Soldering wires to my xbox

[iLikeMyiMac]

I recently bought an xbox modchip to put into my xbox so I can back up games, run console emulators, and maybe put linux on it. Since I have never soldered before I bought a solderless adapter for the chip but this is not working so well as I am not getting a good connection between the chip and the motherboard. After trying to get it to work for a day I am thinking about picking up a soldering iron and solder at the local RadioShack. I am wondering if anybody out there has soldered before and how diffucult it would be for me to try. The solder points are pretty tiny and I am worried about stray solder ruining my xbox. More info on modding an xbox

 

[musicpyrite]

Well, soldering isn't too difficult once you get the hang of it.

If you have never done it before, I would not recommend you first start of with the xBox.

At Ridio Shack, they usually have spare computer parts, try soldering on them first.

And yes, stray solder can, and probably will ruin your xBox.

Edit, oh, what mod chip did you buy?

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

I bought an Xecuter 2.3b Lite preflashed with cromwell bios and an Xdapter for a total of $50 at system-mods.com. I think the xdapter is the problem because all the people I talk to at Customer Support say I have a bad connection to the LPC.

 

[musicpyrite]

Well I don't know what the LPC is, but all I can recommend is that you try to return the mod chip, and/or go to every xBox modding forum you can find, post your problem, and see if they know what to do.

Is the LPC the connection pins from the mod chip to the motherboard?

If yes, then your only choice is to solder the mod chip to the mother board, unless you can somehow bend the pins so they touch the motherboard - but I do not recommend that.

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

Your right about the LPC
LPC points in pic below
Yes I've already posted in a couple xbox modding forums but no responses yet.

 

[Horrortaxi]

This is not a beginner's project! People with a lot of experience doing electronic soldering (very small area, very precise work, zero room for error) regularly fry their Xboxes putting in mod chips. Do you understand that? The experts mess this up sometimes.

I can almost guarantee you'll destroy your xBox if you try to do this. Your best bet is to go to xbox-scene.com and see what they have to say. They might have a good tutorial, someone who will do it for you, or maybe they'll just bid on the parts from your xBox after you kill it.

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

I'm going to keep trying to get the solderless adapter to work because if it doesn't then I can always take it out and my xbox will still work normally.

 

[tomf87]

A guy I know had trouble with his and he found that by loosening the screws that hold the XBox together he could get it to work.

He said he had to keep loosening/tightening the screws until it finally worked.

And, as for stray solder, also make sure you don't get a soldering iron that gets too hot, or the heat will pull the solder traces right off the circuit board.

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

I don't know how loosening the screws would help. My guess is that his chip was loose and my luck when he was moving it around it fell back into place.

 

[slughead]

I modified my PS1.. it took me 30 minutes and I didn't even have the shakes that day

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

I modified my PS1.. it took me 30 minutes and I didn't even have the shakes that day

I didn't know you could mod a PS1. What did you do to it?

 

[tomf87]

I don't know how loosening the screws would help. My guess is that his chip was loose and my luck when he was moving it around it fell back into place.

He had some sort of piggyback connector and if the screws were too tight, it pushed the pins of the piggyback connector away from the chip it was on. At least that's all I can come up.

 

[slughead]

I didn't know you could mod a PS1. What did you do to it?

I made it so it could read burned games. The part only cost $14.

Paid for itself 2 hours after I installed it

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

I made it so it could read burned games. The part only cost $14.

Paid for itself 2 hours after I installed it

Nice Thats one of the reasons I'm modding my xbox because after you copy/backup one new release $50 game to your hard drive it pays for itself.

 

[Horrortaxi]

Nice Thats one of the reasons I'm modding my xbox because after you copy/backup one new release $50 game to your hard drive it pays for itself.

Flexing your muscle and standing up to Microsoft are good enough reasons to do it in my opinion. It has the potential for piracy, but there are good reasons to do it too. They sold you a crippled PC--hell, they sold you a crippled xBox. You can unlock a lot of functionality that Microsoft wants to sell you later, or just doesn't think you should have.

So mod the xBox-just stay off of xBox Live afterward. But make sure you know what you're doing before soldering on that board.

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

Flexing your muscle and standing up to Microsoft are good enough reasons to do it in my opinion. It has the potential for piracy, but there are good reasons to do it too. They sold you a crippled PC--hell, they sold you a crippled xBox. You can unlock a lot of functionality that Microsoft wants to sell you later, or just doesn't think you should have.

So mod the xBox-just stay off of xBox Live afterward. But make sure you know what you're doing before soldering on that board.

I'd never get xbox live. If I want to play on the internet I use aquaduct where I can play halo which is not supported by xbox live. As for copying the games it allows for faster loading times off the hard drive compaired to the DVD drive and you don't have jewel cases everywhere. Also I can play old NES and SNES games on it which is cool. And you can play dvds on it without buying the $30 remote and you can stream mp3s, aac files(not protected), and most video files.

 

[Horrortaxi]

Yeah, that's exactly what I meant--it was sold to you crippled and you can unlock things. You could surf the net on it too if you were so inclined.

Those joystick ports, by the way, are just USB ports with a funky shape to the connector. You can use all your nifty USB devices with the xBox--again if you so inclined.

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

Yeah too bad I've spent all day trying to get it to work with the solderless adapter. Today + Yesterday Afternoon = A lot of frustration + curse words The only thing that I can think is wrong with it is that the BIOS were not properly flashed on the chip by system-mods.com but if I send it to them and am wrong I pay for shipping and a $10 fee for checking it. They also say on their site that "98% of customers who think they have a bad BIOS have not installed their cihip correctly" I'm thinking about giving up on it myself and letting the guy who modded my friends box have a crack at it.

 

[King Cobra]

Any mod chip worth 10 cents must be soldered. And, seriously, pay an expert to do it. Some mod chips require 30 connections in only a 1/2inch area (yes, area, now a width or height, but complete area). Draw that out on paper with like 200 dots and see if you can make all those connections with a pencil on that paper for practice. You mess up a single connection, and it's over, sharpshooter.

You better have someone mod that chip for you, because otherwise you're going to keep f***ing with it to no apparent end.

 

[Horrortaxi]

I thought you couldn't buy a flashed mod chip.

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

Actually this chip doesn't have 30 connections to make. Its has about 10 the size of the sleep light on the iMac/ or the light on the caps lock of the apple pro keyboard/ or the tip of a ballpoint pen. But one the size of a period. Also I could solder it if I wanted to(it came with everything I need to expect the iron and solder), but since I've never soldered before I decided to try an adapter.

The chip comes preflashed with a legal bios called cromwell which is really just a BIOS for flashing other BIOS

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

Ok I got my xbox modded. I had someone else solder the wires. I'm playing paperboy right now on my xbox. Its great. Now all I have to do is buy a bigger hard drive because I can only fit one xbox game on it now.

 

[XboxEvolved]

I don't think I would mod my Xbox to "Stand up to Microsoft" and in the long run this only hurts the consumer, and not them. If anything Microsoft has also not held back anything in the Xbox rather push it to it's limits, I know a lot of new PCs and Macs cant do what Xbox can do, this is why I use my Xbox though because its better for gaming then either Macs or PC.

If you mod your Xbox for neat old games that arent made anymore thats fine, but if its to screw MS or other companies that work hard on games out of sale then your going to be sorry in the future.

 

[iLikeMyiMac]

I don't think I would mod my Xbox to "Stand up to Microsoft" and in the long run this only hurts the consumer, and not them. If anything Microsoft has also not held back anything in the Xbox rather push it to it's limits, I know a lot of new PCs and Macs cant do what Xbox can do, this is why I use my Xbox though because its better for gaming then either Macs or PC.

If you mod your Xbox for neat old games that arent made anymore thats fine, but if its to screw MS or other companies that work hard on games out of sale then your going to be sorry in the future.

How is this screwing Microsoft. I have the game disc in my possession but copying it to my hard drive allows for faster load times and I don't have to worry about loosing the game discs or swaping them in and out. I can stream music and movies from my computer and use it as an ftp server. Actually Microsoft has held back the xbox. The xbox is basically the best computer that you can get for $150 and with the right adjustments it can do everything a computer can do.

 

[King Cobra]

The xbox is basically the best computer that you can get for $150 and with the right adjustments it can do everything a computer can do.

So let's see... "the right adjustments" to do everything a computer does. Let's see... you need a mod chip ($50), a keyboard and mouse ($100), a monitor ($100 at best if you don't have one), hardware enhancements for a dial-up modem, USB, and Firewire (at least $200), an OS other than the xBox's Windows CE (let's say another $100), and you're up to $600. In the meantime, you have all these PCs (all right, so they are portables, big deal) with an 800MHz or faster CPU, a bigger Hard Drive, USB ports, an internal modem and ethernet, more RAM, and a DVD-ROM... for less than $600. My take on all this: There are plenty of other better computers out there.