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XenoFx chip


BlackIvan
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Hello to you all! I'm new here, so there are tons of things that I have to learn about my original xboxes. I've been modding them for like a year now and learned everything I know from forums like this one.

Now I have a problem with my 1.6 Xbox. I bought it as non tested/spare parts, then found out it had a modchip installed and really only needed some good cleaning. The problem is the chip is a XenoFx, and I can't find enough informations about it anywhere. 

I want to flash a newer bios on it to fully recognise my 250gb hdd, but it seems to be write protected. I tried everything powering it on: 1, 2, 5 seconds, holding the white button. The light is red and always on.

Hexen2018 and 2020 can see it as a sst 49lf002a but can't erase it apparently. 

Does this chip require some soldering on it to disable write protection? Or is it just not flashable? 

 

Sorry for the image quality, it's the only one I have at the moment. On the chip it says XenoFx www.xenofx.com

20201124_110425.jpg

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Are you sure what the chip is? It looks like an Aladdin XT plus. I guess it could be something else but I'm sure one of the guys here will be able to give you advice. I read elsewhere (afterdawn) about the modes. I think you tried them though.

 Modes:

Off - Tap the powerbutton and the Xbox starts as normal with the original BIOS.

On - Press and hold powerbutton for 1 second and the Aladdin XT is activated.

Writeprotect - Press and hold powerbutton for 2 seconds and the Aladdin XT is activated in flash write protect mode.

Visual Mode Indication: The power LED will indicate the current mode by different colors.

Off - Green (Normal) / Orange (HDD access)

On - Orange (Normal) / Green (HDD access)

Writeprotect - Continous flashing Orange/Green

Edited by Riff-Raff
fat fingers can't type.
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As Riff-Raff has said it is a Aladdin chip.

Also as the L1 wire is not connected you will not get any LED indication of the 3 modes the chip has.

On every Aladdin chip I use a don't connect the BT wire to the main board and instead I link the BT on the chip to pin2(ground) as this makes the chip always active.

Like this

846404781_aladdinbtlink.jpg.1f24c242899947d51b8c993a408eddea.jpg

The only reason for connecting the BT to the main board was for long gone Xbox Live.

 

Cheers

SS Dave


Soft modding is like masturbating, It gets the job done but it's nothing like the real thing.

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XenoChip is the original Aladdin XT.  The web site is off-line but remnants of it have been captured by the Wayback Machine - http://web.archive.org/web/20050303050101/http://www.xenochip.com/.

What flash chip is installed on the chip?  Carefully pull the modchp off of the pin header as to not disconnect any wires running to it.  Look at the labeling on the socketed chip - SST49LF????

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Found a couple of installation diagrams/manuals too:

http://web.archive.org/web/20060321182537/http://www.xenochip.com:80/manuals/pdf/aladdin_xt_1_6_r_1.pdf

and

http://web.archive.org/web/20051226083837/http://www.xenochip.com/manuals/pdf/aladdin_xt_lite_1_6.pdf

 

There are others also on the Wayback machine for all versions of the Xbox motherboard.  The two above are for v1.6s - the OPs motherboard revision.

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Thanks to you all for the advices, I thought it could be an Aladdin XT 4032 (this also shows why I couldn't boot in any different mode, since 4032 chips only have on or off mode), but has just XenoFx written on the top side. I looked at this topic: 

and managed to take a closer look to that chip tonight. Fund out it has a 49LF002B, which is a non flashable chip, right? (Don't remember where did I read it)

 

20201125_110108-min.jpg

20201125_110157-min.jpg

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I tried hexen 2018 and 2020, than I tried installing the evox dash directly on my E drive but didn't have any luck. The process stopped every time on "erasing". 

I have used XBlastOS, but it just restarted the console without any changes.

Everything above with every possible boot mode (1, 2, 5 seconds ecc)

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8 hours ago, BlackIvan said:

I have used XBlastOS, but it just restarted the console without any changes.

Did it go though the flash process? or did it reboot the Xbox when you tried to flash the chip?

 

 

Cheers

SS Dave


Soft modding is like masturbating, It gets the job done but it's nothing like the real thing.

 

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14 hours ago, SS_Dave said:

Did it go though the flash process? or did it reboot the Xbox when you tried to flash the chip?

 

 

Cheers

SS Dave


Soft modding is like masturbating, It gets the job done but it's nothing like the real thing.

 

Reboot directly when I tried to flash. Could it be because it sees the chip as a 002A?

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On 11/25/2020 at 4:05 AM, BlackIvan said:

Thanks to you all for the advices, I thought it could be an Aladdin XT 4032 (this also shows why I couldn't boot in any different mode, since 4032 chips only have on or off mode), but has just XenoFx written on the top side. I looked at this topic: 

and managed to take a closer look to that chip tonight. Fund out it has a 49LF002B, which is a non flashable chip, right? (Don't remember where did I read it)

 

20201125_110108-min.jpg

20201125_110157-min.jpg

For the xenoFX with an SST49LF002B installed, you need to move the 0 Ohm SMD resistor from the R3 to center pad soldered location to the R4 and center pad location.  Make sure that all three of the pads - R3, Center, and R4 - are not tied together.

Where do the traces go from R3, R4, and the center pad?

What voltage level is measured at R3 and R4?

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On 11/25/2020 at 4:05 AM, BlackIvan said:

Fund out it has a 49LF002B, which is a non flashable chip, right? (Don't remember where did I read it)

It is flashable but not as currently configured on the modchip's PCB.  I'm not exactly sure what the difference is between an SST49LF020A and SST49LF002B that requires a different setup on the XenoFX chip

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2 hours ago, KaosEngineer said:

For the xenoFX with an SST49LF002B installed, you need to move the 0 Ohm SMD resistor from the R3 to center pad soldered location to the R4 and center pad location.  Make sure that all three of the pads - R3, Center, and R4 - are not tied together.

Where do the traces go from R3, R4, and the center pad?

What voltage level is measured at R3 and R4?

Wow, thank you! Are R3, R4 and resistor these three? And what is the centre pad? Sorry, I haven't even installed the chip, I don't know anything about electronics. I'm slowly learning while restoring my xboxes.

20201128_090454.jpg

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1 hour ago, BlackIvan said:

For the xenoFX with an SST49LF002B installed, you need to move the 0 Ohm SMD resistor from the R3 to center pad soldered location to the R4 and center pad location.  Make sure that all three of the pads - R3, Center, and R4 - are not tied together.

The way I read this is.

The black component with 000 on it (0 ohm resistor) between the black line and the yellow line is R3

You need to move it to between the yellow line and the green line R4

The yellow is the center pad.

 

20201128_090454.thumb.jpg.846b58afd30be667730efe7f5ba487f7.jpg.d6c4716204dbeace8646c72e631afe86.jpg

As it is 0 ohm you can solder a short piece of wire on R4 and remove R3 from the board.

 

 

 

Cheers

SS Dave


Soft modding is like masturbating, It gets the job done but it's nothing like the real thing.

 

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6 hours ago, SS_Dave said:

The way I read this is.

The black component with 000 on it (0 ohm resistor) between the black line and the yellow line is R3

You need to move it to between the yellow line and the green line R4

The yellow is the center pad.

 

20201128_090454.thumb.jpg.846b58afd30be667730efe7f5ba487f7.jpg.d6c4716204dbeace8646c72e631afe86.jpg

As it is 0 ohm you can solder a short piece of wire on R4 and remove R3 from the board.

 

 

 

Cheers

SS Dave


Soft modding is like masturbating, It gets the job done but it's nothing like the real thing.

 

Correct - do not have both installed at the same time.  It is my understanding that one of the pads, R3 or R4, is at 3.3Vdc and the other at ground.  If you have both bridges from the center pad to R3 and R4 installed at the same time, you are shorting out the 3.3Vdc power supply.  And, the center pad I believe connects to one of the pins on the CPLD chip which changes the write and/or erase cycle logic of the CPLD to work with either an SST49LF020A (R3 to center bridged - yellow to black) or SST49LF002B (R4 to center pad bridged - yellow to green) flash memory chip.  However, I do not have a XenoFX chip to mess with the modchip to know where those traces connect.

 

Edit: I can not clearly see what or where those traces connect to in the photo. 

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