WTF is going on with my Xbox?

[Shibathedog]

Games and entire directories are either entirely disappearing or becoming corrupt. The HDD is almost brand new. I think what I need to do is backup my games/saves and format. Can anyone help me out here? Why would this happen? I've already lost a ton of stuff and this is very shitty, I'm going to be up all night fixing this. It doesn't seem to be giving me any free space back either so I think I have to format to get that space back now.

[BritneysPAIRS]

you need to partion it with more clusters.... use XBpartitioner the latest version as it will stop corpution after 250gigs or if you used the old one it will stop coruption after 512 gigs

[Shibathedog]

Ah okay, So i'm going to lose everything by doing that right? Unless it can change it without formatting somehow.

 

EDIT: NVM I found out it will erase it so I'll back everything up now, When I format with this tool with it format every drive and return it to stock? That's what I am trying to do before I put all my stuff back on. Or Do I not need to because only F is corrupt? If only F is corrupt I can live with only formatting that.

[BritneysPAIRS]

its gone

[Shibathedog]

Yeah I figured, luckily all my roms are already on my PC's HDD and the games that got screwed up I still have the disc for, I think I'm just going to format F because that seems to be the only one with any corruption, is that the right thing to do? I read that the other partitions should stay 16k clusters and it seems like they wouldn't be effected because they cannot go over 250GB.

 

Thanks a lot for your help though, I play my xbox more than anything else and at first I thought it was screwed! Would have been pretty crappy if it was broken.

[The-Ice-Man]

Most important thing to make sure you always have backed up is your savegames. Games, emus and roms you can copy over again. But savegames, you have to do all the work again. I played through Metal Gear Solid 2 Substance ages ago, got every single dogtag on every difficulty, and got gold times on all the VR missions. If I ever lost that save I'd be so pissed off.

[Shibathedog]

Yeah that would suck! That takes ages to do.

 

So I just booted XBPartioner from XBMC and it says I don't have proper LBA Support. I'm pretty sure I do (I used XBTool with X2 4981) because I think I remember enabling it with XBTool. Should I ignore this? I can flash to a newer BIOS (maybe I should just to be safe) but I'm not sure which one I should use. My xbox is newer than 1.1 (I think its 1.2, but it may be 1.3) and this is for a TSOP Flash so I'm pretty sure I need 256kb. I was looking at this table here: http://www.xbox-scene.com/bios_retail.html but I'm not sure which fixes/features I need and which ones I don't. I've also read that this table is very out of date. Any advice what I should pick?

 

EDIT: It seems like I should pick Xecuter2 4983 or Evox M8+, are these good choices? I really have no idea.

 

EDIT AGAIN: Now I'm reading about this IND BIOS which is supposedly cool because you can configure it with a file on the hdd, sounds nice but it also sounds like I'm going to screw it up. (I should probably stick to something that uses XBTool) and there is a version of Xecuter that is newer than 4983 (it was 5000 something) but then I read somewhere else that I should just stick with the BIOS I already have (X2 4981) which is fine but I guess I have to reflash it?

 

ANOTHER EDIT: I found this thread that says it doesn't work :/ dunno if its true or not because you guys seem to think otherwise

 

http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?sho...mode=linearplus

 

Would it be easier to just split my F partition into 2 partitions? It seems like that would also fix my problem. But I would still need to reflash right?

[Shibathedog]

Wow that post became a mess. So I think what I have decided (Please correct me if I'm wrong because I have no idea what I'm doing)

 

Use M8+ BIOS

Edit the following with EVTool:

 

Import Evox Logo and select one of the logos that comes with it (This is checked by default so I figured I should just do it)

Edit Locations of Dashboards (I like to have a Dashboards directory)

For LBA Support, Select Partition 6 Takes up 137, Partition 7 Takes up rest

Leave Ignore HDD Partition Table UNCHECKED

IGR Method: More Compatible

File Size: 256KB

Fan Speed Default 20%

Xbox Colors: Default

Xbox LED: Default

All toggles except embed eeprom CHECKED (embed eeprom is greyed out)

 

Embed HDD Key is greyed out. So:

 

Boot Config Magic on Xbox

Unlock HDD

 

Boot Evox

Flash New BIOS (No idea how to do this, I just read that Evox can flash your BIOS, last time I used raincoat)

 

Boot XBPartitioner

Format F and G (Partitions 6 and 7) ONLY

 

Reupload all my stuff

 

Doing this will allow me to entirely fill my HDD without any curruption, Play Backups/Imports/Homebrew/XBMC for Streaming Videos/Etc. right? Another thing I am unsure about is I remember in the past the only way to change certain output modes is with the Microsoft Dashboard, Which will not boot when the hard drive is unlocked, So with the M8+ BIOS will I be able to change these things with Evox? I need to be able to change this because my xbox goes from SDTV to HDTV and back depending on what TV it is hooked up to.

 

EDIT: Yep, and this is where I'm stuck, I think I may just do another huge F partition because that guy on that other forum is probably full of shit. It looks like he got banned pretty quick and I haven't seen anyone else with the same problem. Unfortunately there is too much conflicting information for me to want to go ahead and do it yet. Just waiting for the OK from you guys. I've been looking into the HDD locking issue and everything is so vague, some people mentioned some things about the EEPROM but I'm really afraid I'm going to screw up my Xbox without you guys telling me what exactly to do.

[The-Ice-Man]

So you're wanting to update your bios and format a couple of partitions, shouldn't be too difficult. The M8+ is the last bios the Evox team made and is ok, but I have an Xecuter 2 chip so I use the X2 5035, which is a bit newer, the last bios made for the Xecuter 2. X3 bioses are still being developed and are even more feature packed, but require an Xecuter 3 chip as far as I'm aware. Not sure about TSOP flashing, never really known what that was. Hopefully it's not too different from flashing a chip.

 

The X2 5035 I'm using is nice coz it can be configured with an ini file which it reads from the root of the E drive. In it you can change all sorts of settings, like the flubber animations, in game reset keys, or more useful things like what dashboard xbe and path to look for at boot. You can enter 5 paths as failsafes so if it can't find one it looks for the next on the list, which is useful if someone accidentally deletes your dashboard. I have mine set so it loads XBMC from the apps folder on my F drive, if it doesn't find that then it would look for evox on the root of my F, and if it couldn't find that it'd boot the MS dash from the C drive. If the ini file can't be found then the bios just reverts to default settings.

 

To flash the bios, your Evox install needs to have the flash bios option activated in the menu. If I remember this isn't activated by default. If you can't find it in the menu then you can add it from Evox's confuguration ini. Open evox.ini and scroll down to the menu entries. Then under the system or settings section, make sure you have the line:

 

Item "Flash Bios",ID_Flash_bios

 

Mine looks like this:

 

Section "System"

{

Item "Backup",ID_Backup

Item "Flash Bios",ID_Flash_bios

Item "Skins",ID_Skins

Item "Settings",ID_Settings

}

 

Thinking about it, since you're flashing the TSOP and not a chip, it may be a different menu ID value. Not sure. Worth finding an old Evox tutorial to check.

 

When choosing your bios, make sure you choose the right size like you said, the X2 I'm using is 512k. If you're right about needing 256k then make sure you get it right, coz a bad flash is a real headache. And if you did choose to go with the X2 5035, you'd need to patch it for lba48 mode 2, to get F: up to 137gb and G: the rest like you want, coz by default that bios is set to allocate all to F. Intructions for doing that are in the bios rar. Or you probably know how to do that since you said you'd used Xtool before.

 

Once you have the right bios file it's just a case of selecting the Flash bios option in evox, choosing the one you want, and it does it in a few seconds. Oh yeah, Evox needs bios files to be in a folder called Bios, in the root of whatever drive evoxdash.xbe is in. So F:\Bios if it's on your F drive. E:\Bios if it's on your E drive.

 

As for partitioning your hard drive, I've never used XBPartitioner of Config Magic. When I installed my 250gb hard drive I used Slayer's Auto Installer disc to set up the partitions for me. The newer Auto Installer Deluxe, and XMBC Installer Deluxe discs have a similar feature. When you boot the disc, you select 'Prepare hard drive' and it gives you the choice of how to set it up, as in big F or F and G. Or you can load XboxPartitoner and Config Magic from those discs.

 

Anyway, when you're done formatting, make sure you lock the hard drive again. Your hard drive should always be locked, so like you say you can boot the MS dash. I don't think there are any benefits of leaving it unlocked. Mine's been locked ever since I formatted it. In fact I remeber leaving it unlocked and I couldn't get FTP access, then when I locked it I could.

 

Edit: Just read your edit. If you're not sure of what you should do, and your current bios works for you, I'd say leave it alone. Then it's just your partitions to sort. The easiest thing to do is to use one of those auto install discs to do the partitioning for you. If you get the XBMC Installer Deluxe you could just use it to prepare the drive and then ftp all your stuff back over yourself, or you could use the disc to install XBMC for you. It's not the latest build but it has a few less bugs than the latest build, which is why it's the one I'm currently using. The latest XMBC builds are shit. You can't use trainers in them coz the trainer menus are broken.

 

Anyway if you used that disc to prepare the drive then it will mean a clean slate, so you'd have to back up your saves. Ultimately the choice between a large F and F/G split is yours. I've had a large F for years and never had any corruption. As for locking, like I say, once formatted, keep it locked. Don't mess with the EEPROM, that can ruin your box for good. If you use the Auto Install disc to prepare the drive, it should unlock, format and then lock the drive for you so you don't have to worry. Then you can install the MS dash, and whatever other dash you want. And then start copying all your games over again. I know how long that takes.

Edited August 9, 2009 by The-Ice-Man

[Shibathedog]

TSOP Flashing is basically the same thing as having a chip, But you are limited to 256K because you are re flashing the chip on the board instead of adding your own (The modchip).

 

I looked into 5035 and unfortunately it HAS to be 512K and you can't resize it (according to the readme) The newest X2 BIOS I can use is 4983. I don't think you can edit it though because it is encrypted, All the differences between 4981 and 4983 can apparently be added with XBTool though so I might as well stick with 4891 if I'm going to use an Xecuter BIOS since I can't use anything newer (or EVTool, one of them needed EVTool it might have been M8+ though)

 

Something else I read that was interesting was that the BIOS I currently have (as well as M8+, various others) DOES Support LBA properly, but they are incompatible with this XBPartition program (M8+ will apparently work, I know M7 does, my X2 4891 will not, this program is very picky about your BIOS and if you don't have the right one you will get the error I got and it will refuse to work), unfortunately I need XBPartition in order to format with 32K clusters instead of 16K because there seems to be no alternate program for this so I'm basically forced into using M8+ if I want to format with 32K Clusters and avoid corruption on a partition 6 taking up the rest of the drive. So I think what I have to do is either use M8+ or stick with what I have (4891) and create a partition 6 AND 7 instead of Just 6 to avoid the corruption (although it sounds like its not a sure thing so it would be better to go with M8+, I haven't found anything confirming having the two partitions will allow you to avoid corruption but it SOUNDS like it will)

 

I also looked into those auto install discs, and I haven't been able to figure out if you can choose between 16K and 32K clusters, it doesn't sound like you can though.

 

So yeah, I think I'm stuck with using M8+ if I want one big F partition, Or I can chance it and try to use what I have and create an F and a G and hope it works. If I chance it with what I have I can at least use one of those discs you suggested and I won't have to flash anything, just format.

 

If I flash to M8+ I'm worried about getting locked out of my HDD, When you go to edit it, it does not allow you to embed an HDD key, so how is it going to know how to unlock my HDD once I flash it? Does it automatically get it from the eeprom or something? When I flashed with 4891 I had to type it in to xbtool to embed it if I remember right.

 

So I guess my remaining questions are:

 

Can I just use my existing BIOS (after modifying it to be for 6 and 7 instead of just 6), and create a partition 6 and 7 instead of just 6 to avoid corruption? (No partition would be anywhere close to 250GB this way)

 

If I cannot, and I have to use M8+, How can I be sure I won't get locked out of my HDD, and how can I be sure I can lock it again? I think I'm just not understanding something correctly here, It just seems to me the BIOS would have no way of knowing what the HDD key is without me embedding it into the BIOS.

 

What about this IND BIOS? Is that worth looking into? It sounds similar to what you suggested because it uses a config file on the HDD.

 

I know this is a lot of shit to read and a lot of questions, I appreciate all your help so very much, thank you for taking the time to help me. I know you have lives and better shit to do so its pretty damn nice of you to help. I wish I could do something for you in return, if you ever need something I can help you with I will be more than happy to help. Unfortunately Xbox is not my area of expertise. If your computer ever breaks though, hey send me a PM!

[The-Ice-Man]

I've never heard of the IND bios, so can't help with that. If you can't go over 256k then you're right you can't use the X2 5035, I just looked and it is definitely 512k only. So the M8+ is the newest you can go for, unless this IND is 256k. If it is it might be worth checking out, coz being able to edit bios options in an ini file is very handy. The M8 though was a popular choice when it came out, even for people using Xecuter chips. I even tried it myself. I always liked the software reset hardcoded into the X2 bioses though, which is why I stuck with them.

 

Now about the hard drive lock, I've changed the bios on my chip quite a few times, and never once had to embed any hard drive key. In fact I've never had to edit a bios file in any way ever. So as far as I know, if you flash a chip, or the TSOP with another bios, your ability to lock and unlock the hard drive shouldn't be affected. Like I say I've used the M8 bios myself, it was 256k, and I just flashed the chip with it, no problems. I then reflashed with an X2 coz like I say I like them better.

 

As for the install discs, the cluster size isn't displayed as an option, I think it's just done for you depending on what option you pick. I think nowadays you only need to bother with a G partition if you have a really big drive, like 500gb or more.

 

What may be a good idea for you, even though it's old, is to get the Slayer's Auto Install Disc. Reason being is that it has on it a large number of bioses, which you can flash to a chip or the TSOP directly from the disc. If I remember, the M8 might be one of them. It can also back up your current bios, and EEPROM should you run into trouble. It has the ability to lock/unlock the hard drive, format the hard drive for you, and install Evox to the drive you choose. It can also restore the MS dash, and install some old apps if you feel like seeing some really out of date stuff.

 

I still have a disc with version 2.6 on it kept for emergencies. I think there was one more made after that, maybe 2.7. Sure to be on xbins. It may well be exactly what you need. It's what I used to format my current 250gb drive quite a few years ago now. I just plugged the drive in and let Slayer's do all the work, formatted with a big F, installed everything to F, then just FTP'd my old saves and updated apps.

 

Edit: I've just looked at the IND bios, it seems like it does pretty much everything the X2 5035 does, only it's 256k. I'd use this if I was you. Go to xbins and grab the rar for version 5003. It includes an nfo telling you all you need to know, and includes an app for making config files for it. There are two version of the bios .bin file, iND-BiOS.5003.06.bin, this is the one for a large F drive, and iND-BiOS.5003.67.bin, this is the one for a F/G split. Flash the TSOP with the one you want.

 

I'd just stick with a large F. But if you're worried after experiencing corruption, go for the F/G split. Also your games will take up less space with an F/G split, coz of the 16kb cluster size. Some games have hundreds or thousands of little files just a few kb big. But with a 32kb cluster size they all take up 32kb. Which adds up.

Edited August 9, 2009 by The-Ice-Man