Hi. I couldnt find a similar post (others are softmod related or outdated).
So i got an xbox which i found out had meen hardmodded earlier (chip removed).
I have gotten it to a state that when i boot it up i get error 21 (from no error before desoldering to e16 before rebuilding C to e21)

I have hotswapped and gained the eeprom.bin from backup and i have found out that it had evolutionx dash installed.
Is there any way to get past this error via rebuilding hdd or something (i dont know what chip it had because i had this from random guy)
xbox version is 1.4/1.5 (focus chip + 2 lines of psu pins) and i have a working xbox crystal v1.6 with softmod (sid4 + unleashX)

What the xbox does when booting :
boots up and display's microsoft (it didnt display it before the rebuild of C)
displays error 21 and at the same time the dvd drive is doing random noise, like screetch 3 times, then waits for a moment, and then does it again (i think for eternity before i power it off) + tried my crystal dvd which resulted in same error.

What i have tried :
-Tested the hdd for baddies with seagate seatools (totally working hdd)
-rebuild C partition with linux.iso
-Build xbox hdd from scratch using files from AID2

What i am going to try :
-Build xbox hdd from scratch using files from my working softmodded xbox
-install aladdin xt modchip when it arrives

The xbox mobo seems to be fine (after i did some desoldering, it still has the spikeline [whatever it is in eng] from the modchip soldered) so i think its related to the xbe files which i cannot make it boot, even ive checked the proper installation via xplorer360.

any help would be apreciated. and sorry for typo's, not the best in eng.

Read the link in my signature - softmod with eeprom.

i read your comment and tried to search for the Kingroach NDURE 3.1 via google but couldnt find where to download it. any help where i could find it?
EDIT: found it but after "installing" how do i change the ndure.htm to no extension, as in win7 i can only edit the name, which doesnt allow editing of extension.
EDIT2: got the ndure.htm to ndure which is now marked as "file"

i got home and tested it but got an error at the ndure part.

it says something like cp : ndure/e/nkp11 file or directory missing
i checked the install folder and it truly is empty so what should i do now?

and i tested it after locking the hdd but the xbox still gave me error 21, am i missing something? (i did exactly what you said in the post)

After trying to unlock the hdd again when i burned a new copy of xboxhdm, im getting only error's and it says it cannot find eeprom.bin anymore, even if i use the earlier burned cd which worked...
any help still or do i need to wait for the modchip and try that if it works?

ot question about modchips :
If i install a modchip, does it boot automatically to other dashboard? or what, because i cant get it that if it only bypasses the bios, but where does the dashboard come from?

I would suggest you not waste money on a modchip unless you happen to have one on hand already. You can get the softmod working if you invest a bit of effort.

@movax : no it doesnt work, ive tried it several times with ndure and it just boots up to error 21. i cant get past it. i already ordered a chip which cost me 5,5€ so it really doesnt matter.

sounds like the cd rom was set to master instead of slave on the ide.

as for mod chips
Should come with a bootable bios but will probably need flashing so use hexen to flash it.

@shambles : no, i set it to slave drive and it worked great with the exact same setup i tried before. after that it just stopped working.

i got the aladdin xt plus2 modchip today, i soldered i carefully in to place and im still getting the error 21. what the hell should i do to fix this?