I softmodded my xbox a few years ago with NDURE using, I think, this tutorial and I was successfully able to softmod the original HDD. Earlier this week, I tried upgrading (for a second time) the HDD to a 120GB WD Caviar (using the directions in the same tutorial, but partially modified, see near the end of the post) and (thought) I was successful. However, when I leave the xbox unplugged for a long time, the xbox no longer boots and freezes with the green 'microsoft xbox' logo on the screen after the light on the front turns orange (which is what happens when the HDD normally boots). The only way I can then get it to boot again is to put the original HDD in and set the clock, then put the new HDD in again. Obviously, this gets annoying. I was wondering if anyone else had this problem before, as google turned up no (relevant) results, because I would really like to get this fixed.

I used the directions from that tutorial to upgrade the HDD, but I slightly modifed them. This was due to the fact that I don't have a DVD burner and all the stuff on the old HDD was too big to fit on a 700mb CD. I am pretty sure I followed the directions completely, but DIDN'T copy the e:\apps folder to the CD. after following the normal directions the rest of the way, I FTP'ed into the xbox and copied the E:\apps folder onto the new HDD. I also copied a lot of other stuff to make sure the new HDD was an exact copy of the old. this was because the CD I used was one I made over a year ago when I tried to upgrade the harddrive the first time. the harddrive I used that first time turned out to have the click of death and I went back to the old drive about a week afterward.

Sorry if I posted this in the wrong forum or it was WAY too descriptive. And maybe I might not be as much a noob as some of the people here are. I have a lot of PC troubleshooting knowledge, but just not a whole lot of experience with the xbox and (modern) game system modding in general.

i would start by reinstalling the softmod using heimdalls xbox engineering disk..

See if that fixes it for you..

I can only imagine its a corrupted/missing dash issue. but that should pop up an error 16..
Softmods should not need the clock set though so its a perculiar situation.

any way.. if the hexen disk fixes your issue i would then recomend fremoving the clock cap if your xbox is version 1.0-1.5 as they leak and tend to eat through traces on the xbox causing issues.

well, with this softmod, it used to come up and ask you to set the clock when you left it disconnected, and whenever it won't boot and I put the old HDD back in, the first thing it asks me to do is set the clock. I DID change some stuff, so I need to see if the problem is still there, but I will try the hexen disk if I still have the problem. I might also try a full reload of the new HDD since I forgot about the whole shadowC thing and might have screwed that up

well, it seems to be fine now. I must have somehow fixed it when I screwed up the new HDD and then had to recopy a file using xboxhdm to fix it. Before, I could consistently cause problems by leaving it unplugged for a few minutes and then turning it on again. Now, that isn't causing any problems.

Ok..
clock needing to be reset every few mins = bad cap..
So seriously reinstall the softmod using hexen "krazies 1 click softmod install to unleash -x would be my recomendations..

then get that clock cap out of the xbox..

you may want to have some lemon juice or vinegar handy..
If any of that electro crap leaked out you will want to try and neutralize it with the acidic lemon juice or vinegar..

just pour a little on there then wipe it down, if you have some isopropyl alcohol handy use that to clean the board after..
that will prevent the stuff eating through your xbox..

of course if you prefer you can wait till it looks more like this..



Personaly id get the job done now..

damn, had no idea it got that bad. Do you know by any chance which C# capacitor that is? I don't want to desolder the wrong one. and you said this only happens on certain board versions? what if I don't have one of those versions? am I fine?

never seen it happen on a 1.6..
They have a Gold clock cap near the IDE port..
I think that its C7G10 for the 1.0-1.1
and C7G3 for 1.2-1.5

they all have a funny design though where you could have set a cap slightly to the left or right (if you see the picture i posted you will see how there are 4 holes and 2 white outlines.. but only 1 capacitor..)
They all have this same layout so you can find them if my C# were wrong..

But Update your softmod with hexen 1st..
that way you wont have to reset the clock.

well, I figured out how I broke it. when I copied files from the C drive of the old HDD, I copied them to the shadow-C drive of the new HDD. that ended up making the original MS dashboard be replaced by the modded one that loads the other dashboard. the softmod I have loads the MS dashboard to set the clock, and since the file that was supposed to be the MS dashboard was actually the one that loads the mod, it would get stuck in an endless loop of loading the mod, then the mod trys to set the clock by loading the MS dash, which would in turn actually load the mod again, causing the cycle to repeat.

actually, now that I am looking at it, my shadowC image is missing entirely. I must have not put it on the CD to save space soooooo... looks like I REALLY did this a weird way and no one will ever have the same problem as this ever again. the root of this problem is that I am a cheap-ass and don't own a DVD burner.

well aslong as your softmodded now and have ftp access..

you can download Hexen For hard disk Drive not dvd
just google "Hexen For hard disk Drive not dvd"
You will find it fast i edited it especialy for people who cant make the dvd or use the dvd excetera..

You will also want to download. a cfg file i edited after uploading it..
the 1st link you find should take you to a web page with me making comments on the page..
the last comment is me again and has the link to the cfg file you need.

So you can re softmod properly without a dvd burner.
And when your properly softmoded you can get that time bomb of a capasator out of your xbox.

Remember that heimdall made hexen. all i did was edit a few files and update the xbmc on it..
"seemed like a lot of work for individuals to do especialy if they werent all that computer literate, so i did the editing"