Xbox360 Hard Drive Swap??

[Kunaak]

with all these new movies and HD movies, and HDtv shows, and regular Tv shows... music vids and game demos, my stock 20 gig hard drive in my 360 is feeling damn puny, especially since you really only have 13 gigs to use, and 6 gigs is reserved for game saves and such.

so I began looking around and reading and searching for "Xbox360 hard drive mods" or "Xbox360 hard drive upgrades", and things like this for the last week.

well I found many many manyyyyyyy guides on various ways to upgrade.

the easiest... just pop in a USB hard drive... but thats a half ass solution, cause all you can use the USB drive for is, viewing pics, or listening to music, nothing else.

so that is kinda useless for me...

so I did find a real guide to swapping your 360 drive for a larger drive, and I did take the time to do alittle verifying, to see how accurate they are in the facts, and most of its pretty solid.

take out the drive from the XBox, its a laptop 2.5 in HDD, SATA connection, works on any PC.

put it in a PC, and take a larger SATA 2.5 in HDD and ghost from one drive to the next, and put it back together and Viola... more space.

but I keep seeing mixed reports, that the OS runs a HDD check to verify the size of the disc and the product number, otherwise it wont work.
but that doesn't really make sense to me... since the 360 OS is on the drive you Ghosted.
then, for everyone one person that swears up and down that you can't change the 360 hard drive, theres 2 others that will swear they have done it, and are using it fine for months on end.

so I cant find where the truth lies in that claim...

anyone here ever try to upgrade thier 360 HDD?

I got my drive, and got on google and found the drives specs.
its a Samsung HM020GI, rare disc, not even listed at thier website in the archieves or anywhere else, must be a custom drive or something...

its a 5400 RPM drive, with a 8 meg cache.

so obviously I been thinking of giving the swap a try, but the other thing is, I wonder... would it be worth trying with a 7200 RPM drive? a 16 meg cache drive? or just stick with a 5400 RPM Drive?

I mean, some games do use the Hard Drive for loading game levels, like Oblivion and Tony Hawk Project 8, so it would make sense that a faster drive would help in some way for these games...

or the 16 meg cache... obviously any hard drive can benifit from a larger cache... but maybe the 360 is hard wired to use a specific HDD cache size?

so many questions and so little info...

I've read so much, that I even found a few ways to mod the HDD if it truely is chained to one hard drive size, to fool the 360 into accepting a new HDD.

Hex Dump, look at ranges 4000 - 4200. copy, paste, then ghost that to the second new HDD.

but my main problem is... I just cant find anyone to talk to, thats actually tried this, and failed or succeeded.
everytime I find someone, they are on a forum I dont want to sign up for....

I just want to be able to download and store my movies and demos without always having to delete my stuff off the measly 13 gigs I get to use from the stock 20 gig drive.

I know the 100 gig drive was announced in korea... but its set for launch in april of next year... thats like 100 years away for me.

so modding time it might be.... :D

[buick454wnos]

i am using my 20 gig just perfectly right now

It can be modded, look on ebay and xbox scene, as i believe eBay, people will sell the Korean ones probably and XBOX scene has a bunch of modders.


I personally am modding my live camera with a clear case soon, so i dont exactly know, but i think you cant use a external USB HDD for space.

[[XC] moddolicous]

Why not give it a shot Kunaak? If it doesn't work for some reason, just pop the old hard drive back in and return it.

[[XC]thewildblue]

This is pretty interesting. I have done the firmware mod to my dvd so it reads verbatim media andwould be quite interested in this if you get it working.

[Soulburner]

So it doesn't use laptop HD's that are user-replaceable like the PS3? Hmm I thought they were the same in that regard...may effect my choice of what to buy next year.

[eXceeded]

Yeah the 360 requires that you open up the drive thingy and put a new hdd in, guides are all over the internet but the PS3 is good in this regard :D

[Starscream]

i also kept reading mixed reports about this.

Some sites say u can only use MS HDs for the xbox360 and other sites say there are tricks around that but no reactions from people that have tried it.

Do hope its possible as the official Microsoft 20GB HD has is pretty expensive compaired to normal 2.5inch drives

[Kunaak]

I already did this.

it uses a Samsung 5400 RPM drive.
you cannot ghost to another drive and have it work, cause the hard drive is hard locked to your machine, the machine will not recognize anything more then a 20 gig samsung drive.

its a easy mod if it worked... but it doesn't.

getting to the drive is easy, just need some small Torx screw drivers.
ghosting it rather easy, just hook it to your PC and ghost from one drive to the next.

but install it, and you will see nothing different.

it will still show only 13 gigs usable... if it works at all.

[Starscream]

so al them tricks on the net were pure theory from people that didnt test it?

them MS official HDs cost some 75 euro overhere wich is a rip of for a 20GB 2.5inch HD.

When MS comes witha bigger one i wonder how much they dare to ask for it.

[Kunaak]

they seem to be theory.
I did it, and it doesnt work.

then I went to Xbox Scene and started reading every post I could find about it, and there was about 10 other people that tried this in the past and had varying degrees of luck.

for some, it just wouldnt boot.
for others, it would boot, but see no more then 20 gigs.

for all the "yeah it works" posts I seen... I havent seen anyone actually prove it yet, and a whole lot of people explain why its not possible.
(the 360 OS is locked to 1 hard drive size)

[Starscream]

sux.
was thinking bout getting a new console that i can also use as a media center.
But 13GB of HD space doesnt even come close to what id need.

Do hope MS will unlock it like Sony has with the PS3.

[eXceeded]

Well disappointed to hear about this as I was under the impression that it was easy to replace the drive...

[Mako88]

Pretty obvious what MS is doing here, they're clearly thinking ahead and keeping the upgrade path potential solely to themselves by forcing you to purchase one of their "official" MS break-out external HDs later, like the recent HD-DVD drive they just introduced.

Worse, you'd assume that once they come out with their bullsht "Xbox360 60GB HD" add-on box they'll simply do an update over LIVE that allows the OS to allow the higher capacity right? Wrong. Instead they'll of course hardcode that patch/update to their official HD external box's firmware so that only that specific drive/MS box will work, and the original drive in the console still won't be able to be swapped.

What a pain in the ass. 20GB of total size, 6GB of which is used by lame legacy compatibility for games I will never play. Just went through the same process this week as you did K, thought that it would be easy to research and do. Nope.

[[cTx]Philosophy]

Verry interesting read for sure..

Subscribed to see if anything new turns out..

I have a freind that mods Xbox's and 360's ill give him a call and ask him when he gets online

[Lestat]

Kunaak,

Just as with the Xbox 1 the Xbox 360 uses a hard dive locking key and recognition system.

currently it IS impossible to swap out the drive for a larger one.
end of story, anyon who says they can make it works has yet to prove anything.

thats just the way it is. sorry man, as i havea 100gig Laptop Sata hard drive that i have been sitting on for over 6 months just waiting for someone to come out with a way to upgrade the hard drive.

MS has even stated ON the record that it cant be done, that you have to purchase another drive and that they have NO plans to bring out a larger hard drive.

considering that a 100gig SATA hard drive can be had for a little over 100bucks i find it so fvcking assinine it aint even funny that we are paying 100 for a damn 13gig hard drive. cuz it might be 20 in theory but you only get about 9gigs usable when its all said and done.

[Kunaak]

you didnt read any of the post huh?

[m0da]

LOL

well the only thing i can "muddily" clear up is the cache and speed.
im not sure where (so sorry) but i read that the 5400 rpm speed is recommended over the 7200 rpm, either because of the price factor or something else. i dont think the 7200 rpm gives much of a boost.
but a larger cache on the other hand does in fact help.

sorry i forgot where i read all this, but yea

i was pissed when i found out you need a hdd to play original xbox games, so i did a lot of research too.
i said f it, and i swapped my core package with a premium package

gl though with any/everything

[MaxxxRacer]

Kunaak, I've looked too, finding nothing promising.. Its a real shame. I downloaded a few demos and noticed my 13GB quickly slipping away.


With the 1st Xbox it was easy as pie. One of my friends had a 300gb drive in there with about 100 Xbox games on it..

[s7e9h3n]

Just get one of those devices that can transfer your info from your 360 HD to your computer. I know it may be a pain in the ass, but at least you'll be able to back-up the info on the HD and you can transfer it to/from the 360.

AFAIK, it's impossible to hack the 360 HD since the Xbox is reading information from the firmware on the drive. Until someone figures out how to modify that info, we're stuck with what MS offers us...:( (BTW, I've got a friend who knows somebody in Samsung's Storage Division working on a possible fix ;) )

[Lestat]

you didnt read any of the post huh?


i read everything you said i dont know why you assume i didnt by my response, your trying to do the currently impossible, end of story, to debate it further unless your hacking abilities are beyond the big boys is futile.
the only known method to transfer files to and from a hard drive is with the hard drive transfer kit, which can be hard to find at times, but best buy does carry them and occasionally they are in stock but they do not work.
ive read several posts on users reporting its just a stupid device that doesnt even work, period, you cant do anything, its like its DOA.
the MFG of the device pulled it right be fore its initial release with no reason for pulling it, speculation was from pressure from M$, but no one knows, but it is avalable now, and doesnt work very well, if at all.
the 2nd method is with the windows tool like XB360 Tool or something it can read from the drive, although i dont recall if it can write,

hard drive swapping is impossible, the only possibility is to buy another stupid 99 dollar M$ hd and use the usb transfer device and see if you can transfer your profile. and saves.

but as for upgrading or swapping with a non MS drive, impossible, it cant be done currently. there is lots of speculation out there but any serious research will show you it can tbe done, period. not now atleast.

hopefully we will have something soon as a dvd firmware hack can be detected as they have alredy banned people, but not in large masses, so the detection could very well be flakey or random at best. who knows.

i feel and appreciate what your trying to do but the discussion is mute.


for everyone one person that swears up and down that you can't change the 360 hard drive, theres 2 others that will swear they have done it, and are using it fine for months on end

that my good man is an all out line of b.s.
i dont know where your searching but the only place to find the up to date info is xbox-scene, and there is nothing, n o t h i n g about having a working HD swap.
there is a specific thread and its all a bunch of kids throwing around ideas, and it sbeen said time and time again tha Ghost does not work, it will not work, period.

just as with the xbox 1, just like i already said, it uses a locking key and recognition system, the drive is locked until its hooked up to the xbox. (this is why i find the XB360 Tool program to be questionable (as i havent tried yet) and you can NOT use the same key on a different hard drive, they are unique to each hard drive. simply ghosting it doesnt do anything, and in fact the drive would be locked so ghosting it cant work as the drive is locked, unless ghost dos actually is able to bypass the lock and read the raw sectors, which i am not aware of.
the xbox firmware itself is the decryption for the lock, so taking your hard drive to your friends 360 does work, its ben verified, but swapping wont.
ghost did not work on the previous xbox and it wont work here.

you cant even use an external USB hard drive, as the only thing the xbox will let you see is mp3's and pictures. i am not even sure it will let you view movies from the usb drive.

i hate being the downer int he group i am jsut stating facts.
there is only 1 guy right now who has openly said ther eis a possible hack, but its not been verified to work, and it involves hacking the firmware of the hard drive itself. and friends if you want to venture down that road, feel free.

[Canibuz]

owned http://www.xbox-scene.com/xbox1data/sep/EEyAZlukkkkGLVUagB.php

[Kunaak]

owned http://www.xbox-scene.com/xbox1data/sep/EEyAZlukkkkGLVUagB.php


Cool. Thanks.

now... just to buy another hard drive.... :D

[Canibuz]

ah i'll wait for teh 120 gb hack to come I can't be bothered with 40 gb