Anyone modded an xbox?

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sclawson
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Anyone modded an xbox?

Post by sclawson » Sun Jun 29, 2003 10:55 am

Lately I've been low on cash, but just as eager to do some mods. :D I've been reading over at xbox-scene.com about modifying these units to become general purpose computers -- if you're not already familiar with these game consoles, they sell for less than $200 and carry a Pentium III motherboard, a desktop hard drive, and a DVD drive, among other goodies, all in a compact and fairly cool-looking case. Pretty compelling bargain! Also, the unit seems to have an external power supply, and the only fan I've seen (based on photos) is what appears to be a tiny motherboard chipset fan; the P3 appears to be passively heatsinked.

It suddenly dawned on me that this might make for a nice, cheap rig to make silent with relatively little effort. Anyone tried it?

Lithium
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Post by Lithium » Sun Jun 29, 2003 12:54 pm

Good luck with that, as from my personal experience the Xbox is pretty damn loud as is, so it'd take some serious work to make it quieter.

sclawson
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Post by sclawson » Sun Jun 29, 2003 1:36 pm

Lithium wrote:Good luck with that, as from my personal experience the Xbox is pretty damn loud as is, so it'd take some serious work to make it quieter.
Given that I've never owned one, you'd surely know better than I regarding the noise. But I don't see from the photos why it would be so noisy? The only two noise-producing components I can see are the hard drive and the tiny fan on the motherboard. If the hard drive is replaced with a Barracuda IV and the fan is undervolted or replaced outright, or maybe even swapped for a big passive heatsink, I've got to think the xbox would be darned near silent. But maybe I'm missing something??? :?:

madlee
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Post by madlee » Sun Jun 29, 2003 2:08 pm

I have a first generation day one XBox and it's not that loud.

there's a fan, but it just makes the low level moving air sound. the HD is rarely accessed, so there's no noise there.

the dvd player is not noisy either...

the GPU is passively cooled so no noise there.

maybe you have a defective fan in there.

ccorayer
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Post by ccorayer » Tue Jul 01, 2003 1:27 pm

Have to say the loudest thing on it is the fan. The DVD drive isn't running constantly, and when it does it's certainly quieter than my CD-RW and DVD-ROM drive in my PC. Not quite as quiet as my actual DVD players, but not bad. I can't say that I I've ever really noticed the hard drive at all....

chiahaochang
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Post by chiahaochang » Wed Jul 02, 2003 5:52 am

I have an XBox and I think it's loud. It's all the fan noise. You can hear the DVD-ROM drive on occassion, but the fan noise is the dominant noise source. I don't hear the HD at all, but I suspect it's the fact that the fan noise drowns it out.

I've seen mods where people have tried to silence/quiet their XBox. I've seen people cut blow-holes, replace fans, do ducting. Basically, all the same stuff that we do here.

madlee
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Post by madlee » Sat Jul 05, 2003 12:09 am

It makes me wonder, because supposedly there's been tons of problems with the dvd-rom failing...

Granted the xbox isn't silent...

maybe because of the sound from the TV I can't hear it..

DrDDT
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Replacing fan with passive cooler?

Post by DrDDT » Wed Jul 30, 2003 6:05 am

There are many different types XBOXes around, and I happen to own one of the loudest ones around.

Has anyone tried replacing the CPU fan with a passive cooler?
I heard later XBOXes are fitted with a passive CPU cooler.

POLIST8
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Post by POLIST8 » Wed Jul 30, 2003 6:14 am

I thought that they used WD HDDs in the XBox?

madlee
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Post by madlee » Fri Aug 15, 2003 10:35 am

You know what? I'm going to apologize... The xbox is very loud!

I turned it on late at night when the house is quiet with no ambient noise and I was blown away about how loud that thing is.

So, the question is, has anyone modded the xbox?

Lithium
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Post by Lithium » Wed Sep 03, 2003 12:23 am

Well I took the plunge and modded my xbox to have a 80mm panaflo in it. My temps seem higher but there's a guide at xbox-scene.com (which I also used as far as replacing the fan went) that tells you how you can use some cooling paste and it'll apparently help drop temps.

If you're interested in doing this you'll need to realize that the xbox fan isn't 80mm so you'll have to cut the HDD mounting tray and this will require either a dremel tool if you're [h] or if you're [p]oor, like myself, I suggest using a hacksaw.

Also A torx 20 and torx 10 screwdriver(Although I found only a torx 9 fit) to get into the guts of your xbox.

Also the xbox fan has nice plastic clips at the top and bottom on the side, other fans do not. I used the nice blue plastic grommits to hold the fan in place.

Image (Click for bigger images)
This is the hd holding thingy which will have to be cut significantly, at first I just tried to cut the the plastic front part and keep the leg. but the leg had to go, in the end I followed the guide on xbox-scene and cut right up to where the cable is.
Image
This is a shot of the xbox with the dvd rom and hd removed and the stock fan
Image
Here's my ghetto install with the grommits holding the fan in place.

If anyone is interested in doing this let me know and maybe I'll actually get better pictures as I was just following a guide with cruddy pictures.

Temps are a bit higher I think but I never really paid attention, overall I'm far from happy with the current noise and I think that the GPU fan will need some replacing or something. That or it's my replacement hd.

I decided i'd take pics about 1/2 through just for fun but could do a better job if there was any interest. Well and maybe if I replace the other fan or figure out what's the noise maker now.

Harry Azol
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Post by Harry Azol » Wed Jun 23, 2004 10:02 pm

Lithium, any chance you could put those pics up again? :)

TheDarkHacker
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Post by TheDarkHacker » Wed Jun 23, 2004 10:28 pm

I have only painted my xbox and replaced my fan for a quieter one. It uses a standard 80mm fan that is powered by a 3 pin tail. I think what you are taking about is accually putting in a mod chip. I have yet to do this because the new mod chips dont come with the bios flashed and they are not readlly avalable. If somehow you can accually find the bios for your mod chip and evolution x the dashboard replacment for the xbox which allows you to back up your games to the hard drive presumming you have already swapped out your stock xbox hard drive for a nice 250 gb hard drive. There are legal bis out there that allow you to install linux on your xbox and turn it into a fully functional computer but that is another story. If also you can find somewhere on ebay where someone is selling a old mod chip when they used to become with the bios preflashed you are in luck. But even if you do find one on ebay i will of bought it before you because i check everyday. Anyway it is possible to turn your xbox into a media chenter or fully functional computer but the question is hw much time do you have. If you still want to install linux on your xbox i recommend you start looking around here http://www.xbox-linux.org/ for information and resorces. Hope this helped. Reply to this thread if you have any other questions about xbox modding and if this is what you where talking about.

Farnsworth
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Post by Farnsworth » Thu Jun 24, 2004 12:46 am

The earlier generation of X-Box had a (noisy) fan, but the latest generation is cooled completely passivly cooled with huge heatsinks.

TheDarkHacker
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Post by TheDarkHacker » Thu Jun 24, 2004 8:07 am

Ya i got my xbox the first day it came out and replaced the fan the second day.

computerB
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Post by computerB » Mon Apr 10, 2006 7:47 pm

i need to replace the fan also on a 1.6 box
I have a Torx 20 which i used to hotswap, in all the guides it says Torx 10 to remove hd, and the rest, but here yr saying Torx 9, it may be a bit different where u guys live but here is south australia a Torx 20 required 10 phonecalls to various stores, and finallly to a specialist trade engineering supply store, which then charged $9 au.
So i dont want to but a T10 then find out only a T9 fits, you get the idea, if i could get some confirmation on which one it is, that would be graus indeed.

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