Quick questions on Xbox360 modding

So I am completely new to Xbox 360, today I just won one by auction. I have a soft modded Orginal but that is about it. My 360 is a Jasper based on the date code from the photos and I wanted to mod it. First off whats a really awesome mod chip to use on this machine. Second can you do multi region retail games on the 360 when you use a mod chip and CFW. Reason being is I really wanted to play some Cave Co. imports on this machine but I am finding it difficult to find information about making the system multi region at all, which worries me tbh.

Thanks for your time guys

 

Look no further than the Coolrunner, demon or matrix glitch chips. Get yourself a nand reader online such as a NAND-X and follow online tutorials for how to wire everything up, once you preform the RGH hack and have your xebuild image loaded onto the console, everything will be region free, and you can run your own code.

 

Sweet thats what I was hoping for XD. Thank you!!!!

 

http://www.modchipcentral.com/store/product.php?productid=17977&cat=294&page=1 Would this do nicely or do all these chips do about the same thing more or less?

 

the demon chips are the most complex as they add an extra nand flash, but they all do the same thing at the end of the day, Which is glitch the CPU. Some are just more fancy

 

You should really get a X360ACE chip.
They cost almost nothing, and are extremely reilable.
Get a Jr-programmer, the clones work almost exactly like a original.
I have used the X360ACE and Jr-Programmer combination on a number of systems, and it have never failed me.

 

Matrix glitcher is a good money saving way to mod a 360 too

 

If I used a clone are there any disadvantages. In the past I found that knockoffs can sometimes actually have decent build quality if you know what to look for not sure about these though. What are the name of a few of the programmer clones? On the same note as programmers can you program one of these chips using a parallel port? I have an old pentium4 Linux box hanging around that may do me good.

I am actually just thinking of doing a CR3 chip but I have not fully decided.

Also since I have never had an Xbox live account nor have I had any plans to make one as of yet, means I guess the duel nand is useless for me atm. (As from what I have read that is about all its used for anyway) Still having the option to have Xbox Live accounts if I so choose is something that maybe useful to have in the future.


So for the matrix chip you are talking about something like this? http://www.modchipcentral.com/store/matrix-glitcher-360-usa-canada.html Unfortunately its hard for me to find this chip in stock at least close to the US. I saw one on a European shop for 15bucks but I didn't calculate the shipping.

 

If you have no plans for Xbox Live then you don't need dual NAND. Tbh, it is always safer to use 2 360's if you want to use Live anyway (1 unmodded or running iXtreme at the most and the other fully modified). That's hardly a prohibitive setup anyway since 360's cost very little these days.

All the "modchips" for the 360 essentially produce the same result in that they allow you to extract your consoles NAND and then install a replacement modified version and accompanying FOSS dashboard. They don't work like the old PS2/Xbox modchips used to. I still have my old Falcon 360 myself and have considered RGH'ing it on a couple of occasions but it just seems overly complicated to me and it's difficult to find a kit that has everything that you need and doesn't necessitate several different products with a total price of around $70.

Incidentally, I know that you have never really used a 360 before but I would just add that the console is very little without Live. It was clearly built around Live and the offline experience was never particularly good IMHO. If you are buying this just to experience some of great multiplatform titles of the last gen (e.g. Mass Effect 2/3, RDR, GTA V, Bioshock, Fallout 3 etc) or for the modding experience then fair enough but I just thought that I would warn you in advance. In real terms, unlike the PS3, the 360 had very little in the way of top-notch exclusives. Probably less than the Wii did tbh.

 

Yeah so in other words there is no point to me getting live to begin with that's good to know. Cleaver how Microsoft built such a strong network dependence in so little time.

Mostly bought this system to have something to play around with. And also to play some of the arcade titles more specifically the cave shooter titles that came out in Japan. And while I'm sure some might say well why the heck would you do that when you can play it on mame? Reason being is that those ports have some interesting features like replays novice modes and etc. It nay take time for cave to release all their previous titles to steam I figured this was more than an excuse. That and I really get annoyed setting mame up anyways.(I also collect games and hardware so theres that too systems are really cheap now as stated)

So back on the topic at hand I saw some videos on some cheaper cool runner knockoffs that run just as good so atm I'm thinking this will be my final option. After I get the chip I'll get a programmer and solder the system up using RGH. I can't be sure what my dash board version is just yet until it arrives this Wednesday.

If you guys have any suggestions about which method is best let me know. From what i seen you just might as well use RGH or RGH2.

I'll have a full list of the things I am getting to hack it in this thread once I get to that point.

 

I'll watch this thread with interest then as I almost never use my 360 these days and so JTAGging it could breathe a bit of life into it perhaps.

In your case, it is definitely going to be the way to go as Japan/Asia was pretty much the only market that saw heavy region locking on the 360. When it came to the EU and NA, Microsoft and the publishers very rarely bothered.

The last time I looked into this it seemed like some of the better products had more reliable results and that boot times were a real problem on some of the older and cheaper kits. It's also apparently important to keep wire length to a minimum as that can screw up timing I believe.

 

Funny you mentioned wire length this guy I watched actually threaded his cpu wires through the holes in the pcb where the cpu heat sink retentions are at. I should probably book mark that one he apparently does mods as a service it was informative.

Edit went through my history here's some interesting videos!!

Clone comparisons

Jasper RGH (guy seems legit)

 

Was it the American video with the Christmas music in the background? I watched that one a little while ago and the guy really did seem to know what he was doing.

For me the cost of the actual mods is just a bit prohibitive really, the stuff needed for coolrunner seems to cost more than an actual console these days. Another poster on here bought cheaper QSB's from China but I think there were real quality control issues with them and the Xecuter forums can be real snobby if they think that you're using anything other than full and official TX solutions.

 

I put the videos in my post.

Update here's the clone chip I found so far on ebay.

http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&id=221873462810&alt=web

 

I thought that listing might actually be genuine considering the seller was in America and it didn't follow the usual Chinese format but then I read some of the English used in the description.

That will be a clone for sure but the price seems decent and delivery from the US should take far less time than delivery from China.

 

Im actually looking into using lpt programming for maximum savings since all these chips use xilinix they can be programmed using a cheaper alternative I would imagine like a usb spi programmer or an lpt parallel cable

I actually found some premade lpt cables for coolrunners on sale for like 2 bucks
on a modding website. After reading more you could just get a cheap xilinix programmer as long as you match the correct 6 pins to the coolrunner.

Saves me from spending 50 for a programmer. Lpt takes longer though but for the savings ill allow the extra programming time needed.

http://www.xconsoles.com/products/tx-xilinx-lpt-jtag-cable.html

 

Good luck with it all.

Please could you post links to the kit that you buy. I might consider doing this at some point myself if the total price is reasonable.

 

I will have a full list of my final parts when I get around to buying them which may be sooner than later. Then I will follow up with any issues and how well the process goes. I am assuming this will all go well. A bit of research into topics and pin outs goes a long way to saving money sometimes . Heck i could get an official CoolRunner RevC for about 26 USD and still not pay the 50 USD for the programmer now that i know that these boards use a simple Xilinix chip to program. Which comes out good.

For the sake of the "lets do this to a budget" approach I'll use a clone and review my experience with it.

For now I will wait for this system to arrive Monday. (I have exams so you may not hear from me till Friday of next week.)

 

No problem at all, there's no rush. Thanks.

 

If you are not willing to spent alot.
Then why not buy the X360ACE which is 3$, and a clone Jr Programmer which is around 12$ ?
For what you get that is an extremely nice price

Edit: Prices have gone up a little since I bought mine.
But it´s still quite cheap I suppose.