Modded 360S

[DR EGG]

Has anyone modded their Xbox 360? I took the first step today by burying a star-shaped screwdriver into the silver Microsoft logo on my old 360's hard drive, and twisting it until the sticker (and the screw) popped off. After a couple of attempts, I sucessfully detached the drive inside and re-attached it to my new 360 Slim! Phew!

When it comes to consoles, I've soft-modded my Wii to accept burned backups. Didn't void the warantee to do it, and I haven't really played the console alot since. When my "give a shit-o-meter" hits zero, it's time to do easy mods and poke around.

[Reznor]

Modding a 360 is not as easy as you think it is. There are no "real" modchips for a 360. It's all about modifying the firmware on the DVD drive.

I've dove a little bit into how this is done, and I personally don't think it's worth the hassle. And this is coming from ME.

[mahoney]

I think that depends on how you define "mod". I have an old 360 that was hit with RRoD some time ago. I have plans to hack into its own XBLA only machine soon. To me, that's a mod. I could also take it and convert into a movie playing home theater system, but I plan on doing that with an old PS2 I have laying around. If you are talking solely about running non-Microshaft approved software/programs then Rez is right that it requires firmware tweeks and never using Live again. All the frequent updates are seriously good at catching soft mod systems.

The screw driver bit Chad is referring to is called a torx bit. Newer boxes require a torx #8 bit with a security hole. There are ways around that using a jeweler screwdriver and a drill, but FYI.

For some super cool hacks for the 360 check out the latest in kinect hacking. Scroll through the list or Google it to see what people have come up with.

[Reznor]

Or, if you wanna say "Fuck it! Do it live!" there is always the JTAG route.

[DR EGG]

Actually, you "need" two different sizes of torx bits to get the old 360 hard drives open - #6 for the outside casing and #8 for the inside. I bought a #6 and then said "Fuck!" when I found the inside screws were different. Since the inner screws weren't buried in the plastic, I muscled 'em out with a pair of needle nose pliers.

Rez, I'm surprised that it's so hard to mod 360s, considering how many players are occasionally banned from Live for modding.

[King wiL]

I have a friend whom so of you know on here and xbla, naming no names, who has extensive experience in hacking 360's, basically you hack the disc drive. Apparently these days It's a complete pain and lets be honest here, 100% of the hacked consoles that i'm personally aware of have been banned from xbox live or RROD'd either before hacking or since hacking. He now plays on an unmodded 360 as he plays on LIVE with us a lot and would rather be able to do that then be able to play any game he wants for free, but have to play it offline.
It seriously sounds like it's more hassle than it's worth.
Take it from someone who bought a launch Wii and soldered an original Wiikey to the drive, now i can't play originals OR copies released after New Super Mario Bros as my chip is no longer supported for updates by the manufacturer and i'm not opening the thing up and putting a new one in.
Though TBH the Wii's always been a gamecube to me anyway, and i have a crap ton of original cube games.
Take it from me, unless you can be arsed to keep updating/unbricking/unbanning consoles, it ain't worth the time and effort just to save a few quid (or dollars).

Now the PSP and DS however, that's a different story altogether.....