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Full backup of 1.6 Xbox softmodded 15 years ago with IDE Drive?


Gigamaximus
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Hello Everyone. 

I am kind of new/kind of old to the scene, as I have an rev 1.6 Xbox that I bought brand new in 2006, softmodded and installed a 160gb harddrive, which is(was?) limited to 137Gb useable space, copied all my bought games to it, threw in a couple emulators, and then just used it on and off and basically forgot anything involved in the process to the mists of time. 

Recently it wouldn't power on, so I replaced the common 5 3300uF caps that were leaking, and it was good to go. My brain noted that the 16 year old IDE hard drive will not run forever, and I should look at upgrading to a SATA configuration.

Due to the time gap, very old versions of software, I have now read so much conflicting information at this point am not sure what to do in 2021.

I  no longer have the original drive. I don't appear to have an image of either drive (8gb or 160gb) in any of my backups either. My fuzzy memory says this is bad because of linked keys. 

I do not have a PATA usb adaptor, or computer with PATA. I have an Xbox to USB adaptor, but I don't think I have a compatible thumb drive. Based on my research I've ordered the "correct" Startech SATA/PATA adaptor. The existing drive already has an 80 pin cable. 

I do have ftp access without issue. 

I'm attaching a 2 screenshots of my drive/system info, my questions are:

Is that key in the screenshot all I need? If not what is the best way to go about backing up the drive/board key "Just in case" things go bad.

And is Chimp (https://www.reddit.com/r/originalxbox/wiki/chimp/)  still the best way to clone it to a new drive in 2021? 

I undoubtedly will have more questions, but backing up is my first priority, and once I have a confirmed backup I will be much more comfortable playing with it, and hopefully updating the various software I have loaded.  

Any "critical hints" or gotchas would be appreciated as well. 

 

 

 

 

v

 

Xbox Key.jpg

Xbox Drive Info.jpg

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First off, if you’re upgrading to a Sata drive, you will need the adapter as you stated. You can go with any of them to be honest. Depends on your budget. Some just perform slightly better than others, but some people don’t mind the extra few seconds of waiting. Secondly, you’re going to need an application called Chimp if you don’t already have it installed. This will allow you to clone your old HDD to the new one. For that process, you will either need another Xbox or a molex y-splitter to power both HDD at the same time while the cloning is done. And lastly (I think), you should always either back up your eeprom to your computer or null the key. Null meaning set to all 0s or 1s. I’ll have to read it over again and see if I’ve missed something

Edited by MadMartigan
Comment was I the quote.
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Thank you for your reply. Only hardware piece I'm missing is the SATA adapter, I have all other required parts. 

Is there any reason not to null the key at this point? I feel like I didn't when I first modded it for warranty purposes, which is no longer relevant. 

Should I do any "clean up" before cloning? 

If not, I will try to do so and follow the guide. 

 

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20 minutes ago, Gigamaximus said:

Thank you for your reply. Only hardware piece I'm missing is the SATA adapter, I have all other required parts. 

Is there any reason not to null the key at this point? I feel like I didn't when I first modded it for warranty purposes, which is no longer relevant. 

Should I do any "clean up" before cloning? 

If not, I will try to do so and follow the guide. 

 

You're also going to need one of these 80 wire cables instead of the oldstock 40 wire. If you're not in the USA, there are other options. 

I've seen some say that nulling their key messes with some game saves, but I'm not sure if that's a common thing with modded or unmodded game saves. It's still something I do on every console to make recovery that much easier if your HDD craps out, which it will eventually. 

Cleanup should be done beforehand if you've got old junk you don't want on there anymore such as outdated emulators, roms, apps, etc. 

Edited by MadMartigan
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10 hours ago, Gigamaximus said:

Thank you for your reply. Only hardware piece I'm missing is the SATA adapter, I have all other required parts. 

Is there any reason not to null the key at this point? I feel like I didn't when I first modded it for warranty purposes, which is no longer relevant. 

Should I do any "clean up" before cloning? 

If not, I will try to do so and follow the guide. 

 

I prefer to NOT NULL the HDDKey.  There's no real reason to do so.  It does help if you have multiple Xbox's that you want to swap hard drives between but other than that it can cause problems. 

The Problem: Several games, not all, cryptographically sign their saves using the HDDKey.  If the key changes after the save was original made, it can no longer be used to play the game.  The game will say the save is corrupt.  You can fix this situation by resigning the save using the new HDDKey value.  Some of the resigning applications need to know the original key and the new key to resign a save.

You have a picture that shows the HDDKey.  Save it in several locations.  Also there should be a file named eeprom.bin that the softmod saved when it was installed.  if you can't find it ConfigMagic and Evoxdash can be used to create and eeprom.bin file.

A softmodded console requires the hard drive to be locked.  A hardmodded console does not.

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Thanks guys. MadMartigan, I have the 80 wire cable already installed, done when it was softmodded all those years ago. 

KaosEngineer, it is softmodded and not hardmodded, and I've got 15 years of saves, so I'm not going to mess with it. 

Overall it sounds like the hardware parts will be a breeeze.

Is there any utility to update  the various apps and emulators  via the web? I've seen some mentions on forums here and elsewhere but wasn't able to figure it out. Then I went down the rabbit hole of trying to find out what version I have and what is the latest, and how to upgrade. So much has changed in 15 years that I feel like I should just start fresh, but I wouldn't know how to do that. 

 

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1 hour ago, Gigamaximus said:

Is there any utility to update  the various apps and emulators  via the web? I've seen some mentions on forums here and elsewhere but wasn't able to figure it out. Then I went down the rabbit hole of trying to find out what version I have and what is the latest, and how to upgrade. So much has changed in 15 years that I feel like I should just start fresh, but I wouldn't know how to do that. 

 

Download the Rocky5 extras disc from here

Burn that to a dvd-r and insert it into your Xbox. It has an option to update any old mod to the newest Rocky5 mod. It will clean up behind itself also. Once you are done with that, you can use the same disc to install a new dashboard of your choice. I know for a fact that XBMC-Emustation has a downloader that allows you to download the most up to date emulators, custom themes, artwork for games, full games, and much more. There might be a downloader in XBMC and XBMC4Gamers, but I’m not sure. 

Edited by MadMartigan
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