aHun Posted April 13 Report Share Posted April 13 Hello all you smart people. I am a idiot who recently purchased a pre-modded Xbox without knowing anything of this community. The 1.4 Xbox has a Aladdin chip, Cerbios, XBMC4Gamers and a 3tb HDD. Unfortunately, Fedex rough housed the thing on it's way and it showed up with the back corner of the case cracked. I plugged it into my modern TV using a funky HDMI adapter, flipped the video from 720p to 4:3 NTSC, turned the box off and plugged it into my CRT using a 3rd party cable. Setup insignia, updated Halo 2, played 2 rounds, temps were reported as less than 65c, 40c at idle. I then backed out, created a new profile in XBMC and it needed to scan the HDD for content. It hit 40% and froze, then started artifacting some white static over the image. I shut it off, gave it a min, turned it on and it froze on the Cerbios screen with the same artifact pattern. Shut her off, opened her up, all new caps, pretty clean board and new thermal paste under the heatsinks but I still replaced it anyway. The chip seems to be installed as needed, with no visible issue. Put it all back together and it showed the artifacted bios again and froze. I shut it off, pulled the power cord, held the power button for 10 sec and plugged her back in. Now all she wants to do is FRAG. 3 boot loops followed by a red/green flashing ring. Picked up a set of OEM Composite cables today and it came with a free 1.6 Xbox that is stock. Super clean and works flawlessly. Unfortunately, the stock composite cables didn't fix the FRAGing. I'm not in the mood to add to the graveyard of dead systems and would greatly appreciate some advice here. I'm average at a soldering iron on a good day, and I've torn apart many various electronics without zapping myself. What would be my best approach at making these two boxes into one, without loosing the data on the 3tb HDD? What troubleshooting steps should I start with? What's the big DON'Ts that I probably committed by opening the box already? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NokSueCow Posted April 13 Report Share Posted April 13 No error code? 50% Red, 50% Green? If you can get the 1.4 going again, I'd swap the chip to the 1.6 and tsop the 1.4. You'll need to rebuild the lpc on the 1.6. Can you upload some pics of the artifacting? No bulging caps? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aHun Posted April 13 Author Report Share Posted April 13 (edited) 1 hour ago, NokSueCow said: No error code? 50% Red, 50% Green? If you can get the 1.4 going again, I'd swap the chip to the 1.6 and tsop the 1.4. You'll need to rebuild the lpc on the 1.6. Can you upload some pics of the artifacting? No bulging caps? Sorry, I should have clarified. Everything I know of Xbox modding has been whatever I've read in the last 72hrs. 1. I am confused, should be other error codes? See the attached video for what it is currently doing 2. What the hell is a TSOP and how would it be better than the chip? I was looking at LPC boards to make rebuilding it easier, any recommendations for this Aladdin chip? Do I need a certain one for a specific chip or are they universal? 3. I did not see any issue with any of the caps, I'll post some board pics tomorrow. It's getting too late to tear it apart tonight. See below for artifacting vid 73462655589__F704C7AE-2E9E-4B1E-BB75-CFA549B29FFC.mov Edited April 13 by aHun Changed the pic for vid Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aHun Posted April 13 Author Report Share Posted April 13 Artifact video glitchy.mp4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arfows Posted April 13 Report Share Posted April 13 Do you have 3 TB of space on a drive on your PC? If you are worried about losing/corrupting the 3 Tb HD contents, you’ll want to copy the drive contents to your PC using a program called FatXplorer. It’ll take a good long while but will be worth it should something go wrong with the original drive because you could just format it and put the info back on the drive. You can use an ide to Sata USB adapter to get it done or I just plugged the drive into an open SATA slot on my PC Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lopenator Posted April 13 Report Share Posted April 13 (edited) You could try a better modchip or reflowing the lpc. Can you boot retail bios? Maybe the HDD is failing also. It could be a lot of different things. Edited April 13 by lopenator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aHun Posted April 13 Author Report Share Posted April 13 3 hours ago, arfows said: Do you have 3 TB of space on a drive on your PC? If you are worried about losing/corrupting the 3 Tb HD contents, you’ll want to copy the drive contents to your PC using a program called FatXplorer. It’ll take a good long while but will be worth it should something go wrong with the original drive because you could just format it and put the info back on the drive. You can use an ide to Sata USB adapter to get it done or I just plugged the drive into an open SATA slot on my PC Thank you for the software recommendation. I'll have to play with it. I currently have a SATA to USBC adapter but it doesn't have external power. Idk if it can handle a 3.5" HDD, I've only used it with SSDs. Unfortunately, I have a laptop and am without SATA ports. 3 hours ago, lopenator said: You could try a better modchip or reflowing the lpc. Can you boot retail bios? Maybe the HDD is failing also. It could be a lot of different things. I was looking at the Stellar Modchip last night. Looks sexy and easy, but what recommendations do you have? As well, reflowing the LPC sounds scary. Whole mobo in the oven or just a harbor freight heat gun are the two options I have... To boot retail bios, would that be pulling the mod chip and putting her back together? If I plug a stock 1.6 HDD into this system, would it be able to boot up, provided that was the issue? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lopenator Posted April 15 Report Share Posted April 15 I like the stellar chip and I think it's a great chip. Your options of reflowing the lpc are both bad ideas and I advise against. Maybe you should consider sending the mobo to someone who knows what they're doing. What I mean by booting retail and disconnecting d0 from ground and booting into the stock bios on the tsop. You cannot swap stock Xbox HDDs because they are married to the motherboard. You need to unlock them or hardmod the console. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dempsey_86 Posted April 15 Report Share Posted April 15 I think it has nothing to do with the lpc or chip, a modchip will not cause artefacts in image. What it can be is that there is a small bit of solder came loose by rough handeling and is now stuck between the legs of one of the ram cips or the encoder chip for example. A stellar looks nice, but is overpriced, the only thing where it stands out is with 1.4ghz upgraded cpu consoles, otherwise your aladdin with cerbios can do everything what stellar can do. But thats my opinion. I have one and did go back to an xblast in that console. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lopenator Posted April 15 Report Share Posted April 15 13 minutes ago, Dempsey_86 said: I think it has nothing to do with the lpc or chip, a modchip will not cause artefacts in image. What it can be is that there is a small bit of solder came loose by rough handeling and is now stuck between the legs of one of the ram cips or the encoder chip for example. A stellar looks nice, but is overpriced, the only thing where it stands out is with 1.4ghz upgraded cpu consoles, otherwise your aladdin with cerbios can do everything what stellar can do. But thats my opinion. I have one and did go back to an xblast in that console. it can't natively use Xbox one or series X controllers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dempsey_86 Posted April 15 Report Share Posted April 15 Right, I forgot about the wired xbox one controller support. I never installed that update. But its stil overpriced. It also wont help the TS with his problems, as the chip will likely be not his problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lopenator Posted April 15 Report Share Posted April 15 (edited) Doesn't hurt to inspect the solder work as a sanity check though. I had a 1.6 with a shitty rebuild that got artifacts and froze. After I rebuilt the rebuild and fixed the lpc header it worked. Probably not their issue but you never what job was done. Edited April 15 by lopenator 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aHun Posted April 16 Author Report Share Posted April 16 Yeah, most don't like my ideas... Either way, I was looking at getting a budget hot air station. Unless you have recommendations, youtube is full of all sorts of crazy ideas. I'm well aware I can send it out but, in the long run, I'm gonna be better off learning this shit myself. I did try pulling the chip and disconnecting the d0 from it. Still same boot loop and red/green light I ordered a 1.4 donor xbox to play with too. Was gonna try swapping PSU's for the hell of it. Any points I should test with a multi-meter to get some ideas? Below are some board pics Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lopenator Posted April 16 Report Share Posted April 16 Yeah that soldering looks alright. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aHun Posted April 16 Author Report Share Posted April 16 Didn't realize how much traction this thread got well I was tearing it apart I did read up on the Stellar some more. I'm content with the Aladdin setup for now. Single bios and works for what I need. If I get into the 1.4ghz stuff, I will re-evaluate that decision. I could bath the board in ISO, I did already wash what ever I thought looked like trouble. If there's any other pics needed, let me know Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lopenator Posted April 16 Report Share Posted April 16 Aladdin's usually have a shitty d0 pad. I'm actually surprised it was booting off the lpc 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bowlsnapper Posted April 16 Report Share Posted April 16 3 hours ago, lopenator said: Aladdin's usually have a shitty d0 pad. I'm actually surprised it was booting off the lpc As far as I know, Aladdins made in this decade don't have a working D0. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dempsey_86 Posted April 16 Report Share Posted April 16 13 hours ago, aHun said: Yeah, most don't like my ideas... Either way, I was looking at getting a budget hot air station. Unless you have recommendations, youtube is full of all sorts of crazy ideas. I'm well aware I can send it out but, in the long run, I'm gonna be better off learning this shit myself. I did try pulling the chip and disconnecting the d0 from it. Still same boot loop and red/green light I ordered a 1.4 donor xbox to play with too. Was gonna try swapping PSU's for the hell of it. Any points I should test with a multi-meter to get some ideas? Below are some board pics Whats this in the red circle? is this flux or a solder splash? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dempsey_86 Posted April 16 Report Share Posted April 16 never mind, I just looked at a better screen and its just writing on the pcb lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aHun Posted April 16 Author Report Share Posted April 16 8 minutes ago, Dempsey_86 said: never mind, I just looked at a better screen and its just writing on the pcb lol Dam, I was excited to get home and investigate. The donor 1.4 Xbox should be here by the weekend. I'm thinking of learning about proper reflow methods if the PSU swap doesn't fix things. I have no leads as to what else could be going on Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dempsey_86 Posted April 16 Report Share Posted April 16 fyi, what lopenator and bowlsnapper said about the d0 on an aladdin is true. If you want to be sure, you can desolder the yellow wire from the chip and solder it to a ground. This way you are sure the console does always boot from the chip. (ground can be one of the screw posts) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aHun Posted April 16 Author Report Share Posted April 16 1 hour ago, Dempsey_86 said: fyi, what lopenator and bowlsnapper said about the d0 on an aladdin is true. If you want to be sure, you can desolder the yellow wire from the chip and solder it to a ground. This way you are sure the console does always boot from the chip. (ground can be one of the screw posts) No luck, desoldered that d0 point on the chip and and ran the wire from the back of the board to one of the screw posts. Same as before unfortunately Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jjjwelch Posted April 17 Report Share Posted April 17 No idea if this post will be of helpful, but it seemed a bit similar. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aHun Posted April 17 Author Report Share Posted April 17 18 hours ago, jjjwelch said: No idea if this post will be of helpful, but it seemed a bit similar. Idk either but thank you, I'll give it a shot ASAP. Gotta order some more thermal paste first. If that's all it ends up being, I'll be thrilled 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bowlsnapper Posted April 17 Report Share Posted April 17 1 hour ago, aHun said: Idk either but thank you, I'll give it a shot ASAP. Gotta order some more thermal paste first. If that's all it ends up being, I'll be thrilled If your temperatures are normal, then thermal paste is not necessary and it will not fix this. Also, if the graphical errors are present immediately upon boot, then the artifacting is not being caused by overheating. Really, in the case of the Original Xbox, the thermal glue that is used is pretty much fuckin' bulletproof. That stuff is incredibly durable. In fact, if your temperatures are good, I would not remove the stock cooling compound setup. It just would serve no purpose. If you have never removed those sinks and they have never been apart from the motherboard, I would assume that your thermal compound is intact and is still doing the job it was doing 20 years ago. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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