Original XBox as a media player

Link to all the software you need is at the bottom, get the SID 5.01 files)
Guide with pictures at the bottom, so read this whole post first, guide is for SID 4.0, but its almost the same, read my instructions for SID 5.01.


Step by step what I did. It looks complicated but its easy

1) Use Action replay, put the saves on the xbox, boot your game.
2) Load linux from the softmod menu, choose back-up, then backup your eeprom.
3) FTP into your xbox(look in settings of the softmod menu for ip(i set mine to DCHP easier to do), then copy of the eeprom(located in E:/UDATA/2xxxxxxx/000000000000/backup/ then copy the eeprom.bin onto yor PC)
4) You can copy UDATA and TDATA aswell if you want to keep your saves.
5) Set up a Xbox HDM disk(really easy to do).
6) Boot from the disk(cd) with the new HDD plugged(unplug existing, so you don't wipe it by mistake) into your computer.
7) Choose option 1, then on the next step type 'XBOXHD' (without quotes), keep typing 'YES' until it says its done.
8) restart your PC when prompted, then boot to option 3(lock/unlock HD with linux)
9) type 'lockhd -a'
10) Shutdown your PC.
11) Swap the Xbox HDD's over.

Now you have a new HDD with the original files, now to softmod it,
1)boot from your game(saved files are still on your xbox if you used your existing UDATA and TDATA).
2) backup the MS dashboard, then just choose install softmod,
3) choose single boot, and softmod(choose HD if you want it in high definition(you can change it later anyways).
4) Choose the unleashX dashboard(much better than Evo X)
5) Once its done it restarts your xbox and your done.

I know there's alot of steps but it takes around 10 minutes to do(excluding burning the cd and whilst its installing to the HDD.

I will provide links to a guide:
How to open your xbox:
http://www.llamma.com/xbox/Repairs/crack_open_that_xbox.htm

New HDD.
For my steps 1-2:
Use This:
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/558747

Steps: 3-4:
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/403609

Steps: 5-11:
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/548462
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Steps to softmod it 1-5:
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/558747

All the software you need is available at this link:
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/557450

Get SID5.01, its almost the same to install but has newer files, my instructions are for SID5.01.

Got any problems just PM me.

If I am storing my media files on a network server, is it still worth changing the XBox hard drive?

The link in the first post doesn't work, can you just replace it with this:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?p=7829297&posted=1#post7829297

Just remove the bits around it.
Thanks.

Random wrote: »

Ok, this now seems to be going from bad to worse

I wasn't sure if the Xbox itself was faulty, so I got another one, thinking I could give the second one away if I ended up with two working media centres. I copied the saves in, put in splintercell, this time when I select checkpoints I get error 21. If I restart the Xbox it goes back to the usual microsoft dash no probs. Would this lead you to think my save files might be corrupted or wrong?

So, back to Xbox number 1, I suddenly realised that where number 2 said 'microsoft' on the startup screen, number one actually says 'Xecuter2'. So I googled this and it seems to be a mod chip! Could this be the cause of the problems... and what exactly can I do with it if it does have this chip?

Any advice very gratefully received

you either have a chip or a tsop'd machine.
if you have a copy game then just put it in the machine and turn it off.
then power it up and it should boot the disc(without loading dash files)
if you cant ftp in then try cold booting an auto installer disc as earlier posted and rebuilding the HD files