Jump to content
OGXbox.com

HDShadow

Members
  • Posts

    864
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    14

Everything posted by HDShadow

  1. I've dozen dozens of 'homebrew' Doom WADs on the Xbox of one sort or another and not really had any serious performance problem, at least nothing that you would not expect. But if you're just wanting to play Doom I/Doom II and their various iterations (Ultimate Doom and the Doom II Master Levels) on the original Xbox at its best then get Doom: Resurrection Of Evil which includes them as bonuses. It is a fantastic package if you buy Doom III and Doom ROE, you'll be all Doomed out if you play through everything they contain. If you have a Xbox360 then the remastered Doom III BFG edition has all that and an additional set of Doom III missions too.
  2. My suggestion would be to get a new HDD, install it, then use an installer disc to put in a clean hardmod dash. My personal preference would still be to use an AID (Auto-Installer Deluxe) disc but then I'm old school and like things nice and simple. The OGXbox or TruHeXEn ones probably have all the bells and whistles of a more up to date installer but what you use is up to you. They'll all work. Doing this will give you a virgin set up you can play around with if you must. BIOS rule No.1 (Xbox or PC): don't flash a new BIOS unless you know what you're doing and you really need a feature of the new BIOS. Just updating it because there is a new version is pointless because every time you do it you're risking bricking your machine. If you've flashed CerBIOS you're probably wanting to use a larger HDD than you are already so it makes no sense trying to fix whatever mess you've made by softmodding the existing HDD. Chances are that it is unlocked and you can get everything important off it and transfer it to the new HDD one way or another.
  3. Interesting question. Indeed with XBMC4Xbox you can add the Screenshot and/or other picture folders as Sources under the main Pictures menu. In fact you don't even need to do that because the sub-menu > Slideshow option will display using your designated Screenshot folder content However if the Pictures main menu option was removed does XBMC4Gamers include a Favourites option? If so that might work if you add your picture containing folder(s) to that. There used to be a number of gallery plugins you could use (no experience of doing this myself) but they were installed under Pictures from the main menu too. Rather than mess around with XBMC4Gamers wouldn't the simplest solution just be to install XBMC4Xbox as an app for when you want to manage/view pictures?
  4. Did a quick Google on the Xenium matter and from this link I see it can be installed just as an app. Also it appears, its menu has an eeprom backup option too.
  5. Nothing is out of date, if it works it works. So just replacing a dash or 'updating' the BIOS is a question of personal choice not necessity. Why a "Backup" eeprom option is missing is probably because the evox.ini (the dash's configuration/settings file) has been customised for safety reasons. The Flash BIOS option too I'd guess is also likely missing (DO NOT MESS WITH THAT IF IS STILL THERE). But in any case as yours is a hardmod the eeprom backup is less important than if it was a softmod. It is still a good idea to back it up to PC. Check the HDD lock status, being a hardmod you'd expect it to be unlocked but if it is locked then the eeprom backup becomes a little more important. 1). If your EvoX dash does not have a eeprom "Backup" you can either edit/replace the evox.ini but, safer, to install ConfigMagic, an Xbox app, that will do that for you and also put in a safety net in the form of a master password. There are disc based installer tools that will also backup the eeprom for you. Your choice which you choose. 2). No need to delete XBMC or Avalaunch. They're alternative dashboards installed as apps which can be useful, you might even prefer XBMC to EvoX and decide to replace it as your main dash. Ask here for advice before attempting to do that yourself. 3). Not ever seen Xenium installed as an app - possibly a Xenium chip was previously fitted. That's just a guess, somebody here who knows more about Xenium and chip stuff than I do will know doubt be able to help with that. 4). The BIOS is completely separate thing from the dash. UnleashX and XBMC4Gamers are just other dashboards, they do not need a BIOS update to be able to use either. If the chip is a standard Aladdin type it came with a pre-installed universal EvoX M8+ which is perfectly good enough in most circumstances. The golden rule with BIOS, Xbox or PC, is never update them unless you are a 100% sure it will provide some new benefit or a problem fix you're actually going benefit from. Otherwise don't. You can replace your primary dash with a new dash and I'd suggest any one with a built in file manager is a better choice than EvoX.
  6. Good to know. I was just wondering what extra wiring I might need. As I understand it the top of MB red wire going to the transistor leg is for a 5v supply to power the chip on LED. I don't know if the Black Ice chip I've just bought (still in transit) even has an LED but I assume it does. So that wire will have to have the plug removed and be re-soldered somewhere. I'm also not certain what to do about the Xecuter 2.6 CE's switch array. It's super-glued in place so it has to stay. The Bank select and Write Protect switches will be redundant (?) but it might be useful to be able to switch the chip On/Off and, although less important, just the chip LED. Both are catered for in the Xecuter's switch array but can it be adapted to make those functions work with the Black Ice? Anyone know how?
  7. You could test the theory of that being the problem by temporarily removing 25 to 30 of the largest file size icons you've installed and seeing if doing that reduces the effect you're seeing. It is less work than uninstalling them all, reducing their size and reinstalling them and, as said, it could be something else. I remember doing a new softmod a few years ago (UnleashX dash install) and being surprised just how 'zippy' navigating through the UnleashX menus was using this new uncluttered HDD compared to my primary Xbox. That has about sixty games, a couple of dozen apps, and I'd guess a total of at least fifty emulators and homebrew games plus CD music rips installed, most with my own custom (<50KB) icons.
  8. I'm a little confused now as to what the green and red wires under the MB are there for. Likewise the D0 wire which I thought the LPC rebuild board meant it was not required with a v1.6. The YT videos I've seen show an Aladdin chip installed on a v1.6 with an LPC rebuild board working without any additional wiring that I could see.
  9. That sort of problem seems to affect UnleashX particularly; it could be something else but the trouble is usually caused by some unwritten maximum total icon file size cache limit. It seems to kick in between 900MB - 100MB total. Roughly about 200 <50KB icons and what happens is not just that icons do not display, the menu items themselves go missing from the menus. So if you have installed a lot of games, emulators and apps and/or they have a lot of large custom sized icons that could be what you're experiencing. This is why I've always kept my custom icon size down to 256x256 and used various other 'tricks' to reduce the icon file size to <50KB. That might mean using JPG rather than PNG but with PNG you can 'optimise' it using graphics programs settings to reduce the file size eg. using 8 bit palette only rather than standard 24 bit R G B sometimes making the file smaller than a JPG.
  10. ^ I've often thought about getting one of those types and I actually have a Xbox related job where being able to clone the HDD directly to another could be useful.
  11. I don't think is a specific USB3 issue; if the housing/adapter uses a particular chip you can have problems with certain attached storage devices whatever the USB version. My previous primary USB housings (which are not Startech) which are USB2.0 dual IDE/SATA refused to work with a Crucial MX500 SSD so I never even had the chance to test it with FATXplorer. I bought a very basic Startech SATA > USB3.0 adapter (USB3S2SAT3CB) and used with the same SSD it worked perfectly and I cloned my desktop's primary HDD to it successfully. Not tried it with FATXplorer but I thought it might be worth a go as they appear less sophisticated than the combi-type you're using and pretty cheap too. However something I noticed just now, when checking its spec, and the advice provide is that particular adapter will only work with 2.5" drives of any sort, SSD or HDD. Why is not explained but for both 2.5" and 3.5" SSD/HDD Startech themselves point potential buyers at the SATA only USB312SAT3 adapter rather than the USB3SSATAIDE one the OP is using. That will of course depend on whether he is using a a SATA or IDE HDD but I'd guess it is most likely now we are talking here about a SATA HDD. Whether it works, judging from Startech user feedback, with particular combinations of equipment appears to be a matter of suck it and see. Not very helpful.
  12. The red one on top of the the MB? As I mentioned in the previous post that's only used with a v1.6 Xbox which needs a separate 5v power supply. If you look at the pic above which shows the underside of the Xecuter 2.6 CE you can see printed on the PCB itself (in red) an arrow and info about that 5v connection being only for v1.6 Xboxes. BTW I found a YT guide where a guy was replacing a Xecuter with an Open Xenium on a v1.6 and he actually removed the Xecuter's LPC board and used the supplied Xenium one which, presumably, includes the additional v1.6 5v connection. Should I need to dump my Xecuter in the future I'd want to avoid having to do that which is why I asked about whether it was possible to use the Xecuter LPC board with the Xenium. That must surely require a separate, wired 5v connection too - is that possible to do with the Xenium? The YT video guy mentioned the Xenium comes with some Kynar wire so I was wondering if that is why it was supplied.
  13. Well that's comforting :(. Photos of chip/MB etc. Apologies for average quality but I do not have a close-up lens for the camera I was using so had to use digital zoom. However I think they show the sort of detail required. I was hoping when I flipped the MB over I'd see an obviously disconnected or loose wire (D0 perhaps) but just like the soldered wire on top of the MB, which I think is the v1.6 5v supply, the soldering on the three wires underneath still look bright and clean with the connections very firm. So whatever the problem is it doesn't seem likely to be a simple loose connection issue. Did a bit of cleaning afterwards and put the whole thing back together just to check it was still functioning as before and...............................the damned thing booted perfectly using the primary bank (Evox logo). I did not want to stress it by trying a reboot or shutdown and restart, I was just glad it was working OK again. However I did take the opportunity to re-backup the eeprom although I have plenty of full backups of it and C:\, E:\ drive content archived, somewhere. Should it fail again similarly I think the best thing would be to get a replacement chip. If I can find an Open Xenium or similar can I just swap in that without having to do any rewiring or are some of the Xecuter 2.6 CE connections (see pics) chip specific?
  14. ^ ^^Thanks for the response. As I've just posted in message to someone else here, the Xecuter 2.6CE chip, so I've read, needs special treatment. You can't just flash one bank with a new BIOS. The info I have is that you need to create a single 1MB file made up of 2 x 512KB BIOS and flash both the banks together in one go. I neither know how to create that 1MB file nor care to risk blitzing the existing BIOS particularly when the evidence suggests that both the BIOS are OK. I'll try to get some pics up once I've unscrewed the MB and had a look underneath tomorrow.
  15. I've had a Xecuter 2.6 CE chip fitted Xbox v1.6 since around 2005, bought pre-installed and flashed with two banks each a custom Evox M8+ BIOS I've never needed/wanted to change. AFAIK the second BIOS is exactly the same but with the logo removed. All was working fine until last summer when I started to get occasional fragging on reboots/restarts. I found that if I swapped the banks it would usually boot correctly for weeks then suddenly the problem would reappear. I'd swap to the second bank and that would get it working again. So both BIOS are working but something else must be going on to cause this trouble. Fast forward to last weekend and after six months without a repeat the problem has reappeared but this time nothing I've tried to fix it has worked, at least not fully. I left it for several days and I was surprised to find on restart it booted as normal but when I used the IGR the fragging started again. I've dismantled the Xbox but haven't taken out the MB yet. The chip is surprisingly clean, almost dust free and seated firmly on the LPC. The top of MB soldered connections look perfect and are very firm and clean too. So maybe it is one of the underside connections. Is there anything with those connections I should be looking for that might cause this behaviour? It seems reasonable to think it could be a partially broken connection. Maybe a soldering point has dried out/cracked but if so why, until now, did swapping the BIOS banks get it working again? It is getting on for 19 years old and has had a lot of use and I'm worried that the chip itself might have developed some serious problem. Should also mention that with the chip off the Xbox boots without issue to an error 05 as you'd expect with an unlocked HDD. So that is more evidence it is just the chip.
  16. I think it worth making this clear in case other coming here make the same mistake of misunderstanding the XBPartitioner Xbox drive information:- STANDARD PARTITIONS Partition 1 = E:\drive Partition 2 = C:\drive Partition 3 = X:\drive Partition 4 = Y:\drive Partition 5 = Z:\drive X,Y, and Z drives are for temporary cached content, typically it will allow you to skip long intros in some games which otherwise take their time (re)writing it to X, Y or Z. They will be over-written by any other game that use X, Y or Z for that purpose so can not be used for anything else. Also be aware that XBMC and its variants will not show X, Y and Z in the file manager without enabling them each as a Source. EXTENDED PARTITIONS Partition 6 = F:\Drive Partition 7 = G:\drive Any other partitions listed are said to be for attached external storage. However, contrary to the wiki info, I have found neither official memory cards or <4GB USB flash drives display in XBPartitioner v1.3. That is not on any Xbox I've used to test such things. https://consolemods.org/wiki/Xbox:XBpartitioner Clarification about this, from those who know more, would be interesting and possibly useful.
  17. The existing thermal paste used by the manufacturers is meant to be rock hard at room temperature as others here have said. I've done test case thermal paste replacement and seen no significant improvement in the real or reported temperatures. I only trust XBMC and its variants; UnleashX and EvoX are both unreliable in that respect but still can inform you reliably if there is some unusual temperature rise from whatever 'normal' range you get. That varies with ambient temperature, console location and Xbox version. If you do decide to replace the paste for whatever reason then use guides for PC CPU chip heat sink thermal paste application. Basically you need two ultra clean surfaces and minimum thermal paste use. The recommendation is a small pea size blob in the centre of the chip but there are various alternatives methods that can work as well. Tinting, which is applying a thin pre-coat of paste on the chip and heat sink contact plate then wiping it off not using any cleaner is said to help fill the imperfections in the two contact surfaces better. It is debatable whether it has any significant effect but I do it anyway. Main thing is not to use too much thermal paste however it is applied. So if it squirts out around the edges of the heat sink then you're using far too much. If the paste is a conductive type, just like solder splatter, that can be bad for the same, obvious reason.
  18. In either case and I'd guess the Xbox front panel LED, anything that is flashing green/blue means it is customised in some way and it could mean anything. What we need to know is whether the chip is booting and what is happening on screen if anything. Wild guess is that the LED is actually flashing green and red (general hardware problem) and either the OP is partially colour-blind or the originally red LED has been replaced with a blue one.
  19. You're talking about the difference between a redump ISO and a XISO. What you're doing when you use ExtractISO or XDVD Mulleter is extracting the game files from the redump which is a bit by bit copy from the original game disc media. When you have the game files you can either use Qwix or the C Xbox Tool to package them as disc burning, Xbox friendly XISO file or you can FTP the game (in a or to a named folder) direct to the Xbox instead. With the right tools on the Xbox you can also instead FTP the XISO disc image file and get that to play directly too. Never been sure why people want that option but it is possible. Google for a fuller explanation.
  20. It is the classic clock setting error most feared by softmodders - it can't find a dashboard to set the time but you need a dashboard to set the time. But with a chip, if you have a functional disc drive, you might be able to cold boot an installer disc. Failing that formatting/installing a dashboard on PC with FATXplorer should work.
  21. You're saying that with FATXplorer you can now create a 2TB F:\drive rather than, previously, when you had to spit it equally between F:\ and G:\, yes? I too was going to suggest backing up the existing F:\ drive content to PC first and then transferring it back once the drive was correctly partitioned but assumed prtscn did not want to do that as it would take a donkey's age to do.
  22. Hope I have not misunderstood but you are likely going to be unhappy if you do what you said in that final sentence. AFAIK you cannot extend F:\ without wiping its content. Maybe on PC with FATXplorer but I do not know about that. Maybe if you have the, apparently, magic CerBIOS it might be different but in all other cases a 2TB HDD has to be formatted to have less than 1TiB in both the extended partitions ie. F:\ and G:\. n other words it must be split equally. What I do not know also, because I haven't done it myself, is what happens if you clone a 1TB HDD then reformat the clone to create a new G:\ drive in the free space. Whether it reformats both extended partitions and wipes the content of F:\ I have no idea but I think it might do. In short I'd be interested in an authoritative answer too.
  23. It means it was modded at some point but was reverted to 'stock' for sale. It might have network connections but in 'stock' form you cannot FTP to see what is on the HDD. What you're seeing are the left over UDATA/TDATA configuration/settings files for dashboards, apps. emulators etc which the original owner forgot or couldn't be bothered to remove. I'm assuming there are no softmod exploit and installer game saves, most likely from either Splinter Cell or 007 AUF, or Mechassault. Interesting they would remove those but not the other stuff. That could suggest the Xbox was actually chipped or TSOPed. It might be worth opening up the Xbox to check for evidence of that. You might even find a nice chip in situ that needs very little work to get it up running again.
  24. ^ Degrees Centigrade or Fahrenheit? My experience with replacing the thermal paste is that it made little difference to the reported temperatures in °C. You risk damaging the CPU/GPU chip getting the heat sink off and plenty of people have broken the irreplaceable plastic heat sink retainers too. So all in all you have to have extraordinarily high temperatures, you're certain is caused by ageing thermal paste, to make it worth the risk. Some people suggest that the hardened, bubblegum-like consistency of the paste MS used in the Xbox is an indication it is old and needs replacing. They're wrong - the thermal paste used is a "phase change" type which is behaving just as intended ie. hard and glue like when at room temperature but softens with heating. That is why you MUST only attempt to remove the heat sinks when they're warmed up.

Board Life Status


Board startup date: April 23, 2017 12:45:48
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.