Salvage broken xbox's hdd

[bule666]

Hello,
What happend, ..had a hard modd xbox, which broke. I remeber using slayer to setup, which I still have. I want to see if its possible to recover the 160 gig hdd, without formatting hdd or loose data. Of course the mobo on this xbox is useless, and I dont have the hdd key, to unlock the drive. I found a tutorial to jtag eeprom and you could read the hdd key, but a havent tried, that yet. Dont know if I need it. My question is, can I use another xbox, throw a modchip in it, and somehow use 160 gig hdd? I really want my .avi and game saves back. Thanks for any replies

[$$dollarz]

Use hdd regenerator, It will recover bad sectors without destroying data.

[thalungz]

hmm, what exactly is the error u get is it a msg or does the xbox not power up ? u can swap eeproms with this box and the new one (soldering and desoldering) or if u have an error messege like 21 or something like that we can try to rebuild ur C partiion with a few files i have here,

[wolf_gt21]

if your 160 GB HD was locked to begin with then you will most likely need to retrieve the password for it to unlock it.

Try hotswaping it to the other xbox with the xhip on it.

[thalungz]

you can use xboxhdm (http://www.xbox-hq.com/html/download-file-1138.html) to do the following, I hope it helps, if u dont have power on the xbox u removed the hdd from we need to try soemthing else to unlock the drive.

1. if you got a backup of your c you don't need to download latest msdash, if you don't got a backup download ms dash and keep it ready on your pc.

2. unpack xboxhdm onto your pc .

3. put ms dash in the C folder into the xboxhdmlinux folder and overwrite the ones already there.

4. In the root of xboxhdm is a file named 'make-iso-win', run this file and wait for it to finish.

5. It will make a .iso file. (burn this file with dvddecryptor), put the cd in the pc .

6. unplug the XBOX DVDROM IDE cable, take the power cable off the dvd-rom.

7. Turn on the PC, Before the PC BIOS looks for hard drives, hit the Pause/Break key. It should pause at this time.

8. Turn on the Xbox .

9. It will boot to an error code(nr 11) regarding the dvd-rom, but the hdd will be unlocked, this way you'll get xboxhdm to access it on first attempt Now remove ide from hd and swap it to the pc

10. Hit space bar to continue booting the PC. If it takes a long time to boot (several minutes), then the HD has not been unlocked.

11. you will get a menu,now choose Option 1 (by typing ‘1’) and press enter to boot VGA console with xbox-drive utilities (default). Type ‘xboxhd’ when it asks you for a login. Another list of options will show up, choose option 1 again (the one that says ‘Build a new Xbox HD from scratch’) and it will begin to format and write the partition table etc. when it asks you about C type yes and when it asks you if you would like an F select yes .

12. power down pc and xbox.

13. put the hd back in the xbox and boot.

Nice you just recovered your hard drive !!!

PS if you get a msg about a frozen drive , just disable auto detect for the drive (xboxhdm will detect the hd even if it's disabled!)

[bule666]

Well, thanks for all ur suggestions, but I dont think none will work because my box wont even power up., and I dont have hdd key to unlock it. I was thinking since I, will be getting another xbox from friend friday, his dvdrom drive doesnt work, so I will use the drive from my old box, slap it on along with chip. Will be using slayer disk again. I kinda tempted to swap eeproms, but, I rather just pay 15.00 using hdd unlock, and loose all my data if it comes to worst. But I think, I wont be able to use it on modded xbox, from what I heard, only on pc. Can you hot swap hdd to another modded xbox to retrieve data?

[bule666]

Well, thanks for all ur suggestions, but I dont think none will work because my box wont even power up., and I dont have hdd key to unlock it. I was thinking since I, will be getting another xbox from friend friday, his dvdrom drive doesnt work, so I will use the drive from my old box, slap it on along with chip. Will be using slayer disk again. I kinda tempted to swap eeproms, but, I rather just pay 15.00 using hdd unlock, and loose all my data if it comes to worst. But I think, I wont be able to use it on modded xbox, from what I heard, only on pc. Can you hot swap hdd to another modded xbox to retrieve data?

Oh, and I dont have no back up of c/or e partitions, of this drive. But my friend does, from his modded box. In case I may need them. Thanks for all your replies.

[champman]

Man just put the drive in your computer as a slave and copy/burn the files you want. I remember doing this to make a copy of my original xbox drive in order to clone it.

goodluck

might want to visit x-box scene ... etal.

[normsbro]

is the hd screwed?? if it's just your xbox wont power up, just do the swap with your friends un-modded (??) xbox, like you said your working dvd drive and 160 gig hd into his plus your modchip and you should be good to go no need to use the slayers disc....unless his xbox is a version 1.6, then you may have to do some extra work?

[bule666]

is the hd screwed?? if it's just your xbox wont power up, just do the swap with your friends un-modded (??) xbox, like you said your working dvd drive and 160 gig hd into his plus your modchip and you should be good to go no need to use the slayers disc....unless his xbox is a version 1.6, then you may have to do some extra work?

Oooh, thats what talking about.:p I think his might be one of the newer version xbox, wont know till I open the sucker up. Mine was ver.1.1, if thats the case, what kind of extra modifications, needs to be done on this, or where can I get info. Really, appreciate your feedback.

p.s. I thought this couldnt be done since hd unique key is stored in mobo eeprom, and somehow to boot up it will need the key, retrieved it from eeprom chip, I hope im just clueless on that notion.

[normsbro]

what mod chip do you have?

[bule666]

what mod chip do you have?

I got X2.B3 pro, think its xecuter?

[GeordieCA]

The original xbox drives were locked. Then the original xbox bios checked for that.
Your bigger replacement drive doesn't need to be locked. The modchips take care of that.
The only way your replacement HD would be locked is if YOU locked it. This was done if you wanted to use the original MS dashboard & Live (If my memory goes back that far).
If you locked it you should have the unlock key.
On the off chance that you didn't put it in a safe place, use this :)

hddunlock.com