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Comment by: varnull (Nov 14, 2008 03:19)

I just think you got really unlucky. It's not like you were cheating the system in the way most people moan and whine about when they get caught.

While it's unfortunate it's clearly in the rules.. and as adults we understand the implications of our actions and accept them when it comes down.

One very interesting thing.. I have never heard of somebody who bought a replacement drive and flashed it with their original firmware getting banned. It doesn't seem like there is anything actually hardware related to do with the dvd drive which is checked, just the firmware.

Another thought.. obviously M$ are as capable of downloading all the firmwares and flashing drives just the same as we are, in fact they are stupid if they don't do that, then work out exactly how to detect it remotely. This leads to a very interesting possibility, but it does mean a lot of flashing or how about buying another drive and just swapping them if you want to play on live? Jumper cables and some switches and the modded drive sitting on top anybody?

Free open source software = made by end users who want an application to work. The flower of carnage-shura no hana..

Comment by: EricCarr (Nov 14, 2008 05:32)

I know a kid in Australia who was banned and does not have any modded firmware. When his dad contacted M$, he was banned for modded console.

Comment by: mshockey (Nov 14, 2008 05:47)

I've actually considered doing just that. It wouldn't be very difficult to have an external drive that was mod free to use with the games you play online. Disconnect from the internet while using the modded drive and put a switch to re-route the power from the internal to the external drive for online use. You would have to own all the online games but we all own all of our games anyways, right? Kind of a happy medium. Wouldn't stop the ban if M$ used a system update to detect it. Once you had the update and switched back to the modded drive while offline your system would still get banned...I think. Good thought though....would definitely cut down on the risk.

Comment by: NexGen76 (Nov 14, 2008 18:51)

Cmon lets be honest here more than half of the people that mod there system have no intent to backup there own games.Its to cheat the system & download games from p2p networks so they don't have to pay for them.Microsoft sells have shown that clearly how can Microsoft have 8 million more install base than Sony but move far less software.If we want to talk about this issue let clearly lay the truth out on the table & stop acting innocence when more than half of the people with modded consoles are not.But there have been some issue where Microsoft have banned people that never had a modded system & my cousin was one of those people.I have no issue with Microsoft doing this but they need to be more accurate.

Comment by: atomicxl (Nov 15, 2008 13:17)

There are very few legit reasons to have modded firmware. If you want homebrew, MS gives away dev tools for free and for $99 you can use your creations on a 360. So the homebrew question is out of the window.

If you're interested in trying to make your 360 into some super media center device... well it already does that legitimately. If you need more than what it offers... you're a tech head. If you're a tech head you probably have a pc that can connect directly to your TV.

As far as backing up games. I'm highly skeptical. I'm sure a MASSIVE portion of people backed up games that they purchased... and then had something like Gamefly where they backed up every game that they rented. Just in case the disc broke while they rented it or it was scratched... ;)

Comment by: joonbugg (Nov 16, 2008 06:10)

I know Im really in the minority, but I could care less about the bans. My 360 has been banned for about 18 months now, and the only games I played on Live were UNO and occasionally Hardwood Spades. I dont play other games on live, because to many people just quit anyways. All I play is sports games and GTA, thats it. I got well over 100 backups for the 360, but I dont look at it as taking anything from M$, because I would have only bought maybe 2 or 3 games anyways. I have had my PS3 for over a year now, and the only games I have bought for it are GTA4, MLB the Show 08, and NBA 2k9. Thats it. I have only logged into Playstation Network 3 or 4 times since I have had my PS3. Im just not into online play. Like I said, I know im in the minority.

Comment by: noopeeela (Nov 16, 2008 10:03)

Hello all

So is it the firm ware that gets you banned or is the pre-release game saves that get the console banned? As i know the acheivements are backed up with the server everytime you log on to xbl for the game tag recovery. Also does this mean if you use that hard drive on a flashed console playing pre-release games and then conect to xbl on an unflahed one that could mean that console could be banned also, although it is for intensive purposes "clean" but you are admiting guilt of playing dodgy games. Can some one with a bit more knowledge clarify this for me as i dont know if to buy and arcade or premium to go back on line with.

thanks

nooop

Comment by: heraldsun (Nov 17, 2008 21:40)

Originally posted by EricCarr:

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I know a kid in Australia who was banned and does not have any modded firmware. When his dad contacted M$, he was banned for modded console.

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Exactly, I was reading through the posts to see if someone had mentioned this, I to know of people with unmodded 360's(firmware mods etc,etc)and they have been banned too.so is it random banning or is it really a ban for modded 360's ? I would be interested to know if the people that are getting banned and have legit consoles if they in actual fact have refurbished units sold off as new

Comment by: Brian0423 (Nov 18, 2008 01:54)

a guy who modded my xbox informed me of certain games that are "nuked". games with a strand of code in them that cannot be copied. which is how they find you to band you when you play online. i was told it was COD4, COD5, GOW,GOW2 and halo 3. are some of them.... you can play them once twice three times... twenty times online..but its just a matter of time till they get you.

and if you get banned. its not your name that gets banned. its the serial number on the xbox that gets banned. you can go out buy another one and log in to get your membership back.

Comment by: heraldsun (Nov 18, 2008 02:07)

Originally posted by Brian0423:

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a guy who modded my xbox informed me of certain games that are "nuked". games with a strand of code in them that cannot be copied. which is how they find you to band you when you play online. i was told it was COD4, COD5, GOW,GOW2 and halo 3. are some of them.... you can play them once twice three times... twenty times online..but its just a matter of time till they get you.

and if you get banned. its not your name that gets banned. its the serial number on the xbox that gets banned. you can go out buy another one and log in to get your membership back.

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I understand all this but it still doesn't answer my question about unmodded consoles getting banned and repaired consoles being sold off as new, is this possible ?

Comment by: Brian0423 (Nov 18, 2008 02:43)

its possible, take a broken modded console that was banned for instance. kid probably had a two year warranty with best buy or circuit city, turned it in. got another...modded it...and is back online.. meanwhile that console sent back, stripped and sent back out possibly with the same SN?

not sure..kinda reachin on this one...

Comment by: heraldsun (Nov 18, 2008 03:22)

Originally posted by Brian0423:

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its possible, take a broken modded console that was banned for instance. kid probably had a two year warranty with best buy or circuit city, turned it in. got another...modded it...and is back online.. meanwhile that console sent back, stripped and sent back out possibly with the same SN?

not sure..kinda reachin on this one...

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Thanks for the reply.but as i said there are some people i know that don't have modded consoles and they have been banned, i understand about advance playing of games before the street date...but you can't with an unmodded console ? what you are talking about is what a majority of hackers and backuppers term "poison pill" in the game. as you have stated early playing this game,thats why i am kind of confused on people with legit consoles being banned and my thinking of refurbs being sold out as new if the drive doesn't need replacing i'm sure M$ won't replace it unless absolutely necassary.
it's very interesting that it only happens once a year and nearly right on the update period,granted the majority of 360's on live are modded and being banned but theres also a certain amount of unmodded 360's also getting banned.
And it takes M$ 12 months to ban these modded 360's.I can only assume why they leave it so long..monetary reasons,thats my assumption

Comment by: ChiefBrdy (Nov 18, 2008 03:45)

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Its less than a week until you can back ur 360 games up on its HDD, stop complaining, alteast M$ are now giving people that actually want to backup for safety the ability to do so.

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You'saying we'll be able to back up our games on the hard drive, I'm assuming when the new firmware comes out? Nice.

What's to stop people from putting rentals on their HDD's, then deleting them when finished?

Comment by: heraldsun (Nov 18, 2008 04:08)

Quote:

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Quote:

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Its less than a week until you can back ur 360 games up on its HDD, stop complaining, alteast M$ are now giving people that actually want to backup for safety the ability to do so.

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You'saying we'll be able to back up our games on the hard drive, I'm assuming when the new firmware comes out? Nice.

What's to stop people from putting rentals on their HDD's, then deleting them when finished?

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from what i understand this will be possible but you must have the game in the console...how this works i don't know,some people are saying the disc doesn't have to spin up or as fast something along those lines..if i am wrong someone will correct me.

Comment by: mshockey (Nov 18, 2008 08:01)

The game will have to be in the consol but it will work with a backup. It just cuts down on loading and helps the games like GTA4 that some of us experienced render issues with.

Quote:

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its possible, take a broken modded console that was banned for instance. kid probably had a two year warranty with best buy or circuit city, turned it in. got another...modded it...and is back online.. meanwhile that console sent back, stripped and sent back out possibly with the same SN?

not sure..kinda reachin on this one...

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Yes, there are modded 360's floating around out there that people don't know are modded. I personally know of at least one.... If you had a modded system and decided to sell it on ebay as a normal system then the buyer would never know it until he/she tried to put a backup in it or until he/she got banned from live. Find the person who got banned and send them a backup and let them try it....that would set all our wonders to ease.

Quote:

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a guy who modded my xbox informed me of certain games that are "nuked". games with a strand of code in them that cannot be copied. which is how they find you to band you when you play online. i was told it was COD4, COD5, GOW,GOW2 and halo 3. are some of them.... you can play them once twice three times... twenty times online..but its just a matter of time till they get you.

and if you get banned. its not your name that gets banned. its the serial number on the xbox that gets banned. you can go out buy another one and log in to get your membership back.

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The games that he is talking about were games that were leaked "deliberately"....so I've heard. COD4 was the main one I heard about. If you used an original disc for the backup then this does not apply. I have personally played COD4 hundreds of times online and never gotten banned. Same with Halo 3. I wouldn't personally ever download a game.....too easy for M$ to screw with it. But I suppose if they could do it to a downloadable game they could do it to just about any game. But if you think about it.....everyone playing the downloaded game is obviously using a burned game.....maybe M$ doesn't have a way to differentiat a good xbox from a modded xbox using a real game....maybe their system only detects the actual bug they put in the download and bans everyone who uses it. Something to think about.

Comment by: ChiefBrdy (Nov 18, 2008 13:41)

Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Its less than a week until you can back ur 360 games up on its HDD, stop complaining, alteast M$ are now giving people that actually want to backup for safety the ability to do so.

---

You'saying we'll be able to back up our games on the hard drive, I'm assuming when the new firmware comes out? Nice.

What's to stop people from putting rentals on their HDD's, then deleting them when finished?

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from what i understand this will be possible but you must have the game in the console...how this works i don't know,some people are saying the disc doesn't have to spin up or as fast something along those lines..if i am wrong someone will correct me.

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I see. It's not for backup then. It's just to make the game faster.

Comment by: DXR88 (Nov 18, 2008 15:31)

Quote:

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I see. It's not for backup then. It's just to make the game faster.

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yes, but also it saves your 747 of a dvd drive from getting hijacked by the mystical Laser burn out gremlins.

Comment by: creaky (Nov 18, 2008 15:50)

747 is right, when i first turned mine on i was worried a council (35 miles) away were going to charge me with noise abatement. Console was stood up on end on a wooden floor. Laid the console flat and luckily it's very quiet otherwise it was going back to the shop or i was buying some big furry earmuffs.

Anyways, back to mass bannings, i'm following the 'November 2008 Ban Wave' thread here - http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/717721 but so far we have 18 pages of hearsay unfortunately, not many facts as yet..

gif created by phantom69, he's a good lad
Forum Rules - http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/2487
'Verbatim Taiyo Yuden', vanilla Verbatim, vanilla Taiyo Yuden & RICOHJPNR03 are the ONLY media allowed near my Burners/standalone players

Comment by: IguanaC64 (Nov 18, 2008 19:41)

I don't own an XBox...360 or otherwise. When my kids starting playing my old PS2, I happily installed a modchip so all my kid's games could be stored on a hard drive. Kids are hell on optical media...no matter how much you try to make them take care of the disks. They don't care NEAR as much as I do when they ruin a game because they have no real concept of $$$ when they are under 10 years of age...no matter how much you try and make them earn what they have.

There is no repair for some disks...I don't care what kind of shoe polish, tooth paste, grinding, or turtle wax you choose to use.

I also enjoyed doing homebrew SNES and Genesis emulator stuff on my PS2.

...and yes..I am a tech-head...and no...a $400 PC isn't always as cost effective or reliable as a $100 used console for a media center...

Comment by: Brian0423 (Nov 18, 2008 21:53)

i know with my modded console i won't connect my xbox to live until after i read some postings if people are getting banned or not. is there a good thread or maybe even this one that people will report what the update will give us....other than the "sweet avitars" (yea right) and the "netflix" capabilities?

Comment by: creaky (Nov 18, 2008 22:01)

Originally posted by Brian0423:

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i know with my modded console i won't connect my xbox to live until after i read some postings if people are getting banned or not. is there a good thread or maybe even this one that people will report what the update will give us....other than the "sweet avitars" (yea right) and the "netflix" capabilities?

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here you go -
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_jump.cfm/717721/4373610
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/719833
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/719662

gif created by phantom69, he's a good lad
Forum Rules - http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/2487
'Verbatim Taiyo Yuden', vanilla Verbatim, vanilla Taiyo Yuden & RICOHJPNR03 are the ONLY media allowed near my Burners/standalone players

Comment by: Brian0423 (Nov 19, 2008 04:04)

thanks. i'll be checking back on it pretty much daily.


i had recently had my xbox worked on by a guy who used to be employed by microsoft to fix the red ring of death. i asked him if he thought the NXE would find the modders and ban them... he said he highly doubts it that they just want to update the dashboard to get the deal with netflix and add some avitars to compete with the wii.

as for detecting firmware for your dvd drive... he doesn't think so......but you never know.

Comment by: rrmk37 (Nov 21, 2008 18:56)

Originally posted by criptodan:

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@ DXR88 dont use bold? dont use caps? its irritating? well how bout this

I COULD CARE LESS! I PAY FOR MY GAMES, SO I WONT HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT THE BANHAMMER!! DONT WANT TO GET BANNED? DONT BE A "PIRATE". SHAME SHAME SHAME ON YOU CHILDREN! YOU WANT TO MOD YOUR GAMING MACHINE? BUY A FREGGIN PC AND MOD THAT, SILLY TURDS :)

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Yeah your so upright and true.
I dont pay to play a game because I use PS3 and unlike you wasting money mine is free.
Go flame elsewhere if you cant post something of value.

Comment by: Brian0423 (Nov 21, 2008 20:02)

lol.... that guy's pissed cause he calculated how much he spent on all his games.

Comment by: leeroy94 (Jan 10, 2009 23:40)

If you ask me the way people get caught is by playing games that are downloaded from torrent sites. M$ releases some of these games that will pay fine but gives them a flag that your playing that copy. If you want to stay on live with a modded system always get the newest firmware update that your xbox was flashed with, do not download games (if you do stay away from the ones that say seed4me) , get a kreon drive and make your own copies to play, dont get bad reps from other players giving M$ a reason to look at your profile,... thats all i got for that .... my friend has had iextream FW 1.4 for a while and has not been banned, i think it is up to 1.5 now and the drive was swapped from liteon to samsung.... the people that did the mod say that many with hatachi drives were banned but the samsung drives were the safest... hope i could help