The Lazy Genius

Hacking Linux onto your 360 just got a wee bit easier

Xavier Ashe — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 10:33:00 -0400

Once again, we're a far cry from PS3-Linux-easy, but those 360 kids seem rather hard to dissuade. The latest development on the XeLL bootloader front is that you no longer need a serial cable hooked up for executing the boot loader, all you need is a 360 set up for running burned DVDs, a modified version of the King Kong disc -- you'll want the original game, Windows and a DVD burner to get that together -- and of course a Live CD with XeLL and your Linux distro all prepped to go. By now we're sure we don't need to tell you that this is limited to those lucky 4532 and 4548 kernels, but if you've got all of the above ingredients, plus a little bit of patience and complete disregard for warranty voidance, it looks like Linux on the 360 is within your reach at last. Peep a video after the break of the previous version of XeLL doing its thing.

From Engadget.

Xbox 360 Hypervisor Privilege Escalation Vulnerability

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 08:45:00 -0500

Overview:
We have discovered a vulnerability in the Xbox 360 hypervisor that allows privilege escalation into hypervisor mode. Together with a method to inject data into non-privileged memory areas, this vulnerability allows an attacker with physical access to an Xbox 360 to run arbitrary code such as alternative operating systems with full privileges and full hardware access.

Technical details:
The Xbox 360 security system is designed around a hypervisor concept. All games and other applications, which must be cryptographically signed with Microsoft's private key, run in non-privileged mode, while only a small hypervisor runs in privileged ("hypervisor") mode. The hypervisor controls access to memory and provides encryption and decryption services.

The policy implemented in the hypervisor forces all executable code to be read-only and encrypted. Therefore, unprivileged code cannot change executable code. A physical memory attack could modify code; however, code memory is encrypted with a unique per-session key, making meaningful modification of code memory in a broadly distributable fashion difficult. In addition, the stack and heap are always marked as non-executable, and therefore data loaded there can never be jumped to by unpriviledged code.

Unprivileged code interacts with the hypervisor via the "sc" ("syscall") instruction, which causes the machine to enter hypervisor mode. The vulnerability is a result of incomplete checking of the parameters passed to the syscall dispatcher, as illustrated below.

More info at Security Focus.

Upgrade your XBox 360's HD by yourself

Xavier Ashe — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 09:05:00 -0500

TheSpecialist (one of the hackers who worked a lot on the original Xbox (360) DVD Firmware hack) sent us an awesome new tool that will allow you to use your own new SATA HDD in your Xbox360! No more 100usd for 20GB ;)

The current tool only works with Western Digital BEVS series HDDs (20GB or larger needed) and for now you can use max 20GB, but when Microsoft will release larger drives you will be able to use as much space as Microsoft's largest HDD.

Official Site: n/a, by TheSpecialist
Download HDDHacker v0.5B: here
Open Xbox360 HDD-case: here
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com

Read the full readme on XBox-Scene.com.

Wiinja modchip enables Wii / GameCube backups to function

Xavier Ashe — Sun, 28 Jan 2007 00:13:00 -0500

We've seen plenty of Wii hacks since its November release, and we've even seen a completely uninspiring "hack" to run backup discs, but this time, we're thinking it's for real. The Wiinja modchip is on the loose, and apparently it requires soldering to the Wii innards in order to function, but it purportedly allows for Wii and GameCube backups to be played back on the console. Unfortunately, there's not a whole lot of information beyond that, and there's just a single photo to instruct forthcoming owners how to correctly attach it, but if there's one thing that helps its case, it's the video. So go on, click on through for the YouTube demonstration, and start saving up those €40 ($52) it'll run you when this hits "commercialization."

From Engadget.

XBox Modder Arrested

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 08:50:00 -0500

Operating out of a Newark home cluttered with DVD burners, computer towers and piles of blank discs, Derek Ramirez was like countless other high-tech thieves pirating computer game software, authorities say.

But, those authorities say, Ramirez was a thief with a difference. He would not only sell customers pirated DVDs for Microsoft's Xbox 360 game. For $60, he would modify an Xbox console so it would not reject counterfeit software, they said.

Investigators estimate Ramirez, who advertised on the Internet, had thousands of customers before the Essex County Prosecutor's Office raided his home and arrested him yesterday.

"He was one of our higher profile targets in the area," said Robert Hunter, manager of intellectual property enforcement for the Entertainment Software Association, whose investigators keyed in on Ramirez.

Ramirez, 24, was arrested in the three-story home on Mount Prospect Avenue he shared with his mother and other family members. He was charged with violating New Jersey's anti-piracy act, a third-degree offense that can carry up to five years in prison.

Read the full article on NJ.com.

Audio from Xbox hacker's USC talk

Xavier Ashe — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 21:45:00 -0500

The audio from Andrew "bunnie" Huang's free talk at USC last night is online, thanks to students Mike Jones and Andy Sternberg. Bunnie came to fame for breaking the crypto on the Xbox, enabling the creation of Xbox Linux, and is now working with the startup he founded, Chumby, which makes an open media-player/device.

Bunnie's talk was a fantastic exegesis on the mind of a reverse-engineer, the perils and promise of hardware hacking, and the pursuit of business models that encourage smart customers to get the most out of their devices.

Next week's speaker is EFF Staff Technologist Seth Schoen, whose many claims to fame include authoring the DeCSS Haiku, his sharp critiques of trusted computing, his role in uncovering the color printer secret codes, and many other seminal technical achievements. He also maintains the Bootable Business Card distribution of Linux. Seth speaks at 7PM on Tuesday, Nov 28, at the USC Annenberg School, room 207. Link, MP3 Link

From Boing Boing.

Play the XBox 360 HD-DVD on your PC

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 08:58:00 -0500

Double Double toil and trouble, well more accurately it’s Torx 5 Torx 7 toil and lots trouble. Enticed by the $199 price, we set ourselves on a mission to find out if the Microsoft’s XBox 360 HD-DVD player could work on a normal PC. Now, this can’t be an easy task, can it?

Knowing there was already software available for Windows XP to play HD-DVD’s, could simply plugging the HD-DVD drive into a PC work? Well, no Windows needs drivers.

If Windows wants drivers, drivers it will get. After installing these drivers magic started to happen. The HD-DVD drive was now recognized in Windows XP. Now we needed a piece of software to actually play the HD-DVD. And after some hard work we managed to find a version of WinDVD 8 that was able to play an HD-DVD movie even on my low end hardware (Granted with some stuttering).

Wow... a $199 HD-DVD for my home theater PC. DONE! Read all the details on UNEASYsilence.

MS Replies to XBox Hacks: Hitachi GDR-3120L v0078FK

Xavier Ashe — Mon, 16 Oct 2006 13:18:00 -0400

There's a thread on our forums about a new version (0078FK) of the Hitachi-LG GDR-3120L Xbox360 DVD drive found in newly manufactured (starting end august 06 anyway, maybe earlier too) consoles (mostly found in Australia and UK atm, but soon probably everywhere).
The drive has many changes to try to make FW hacking harder. Garyopa posted a great summary of all discoveries found so far about this new drive version:

[QUOTE]
There has been many changes done to the new Hitachi GDR-3120L - Version: 0078fk drive:
* 1: No "memdump" command works, totally new program needed
* 2: Chip type has been changed to a 39VF020, so new "flashsec" program needed
* 3: Black hard glue has been added covering all the chip pins and the controller pins.
* 4: External "debug" triggering into ModeB has been removed.

What does all mean:
* 1: The Team-X kit will no longer work on this drive.
* 2: Dumping the firmware by software is currently not possible
* 3: Wiring in a patching-on-the-fly "mod" would be very hard due to the "new black glue"
* 4: Removing the flash chip to externally be read will destory the drive due to the "new black glue"

What options are left to us:
* 1: Get more people working on this new drive, currently only in UK and Aussie.
* 2: Destory at one drive to be able to dump the firmware, using a external programmer.
* 3: Afterwards sitting down and re-writing all the programs: "memdump, firmcrypt, flashsec".
* 4: If you can't wait, buy an older produced x360 console (Before Late July/Early Aug. dates).

That's all for now....
We are working on it....
Hopefully some poor soul will give us one personally...
So we can destory it and play with it for everyone else....

From XBox Scene News.

Xbox modder gets home detention

Xavier Ashe — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 16:29:00 -0400

Late last year, three men who worked at the ACME Game Store on Melrose Boulevard in Los Angeles were charged with copyright infringement for selling illegally modded Xboxes. The consoles were outfitted with special chips and larger hard drives which allowed them to play and rip illegal copies of games. Jason Jones, the owner of the store, has been sentenced to six months of home detention, reports KCAL 9 News. On top of the six months of home detention, which includes wearing an electronic ankle bracelet to track his location, Jones will serve three years of probation. A second man, Jonathon Bryant, will serve only the three years probation after Jones admitted he was the sole owner of the store. A third man, Pei Cai, remains at large and is considered a fugitive. Jones and Bryant were also ordered to pay more than $2,600 to the Entertainment Software Association (ESA).

From GameSpot News.

Xbox 360 Piracy Spreading Fast In China

Xavier Ashe — Thu, 27 Jul 2006 08:19:00 -0400

As part of Gamasutra's visit to Shanghai for this week's ChinaJoy game exhibition, we've discovered that Xbox 360 game piracy appears to be spreading notably in the country, with at least one vendor offering Xbox 360 titles such as Hitman: Blood Money for around 30 Chinese yuan ($3.50).

This development has occurred after an incident in March 2006, in which hackers managed to flash changes to the firmware on the Xbox 360's DVD-ROM drive which allowed non-authenticated (copied) games to be played. Further information on the hack surfaced in late May, when other parties appear to have released a public version of the exploit, and Microsoft's Gamerscore Blog published an official response to the problem.

But, judging by the shrinkwrapped copies of Xbox 360 titles available publically in the country, Microsoft's much-vaunted security system has been definitively bypassed for physical media-based Xbox 360 games - with stores or individuals in Shanghai presumably offering to flash the Xbox 360's disc drive BIOS for a fee.

As for the large selection of Xbox 360 games available, a recent Chinese-language article at Sina.com pictures some of the titles readily available at game vendors throughout China, also including Ninety-Nine Nights, Fight Night Round 3, and Project Gotham Racing 3.

Read the full article on Gamasutra.

XBox-Scene News show us the goods...

Xavier Ashe — Sat, 22 Jul 2006 11:48:00 -0400

Here are some high-res pictures of the sample we received of the Globe 360 (pre-order) dual-firmware DVD chip with "on-the-fly" DVD-key patching.

More Pictures:
* Close-up of Actel CPLD chip: low-res | high-res
* Close-up of socket-ed SST flash-chip: low-res | high-res
* Close-up back of PCB: low-res | high-res

Features:
* Plug&Play: Don't need the extraction of drive-key from the original firmware of drive on your console, only install the chip and the "unsigned" firmware on-board will be boot.
* Firmware-drive Upgrade: you can use an upgraded firmware for better performance of your DVD-drive to reading DVD-R DL support (ex: you should use on Hitachi-LG the firmware vers. 059 instead your original 47D or 46D).
* Electronic Switch ON/OFF: enable or disable the chip when turn-on your console by power button, you can check the state of chip by a led-indicator.
* Easy Reprogrammable Flash eprom: the on-board flash eprom is mounted on a socket connector for an easy and clean remove in order to fast reprogramming it.
* Compatible with all DVD-drives on the market (Hitachi-LG and Toshiba-Samsung).
* High reliability through ACTEL CPLD technology.

Official Site: http://www.globe-360.com
Install Diagrams: Toshiba-Samsung | Hitachi-LG
Pre-Order Globe 360 ($53): divineo.com
Discuss this news item on our forums: forums.xbox-scene.com

From XBox-Scene News.

NME-360 XBox Mod Chip

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 11 Jul 2006 19:26:00 -0400

We are proud to introduce the first real Modchip for the Xbox360!

The NME-360 enables your XBox360 to play backups of your highly valuable original games. NME-360 is a universal solution for ALL currently available XBox360 Consoles on the market. Forget crazy dual mods with 30+ wires or even bricking your DVD drive by flashing corrupt/wrong firmware files. Your original firmware stays untouched and intact at any time when using the NME-360. There is no need for any firmware-reading or flashing.

Simply install the NME-360 with 4 cables for Samsung or 11 wires for Hitachi/LG and you are done...NME-360 - the clever solution:

The NME-360 autodetects the inserted media. If the inserted media is a backup NME-360 injects the necessary information to the DVD drive enabling it to boot smoothly ahead! If the media is an original game, or anything else, which doesnt require any further action of the NME-360 then it simply falls asleep so there is no need for an external switch whatsoever. This way it can not be detected online when you play an original online game.

Official Site: http://www.team-underdog.com. Expected Retail Price: $50 Thanks to hitman43[ModControl] and gamefreax for the news/link. Found on forums.xbox-scene.com.

How-to Backup Your Original XBOX 360 Games

Xavier Ashe — Sun, 21 May 2006 18:14:00 -0400

Now that you've flashed your Xbox 360's firmware to enable the playing of backup discs, you probably want to start actually backing up those expensive games you bought in case they get scratched or perhaps even melted by your toasty 360. And luckily for you, CleverMod has posted just the step-by-step instructions you need for ripping your games and then burning the images onto dual-layer DVDs -- but keep in mind, you're voiding about a million warranties with all of this flashing and ripping and such. Basically, CleverMod's method involves disassembling a DVD drive so that you can switch discs without hitting the eject button, and then installing a program called WxRipper that finds a so-called "magic number" from any regular 8+GB dual-layer DVD. The program then uses that data to unlock a substituted 360 disc and dump a RAW copy onto your hard drive, which can be burned onto a blank disc and presumably played using the Commodore4Eva hack on Toshiba-Samsung drive-sporting 360s. And just to be super clear, if you don't own a copy of the game you're ripping, then you're not allowed to do this (i.e. Blockbuster, GameFly games are off-limits).

From Engadget.

Xbox Waterballoon Fight In Real Life

Xavier Ashe — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 16:42:00 -0400

Those crazy aussies are trying to recreate the famous water balloon fight commercial for the Xbox 360 in Sydney on April 22.

Xbox 360 is hoping to set the world record for largest water balloon fight at Coogee Beach in Sydney to celebrate the console's launch. You have to buy tickets to get in, but each entry comes with an Xbox 360 Challenge Pack.

The pack's include an unnamed 360 game, a T-shirt (which I desperately want), atrucker cap, swimming goggles and canvas bag.

The event will include hands-on time with unreleased games, music by Melbourne band Kisschasy and both a radio station and a TV show both capturing all of the fun.

The current record for largest water balloon fight was set in 2005 when 2,677 Spaniards threw 50,855 balloons.

From Kotaku.com.

Team Avalaunch Xbox360 SATA Adapter

Xavier Ashe — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 16:35:00 -0400

Here are some shots we received of another Xbox 360 Harddrive SATA adapter currently in development by the guys at Team Avalaunch(info). The small PCB will allow you to connect your Xbox 360 HD on your PC without removing it from its case. You'll notice that for the connection to the Xbox 360 HD and for the PC SATA data-cable they used simple tracks/lines on the PCB. For the power there are 2 options: either a mini-B USB port (like used on PSP or many digital cams for example) so you can power the Xbox 360 HD with a cable from your PC's USB port (data will still go over SATA, this is no SATA-to-USB device) or you can power the HD via a standard 5v pin (like you can find on many electronic devices like the connector to recharge your PSP for example). There will also be adapters for both small and large HD power connectors to get power from the PC PSU.
The public/retail release is expected just after easter. There's no final price yet, but they are working on getting an as low as possible retail price.

More Pictures:
* Back Avalaunch 360 SATA PCB: low-res | high-res
* Top PCB with no components: low-res | high-res
* Bottom PCB with no components: low-res | high-res

From XboxScene News.

wxRipper v1.2 and wx360 v1.6

Xavier Ashe — Wed, 25 Jan 2006 13:57:00 -0500

Gael360 released a new version of his tools to dump Xbox 360 discs with a PC DVD-drive using an hot-swap method (means you'll have to open your drive - see previous news). This is a translation from french to english of what he said on the gueux forums about the new release:

I just released a big update of my tools, you will now be able to find the 'magic number' immediatly, without having to scan an unknown Xbox 360 DVD.

So there's no longer a difference between known and unknown games, they will all be detected/dumped the same way.

The advantage of this method is that you will be able to use wx360 directly to open the content of the DVD without having to dump it first. After doing the hot-swap you'll just have to open wx360, select the DVD-drive and click the DVD icon.

wxRipper will thus have a feature to find the 'magic number' immediately, without scanning the Xbox 360 DVD. The features related to dumping did not change.

Stream DivX Movies to your Xbox 360

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 15:09:00 -0500

this article shows how to stream DivX (and XviD) movies to an XBox 360 using a Media Center. for the picky people, it doesn't actually stream DivX ... it converts to WMV on the fly to stream. the core process for accomplishing this is taken from a thread found on the XBox forums : Playing DivX movies without having to Re-encode, through media centre. and this might be the original post (in German) : Divx mit Mediaencoder auf die Xbox360 streamen!, so they get credit for pioneering this approach. it works fine, but has the disadvantage that you have to manually set up the encoding process on your Media Center and then move over to the XBox 360 to watch it. so all this article really does is provide an MCE interface so you can control everything from your XBox 360 being used as an MCE Extender. i.e. its for lazy people. it was also an excuse for me to write a ListMaker AddIn for MCE ... which i hadn't done yet. not to mention my MCE setup doesnt have a TV Tuner and only has 32 megs of video RAM, so i cannot play video on it at all :(

From Brains-n-Brawn.com. Be patient, Digg effect in force.

bf Unpacker

Xavier Ashe — Mon, 16 Jan 2006 23:20:00 -0500

th0mas has posted in the forums about an unpacker he wrote for .bf files. It should unpack the files such as "KingKongTheGame_clean.bf". (see this discussion)

C souce: http://th0mas.sixbit.org/bfunpack.c

Untested windows binary: http://th0mas.sixbit.org/bfunpack.exe

From XboxHacker.net.

I.C.E. chip a scam, real modchips on their way

Xavier Ashe — Fri, 13 Jan 2006 13:00:00 -0500

Well ... in fact the article from team xecuter is mainly about one of the 'hot' discussions currently in the scene: the Team I.C.E. 'modchip' for the Xbox 360. Xecuter(info) received an email (which we received too) from Divineo giving even more reasons to think this modchip is fake:

The 360 chip is 99% a scam, we had booked tickets to go meet them, we were ready to make huge prepayment and more after we meet the guys at their office and see the working X-Box 360 with back-ups they 100% confirmed they had and it was no problem to show etc. Now at last second they cancelled, with some lame reason, those guys are scammers I really believe. They did the same to Xenium(info), backed off and changed completely what they said.

You might have noticed we ignored anything related to this chip so far here on the news (it's of course heavily discussed on our forums). The reason is very simple, I think most of our visitors trust our news for this type of information and we don't want to give attention to fakes/scams (good or bad news it's all publicity). So just like we don't post about fake bootdiscs, videos and alike (posting such things will just motivate even more people to do similar 'jokes'), new teams announcing a new modchip concept will have to provide enough proof (so no fake pictures, impossible OS features and what-not) or support from trusted teams/people/shops before we'll post about it.

Anyways (damn, now I still ended up talking about that chip on the news) ... what I wanted to post about is that team xecuter re-confirms that real 1st-gen modchips are coming in a reasonable amount of time to the Xbox 360, taking the doubt away from some people that they were referring to the 'thing' above in their previous news post:

We can assure you there will be more than one type of mod available from different groups in the coming weeks/months - just be patient.

From Xbox-Scene.

Xbox 360 Hacks: Modchip and Hot Swap

Xavier Ashe — Thu, 12 Jan 2006 09:38:00 -0500

Got two bits of new on the 360 hacking front. First is the existance of a 360 mod chip:

Testing has been completed by our affilate Infinitymods.com ! The I.C.E. Chip v1 is confirmed working with xbox 360 NTSC Units, at this time. PAL is currently under testing but should have no issues. Samples can be provided apon release date of the chip for bulk orders only, and are limited. Stay Tuned for updates !

The makers of this modchip is Team I.C.E. and looks like will be selling through a number of retailers. Other info gathered: Price is retail , Wires are 20-30, Install time is approx 25 minutes, able to direct boot backups, dumped isos, or full rips.

Also, here's a video showing a hot swap trick to play a backup of PGR3. Good Stuff:

Xbox 360 inches closer to piracy with bootable, modifiable kiosk DVD

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 09:15:00 -0500

An Xbox 360 hacker's checklist:

Being able to rip games off of Xbox 360 DVD discs? Check
Being able to boot the system off of a custom disc? Check
Being able to run home-grown code on the Xbox 360? Not yet
Being able to decrypt ripped games so that copies of them can be used? Not yet

If the group of hackers that call themselves "Pi," is to be believed, the second item in the checklist above has been achieved by exploiting unencrypted content contained on disks intended for use on Xbox 360 kiosks in European retail locations. They write, "This leaves hackers with the possibility to hack around with this disc that load from a normal DVDR5 backup! .... YES you can run this! Burn the iso, put it into your xbox and be very amazed...."

Link.

17 Mistakes Microsoft Made in the Xbox Security System

Xavier Ashe — Wed, 28 Dec 2005 12:31:00 -0500

This article is about the security system of the Xbox and the mistakes Microsoft made. It will not explain basic concepts like buffer exploits, and it will not explain how to construct an effective security system, but it will explain how not to do it: This article is about how easy it is to make terrible mistakes and how easily people seem to overestimate their skills. So this article is also about how to avoid the most common mistakes.

For every security concept, this article will first explain the design from Microsoft's perspective, and then describe the hackers' efforts to break the security. If the reader finds the mistakes in the design, this proves that Microsoft has weak developers. If, on the other hand, the reader doesn't find the mistakes, this proves that constructing a security system is indeed hard.

This paper dated 2005-10-25, has been submitted to the 22nd Chaos Communication Congress and will be presented on December 29th 2005, 18:00, at the Berliner Congress Center, Berlin, Germany.

You are invited to comment on this article on the Discussion Page.

Remember that good news I promised a week or two ago?

Xavier Ashe — Wed, 28 Dec 2005 09:30:00 -0500

Well I can finally announce that I am no longer an Independent Consultant. I am now a happy post-sales consultant for Guarded.Net, the maker of NeuSecure, easily the best SIM out on the market. But WAIT, Guarded.Net is no more! They were bought bought by Micromuse a few months ago. But WAIT, Micromuse is no more! Last Thursday, it was announced that IBM intendeds to buy Micromuse. So I still will be doing security consulting, implementing NeuSecure at most of the best IT shops in the world. Eventually NeuSecure will be integrated with Tivoli, which will be fun as well. This blog will live on as I travel and hope to bring some interesting anecdotes.

Linux Drivers for XBox Hard Drive File System

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 12:38:00 -0500

Free60 (pun-intended) is a project towards porting GNU/Linux, BSD, Darwin and related open-source operating systems to the Microsoft Xbox 360 video game console.

As long as the Xbox 360 has not been released worldwide, this site will be used to collect documentation:

Great collection of information for any aspiring XBox 360 hackers! Free360.com.

There is now initial support for the Xbox 360 hardisk filesystem (XTAF) in CVS. This is a patch for the 2.4.32 Linux kernel.

Download the Xbox 360 Game Dump Extractor v1.0

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 12:32:00 -0500

So you've seen all our raw dumps? but what can you use them for? Nothing in their current form, yet! - But here we go with a nice extractor tool so that you can extract the dumps and check out the files, we even decided to release the source code, so that you can figure out the filesystem and make even nicer tools and clean up our horrible looking code, cause we are lazy and old!

Usage: extract360.exe gamename.360 [wildcard]...

For example: extract360.exe pi-nfsmw.360

Sit back and relax, and enjoy, these xbox360 games are quite large! And a note to the tech guys: Yes, once you get past the protections and down to the raw bits on the disc, its just the standard xboxdvdfs, however the offset and layer breakpoint are different! / Team PI Coder - over and out!

Download Game Dump Extractor v1.0 (incl. source code). From XBox-Scene News.

UPDATE: 2 GUI frontends have been released, if you do not have a keyboard, and must do everthing via a GUI.

Download Halobox GUI Game Dump Extractor: here
Download Sonia GUI Game Dump Extractor: here

Xbox 360 file system de-coded

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 12:26:00 -0500

The Xbox 360's DVD file system has been exposed, a coding group calling itself Pi, has claimed.

The group said it has posted source code for a utility that allows discs' files to be extracted and displayed as raw data. The group admits there's not much that can be done with it beyond explore the file-system structure, if anyone is prepared to jump through all the hoops necessary to bring code and disc contents together.

The utility runs on a PC, apparently, but Xbox 360 DVDs are incompatible with PC DVD drives. Since the code won't run on an Xbox 360, users have to create an image of an original disc then transfer that image to a PC.

Read the full story at The Register.

So just how hack-proof is the 360?

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 29 Nov 2005 09:00:00 -0500

We haven’t yet had a chance to get our hands dirty and bust out our trusty tunneling electron microscope to see for ourselves just how in deep we’d have to go in order to load up our new 360 with Linux, but apparently the Free60 Project has a pretty good idea of what’s in store for Xbox hackers this time (though of course none of this is officially verified):

The flash is encrypted with a per-box key
The key is stored inside the CPU
The boot ROM is stored inside the CPU
Also inside the CPU is a hypervisor that verifies the running state of the kernel, making sure there is no modification (RAM checksums), else the Xbox 360 panics and blows up!
The CPU contains RAM inside of it to store the checksums
All interrupt/exception handling is done by the hypervisor
All code runs in kernel mode
The emulator for first generation games can be updated via an official Microsoft download burned to CD by the user, though the CDs’ content will be encrypted and signed with public key cryptography. The boot ROM is stored inside the CPU.

Don’t worry if you don’t know what any of that biz means — but if you do, you probably know that this is a real world best-case-scenario trusted computing environment. In other words, would-be Xbox 360 hackers have definitely got their work cut out for ‘em.

From Engadget.

PSP on the 360

Xavier Ashe — Sat, 26 Nov 2005 22:09:00 -0500

Presenting the official Joystiq guide on getting your shiny toys to play nice together: your Sony PSP and your Microsoft Xbox 360. Just like iPod integration, this seemed crazy, but we are here to announce: it works great.

To the right is a lovely, svelte PSP next to the impressive 360 (with PGR3 faceplate). In between them, a simple USB to USB mini connector.

Pretty straightforward, but cool nonetheless. From Joystiq.

Ready to buy that Xbox 360?

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 22 Nov 2005 13:00:00 -0500

Check here first:

The Best Buy Xbox Inventory Locator

Zip Code:

Developed by Chris Lambert

Microsoft Releases 360 Compatibility List

Xavier Ashe — Tue, 15 Nov 2005 10:00:00 -0500

Microsoft has finally released a list of Xbox games that will be playable on the Xbox 360.

The good news: the list is over 200 titles long. The bad news: I don't see NCAA 2005 Football or any of the Splinter Cell games on the list.

One special note: A software emulator is required for each original Xbox game you play on your Xbox 360™ console. Please check back for more details as we approach the launch date.

Found on Forever Geek.