

This post has been edited by hyfall381: Jun 12 2010, 04:48 AM

[steveo1978]

yeah just pay attention to what you select you shouldnt need any dual boot stuff so leave that alone

[hyfall381]

ok i did what you said. used the installer and xboxhdm and i made the 160gb hdd with it. i also locked it. i put it in the xbox, without the chip, and it booted to the unleashX menu!

just for the heck of it, i used that same cd to do the same thing to the 10gb drive, but because it cant lock, it still didnt work.

so now my question is, how do i go about with tsop'ing the xbox? i dont recall ever doing that before. i remember with a modchip and evox, you could flash a bios on the chip just by burning it to a dvd and using evox. is this similar? i didnt see a similar option in unleashX.

and what bios would you recommend? obviously i need one that supports booting unlocked hdds.

sorry for these noob questions regarding an old system! but i really do appreciate your help.

[steveo1978]

http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showtopic=266342 look at those pics and see if ou thin you can solder those points together. if you cant solder there are still other ways to go.

[xboxmods2977]

Use X2 5035 (512k) for the TSOP, being that you have a 1.0 (1mb TSOP) xbox. It will allow an unlocked HD.

If I remember correctly, the last version of Evolution X automatically re-sized bioses to the fill 1mb TSOP's, not positive about that but if not, raincoat 0.7 has the option.

Alternatively, you could use X2BM (PC app) to double the bios so it will fill your TSOP, which is what I use.

Double check that you have booted from your softmod (modchip disabled) before you attempt to flash your TSOP or your flasher could inadvertently flash your modchip instead.

[hyfall381]

Hey Steveo.
yeah... im not skilled at soldering such small points. but going from those pics, it looks like on the front of the board, theres a part where the yellow and skyblue are close enough to where i could just bridge them. same thing on the back with the red and blue. maybe even a toothpick and some conductive glue would work?

but what are the other options you mentioned?

Xboxmods2977,
thanks for the info. i am familiar with x2bm. i still have my old xecuter flasher . so now i know which bios to use, and the size it needs to be. i appreciate that.

so i assume i have to have the board 'ready' before i flash it. hopefully there are easier options beside soldering. thanks again for the help.

[steveo1978]

Well for the other methods you can check an electronics store like radio shack for a conductive pen but it may be hard to find. The easier thing to find is "rear window defogger repair kits" it comes with a little bottle of conductive paint and I have used the stuff alot and it works great and even though the bottle is small it is enough paint to do alot of points so if later on you wanna do more you will have it on hand. You just put a little dot on each point let sit for a few seconds then boot the xbox and flash away. That stuff once applied last for a long time and it may be a little more newb friendly cause you dont have to worry about solder splashes.

but on another note to solder the point you can just put a small amount of solder on the tip of the iron and just drag it over the to small points.

[hyfall381]

hi Steveo

thanks again for your help. I didn't have time today to try anything, but tomorrow i will. i am familiar with that defogger kit. i remember using it to fix a trace with on one of my xbox originals back in the day.

the conductive glue i have should work the same. its actually left over from my cousins intensafire mod he bought. i put it in his controller for him and the glue works well. so because i already have that, ill give it a go tomorrow.
i figure if it doesnt work, i can always carefully chip it off and try that defogger kit. or, as you said, maybe i can just apply a drop of solder to make the bridge.

tomorrow when i take out the board and see the points for myself, ill know what ill do.

so once its done, would i install evox and use the flash bios option?

[hyfall381]

alright, im all set!

i went ahead and used the conductive glue i had. wasnt too bad. i put everything back together and booted up. i put the bios xboxmods2977 recommended (thanks!) into the bios folder within evox, then i used evox to flash. it went smooth with out any problems.

the xbox restarted, said something about xecuter bios, did the xbox flubber, xbox screen, then i got a black screen!

i just figured it was because the softmod was running the dash from the e folder, but now the new bios is looking in the c folder for a dash.

so i used xboxhdm to put the stock dash/files/folders onto that 10gb hdd that couldnt be locked. once it was done, i put it into the xbox and everything boots up great now!

now the evox dvd is running so i can ftp a different dash, emulators, all that stuff.

so Steveo, thanks for all your help man. I couldn't have done it with out you!

[steveo1978]

no problem. If you need anymore help just ask