360 DVD Drive Firmware Flash Update

[Yoshimax]

Just been having a chat around this as somebody I know flashed their DVD firmware to boot copies.

What's to stop MS from re-flashing the drive via an xbox live update or disc stored update ? Anything ? Nothing ? Legal Implications ? Risk of borking 360's ?

Not doing it meself - Really don't want to ruin my 360 experience by massively diluting the games (plus your gamercard would look horrific with hundreds of 0-20 gamerpoint games on it !) - Just wondering as I'm sure they'll sort this out sooner or later - possibly when they release the update to control drive speed ?

[Yoshimax]

Apologies Mods might want to move this to Ask The Forum ? I use it so little I'd forgot about it ><

[Shinebi]

I thought the drive firmware is flashed on an extra pcb that sticks onto the back of the drive. The guys from teamxecuter made such a thing. It auto detects the signal from the drive to the motherboard. If an original disc is played, nothing happens, if it's a copy or an import, it intercepts and sends the signal from the firmware that's on the pcb and automatically disables the online features, so you can't be detected/banned. So actually, as long as the firmware on the pcb is updated from time to time (to override the original firmware from the drive), nothing can go wrong. This is very handy to keep the machine in its original state, as you don't need to solder, just plug in the pcb.

[Yoshimax]

I dunno about that ! That's not how his works - he can play the copies on live no problem - Never heard of an additional PCB I thought they were flashing the actual drive firmware ???

[VR46]

The firmware flash only allows playing of backups as far as I'm aware, it didn't allow region free goodness.

The PCB thing must be a newish developement, I've not seen one of them.

Yoshimax, with the firmware flashed you can play copies on Live yes, however if MS catch/detect you ... guess you'll lose your gamertag and your machine will be banned from Live.

[Yoshimax]

Yeah that's what I'm trying to get at - They CAN if they want detect and ban this ? My mate seems to think it won't happen as if there's a legality around them doing this or that they won't do it for fear of borking loads of 360's - I think they WILL do this sooner or later and so it's not advisable !

Like I said you can spot them a mile off - Gamercards full of games that have barely been touched with 5/10 points a pop - not the sign of a committed cash-spending gamer............

[Shinebi]

Well, it's kinda old news now, check out the pics with the pcb attached.
Nowadays, there is even more fancier stuff around that sits integrated on top of the 360...

[bootmonster]

Yeah that's what I'm trying to get at - They CAN if they want detect and ban this ? My mate seems to think it won't happen as if there's a legality around them doing this or that they won't do it for fear of borking loads of 360's - I think they WILL do this sooner or later and so it's not advisable !

Like I said you can spot them a mile off - Gamercards full of games that have barely been touched with 5/10 points a pop - not the sign of a committed cash-spending gamer............

AFAIK Microsoft cannot tell if the drive has been flashed. The latest releases of the firmware report back as original if Microsoft do any sig checks, and Microsoft would never (couldn't?) flash a DVD drive firmware as part of a mandatory update. If the update failed (ie. unplugging power etc) it would be a definite brick and be straight back to Microsoft for a replacement, a risk they won't take it seems.

In any case, the news of the kernel exploit is much more appealing than the flashed firmware in my opinion. The idea of a next gen version of xbox media center has got me foaming at the mouth

[babs]

Like I said you can spot them a mile off - Gamercards full of games that have barely been touched with 5/10 points a pop - not the sign of a committed cash-spending gamer............

I have some like that, but that's due to me borrowing titles from friends, that sort of thing. Renters probably get the same.

[Yoshimax]

True. AFAIC you're all dirty pirate bastards though

[NekoFever]

They should be able to block it if they want to, since even on the original Xbox it was possible to look at the checksum of the drive firmware, which can't be faked because it doesn't involve talking to the drive at all. There's no reason why they couldn't just reflash the drives with the next update either, since they're already reflashing the 360 itself. We all know of 360s being bricked by updates so I'm sure they won't lose any sleep over some modded ones which will have invalid warranties anyway.

The theory as to why they're not doing anything is that it's not really being used to ruin Xbox Live games like what happened with Halo 2, and with quite an esoteric hack like this it probably means that those who are just interested in piracy aren't going to bother digging for hacks to the actual security. Look how little progress has been made on that front in well over a year: one hack using a vulnerability that was patched months before it even came out and so is useless to the vast majority of players.