Ok ice, I'm sure everyone appreciates your enthusiasm and desire to help, but this topic is well covered.

One good example:
http://www.xboxhacker.net/index.php?topic=11209.0

The USB on the CK3 is for the USB to Serial (to TTL) for retrieving the key from liteons.  Nothing is actually sent to the liteon over serial.  You still need to connect to the liteon via SATA to issue commands and to upload new firmware.

A seriously round-about connection to try would be (assuming your laptop has a SATA HD):
Connect the DVD-Rom via SATA to where your HD normally connects, power it with some external power adapter, and boot to a USB device to flash in DOS.  Of course, you couldn't use a USB to Serial adapter in DOS, so unless your laptop has a real serial port (few new ones do) you'd still need a serial card (not USB!) and pray it's compatible.

Seems easier to just order the card from the UK.  Or get your hands on a desktop.

Edit: Kind of makes me want to boot my laptop into Windows from a USB device, so I could use the USB to serial and flash a liteon, just to say I pulled it off.

Edit 2: I actually tried this a couple weeks ago, and I couldn't get my Inspiron 1520 to boot Windows from a USB drive.  It kept bluescreening on the restart during install.  Maybe I should use my already installed windows from USB?  Maybe one of thise bootable Windows Discs (PE, Bart's, etc) would work?

NOT the Bible

From my post here: http://www.xboxhacker.net/index.php?topic=11186.msg72769#msg72769

"Yes, the textbook tutorial is a great guide, good searching.  It's the guide you want unless you have a 79 Hitachi or a liteon.

For the 79 Hitachi, go find Podger's guide: podger.pdf - The Textbook is outdated for this drive (You don't need the passkey)
For the Liteon, go find the NOOB liteon flash guide. - The Textbook doesn't cover flashing this drive at all I think."

There's been alot of discussion about fan mods and there is no proof that anyone has ever been banned for it.  (see my sig for a funny post about it)

Replacing the laser won't get you banned, but I still wonder about the random closing of the tray.

Why no eBay?

Two minutes of searching:
http://www.modchip-store.co.uk/xbox-Case-Blue-p-81.html

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I wonder if kierandonnelly will even read this (not banned yet?)

Look for the textbook tutorial 2008.  It covers iPrep using a few different methods.

Well, I think I found a part, 1204 Right Angle Bi-color:
http://solidstate-lighting.com/index.php?option=com_aboc&no=302002

Here are datasheets for the first two on the page:
Super Blue/Super Yellow: http://solidstate-lighting.com/pdffiles/SMT/BL-HB4KB34B-TRB.pdf
Super Blue/Super Amber: http://solidstate-lighting.com/pdffiles/SMT/BL-HB5JF34B-TRB.pdf

Now if I can find anyone selling that part number...

Edit:  American Bright LED sells them, with a minimum order of $250, which isn't bad, but I'm not looking to resell.

Edit: This is a damn frustrating search.  No wonder no one else has covered this.  Also, when did the modify button start showing up?

It looks like they are 1204 right angle bi-color red/green leds.  Now if I could only find some that are red/blue.  I want blue lights normally, but I still want my red error lights.

Mouser seems to have failed me, which is unusual, but I'm looking elsewhere.  I've found some direct replacement red/green leds, but not red/blue.  I'd settle for [almost anything)/blue really.

Well, I don't think there's anything in the liteon that says Microsoft.  It'd be nice if pecanrican05 could clarify.

Oh, the paperclip didn't fall on the DVD-rom drive but the motherboard?  Yeah, I guess I glossed over that.

Looks like the prospect isn't good.  If you could repair the board yourself, you probably wouldn't have asked here, and anyone that can repair it (if possible) would probably cost more than the board is worth.  I hope someone else proves me otherwise.

Wow, that really highlights the volatility of the drives.  Were you using the paperclip to bridge R707, or did it just fall from something?

I've seen many threads from people with fried liteons (from power plug upside down) and alot of work done to try and diagnose and repair enough to dump a key.  Some have been very thorough, but I haven't read any success stories.  Yours didn't go out the same way, so it may not be applicable to you.

Try and dump the key.  If it dumps, then you're good, buy a new drive.  If it doesn't dump, then you're out of luck.  Any answers you'd get about your drive's condition would be speculation.

I was wondering if the Ring of Light / RF board was common among all board versions or are they different?  I want to do a light mod on my ring of light, but would rather make my first attempt on an extra board.  They are selling on eBay really cheaply.

Also, is there no direct replacement LEDs that fit the form factor of the originals?  I see many people refer to 0603's, but that is only one color, and you can't wire in a secondary without some kind of jumper or extension.  I would only do the mod if I would be keeping my error lights.

I initially assumed that the reason people were using non-SMD leds was the ease of soldering, but is it because there isn't the proper SMD replacement part and the through-hole style lets you bend the legs to where is needed?

I guess there is room on the outer four lights for the larger leds, and the center is only one color anyway.

So a 0603 for the center and a common cathode of some sort for the others?

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I think I'm close to finding a suitable direct replacement on mouser, (right angle, bi color, common cathode) but I'm not there yet.

So the videomode is never a problem with the 360?

Is there no actual difference between the PAL and NTSC version of a 360 game, or does the box just handle it?

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I've never quite grasped this in the newer game consoles.  With the Wii, you can 'force' the videomode of a game to PAL or NTSC, and it only sometimes works.  Also, if you're using HD of some sort (720P, 1080i), is PAL and NTSC even applicable?

I understand why it would matter for a movie, it's all recorded or prerendered at a specific resolution and frames per second.  But a video game, should play at many different resolutions, why do they get labeled PAL or NTSC?  Are games hardcoded to a certain resolution or framerate and get scaled to whatever output you use?

Yes, the caps lock hurts my ears.  The lack of punctuation hurts my brain, and makes that whole post hard to read.

You're trying to use the Hitachi from a dead console in your other console that came with an BenQ?  Is that right?

Just putting the BenQ's key on the Hitachi is not enough.  You will need to dump the firmware from the BenQ for your key, then spoof the Hitachi to act as a BenQ. 

Oops, sorry about that Yoni, I misread.

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I'll ask something while we're on the topic.  Any game that you want to play on your console must match your region, contain your region, or be region-free.  Got that.

Are all PAL games compatible with NTSC consoles, and Vice-Versa, assuming they are region-free?  Or is it hit and miss?  Or not at all?

I've seen a big compatibility matrix for the Wii, and the NTSC <-> PAL thing seems hit or miss.  So what about in the 360?

This link will explain Pal and NTSC:
http://tinyurl.com/dl6hb8

Wow, thanks torne!  That's incredibly informative.  That's why I decided to ask here instead of somewhere like Yahoo! Answers. (Bunch of retards)  From searching I can't find data that means anything in the real world.  So I asked.

I think I'll have to read through that a couple more times to digest it all.

Here's what I got so far:
Dual channel is better than not, but doesn't mean much.  There can be some benefit to matched pairs in the right slots on compatible motherboards, but only enthusiasts/fanatics should be troubled with changing it if it's not already utilized.

Paging to disk isn't intrinsically bad.  Don't worry about trying to add enough memory so that the swapfile is never used.

Seeing absolute memory usage is terribly difficult.

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Do I ever get to the point where I'm staring at my screen as my computer slows to a crawl and I hear my harddrive grinding away?  No.
Do I ever get to the point where I'm waiting on my computer at all?  Not really.  I think my RAM is fine.

Giga, I thought that a certain efuse specified your console as a devkit, but going from devkit to retail was one-way only.  If you could re-program the efuse via JTAG, then you could possibly make your retail console act as a devkit?  Too bad it doesn't seem possible.

So my Dell Inspiron 1520 takes Windows 7 beta 64-bit just fine.  Even my bluetooth works.  I haven't installed anything except firefox yet, though.  I'll probably be trying out XBC later today.

I'd like some more opinions on a few things.  Removing the page file altogether... if you have "enough ram" is this ok?  I mean, if you can handle everything you need in ram, is there ever a good reason to page anything?

If you are using a 32-bit OS, is it better to put 2 2GB sticks in, than a 1GB and a 2GB? Or 3 1GBs?  (Assuming you have a video card >512MB) Doesn't dual channel require an even number of like sticks?  Does dual channel matter anymore?

The most multitasking my home desktop sees is probably Dreamweaver with a few pages open, Photoshop with a few web-graphics open, Internet Explorer with a few pages open, firefox with two pages open, BulletProof FTP, and maybe Winamp playing.  Across two screens.  Would a heavy game have more/less memory usage than this?

If windows does such a bad job of showing me what it's using, are there any other apps that do better?

I remember reading about Vista's apperant excessive memory usage.  People were complaining that Vista was using dramatically more memory than XP ever did, and it was explained that although Vista does use more for just itself, it also attempts to use all memory not needed by applications as cache.  That is, the more you have available, the more it uses as cache.  Not a bad thing, but it can make it look at first glance like you NEVER have enough memory no matter how much you throw in.

Thoughts?

I've only seen that message about Xbox1 games as well, hence my questions.

*shrug*