Flashing your original firmware to an identical drive should be Live safe.  Any other drive will have to be spoofed.  May or may not be safe.

Options:
1. Flash original firmware on identical drive, have loud dvd-rom, be safe on Live.
2. Spoof quieter drive, risk being banned on Live.

Some people report other brands working great for them, while others say the same discs don't play for them at all.  It also depends on which drive you have as to how picky it will be.  So, it will be hit or miss.  I haven't heard anyone say that the MIS Verbs didn't work for them while something else did.

If you want to take the time and find a cheaper brand that will work for you, sample around.  Other's results may not be the same for you.

If I'm reading that correctly:
DVD-10 (12cm, DS/SL): 8.75 gig (9.4 G), about 4.5 hours

These discs are not dual layered, they are single layered, DUAL SIDED.  Basically like having two single-sided glued back-to-back.  So it's 4.7GB per side, not enough to burn a proper backup.

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Edited.. because I don't pay attention.

Two parts:
1. You'll need to read the firmware from your original drive.  You need the key specific to your system to put on the new drive.
2. If the new drive is not the same type, you will need to spoof the original type with the new drive you intend to use.

As far as playing on live... If you flash with third party firmware (to read backups) you must accept eventually getting your console banned from Live.  There is always the risk of this if you flash.  Especially if you're spoofing.  If you don't want to play backups, your best bet is to get the same drive type as you had originally, and flash your original firmware back onto it.

I'm not sure if there are specific tutorials for spoofing.  I haven't run across any, but then again, I haven't been looking.

Verbatim, made in Singapore.

Ok, that link in the first post used to point to another forum (Easy360Mods), and now it's rapidshare...  in case my first comment doesn't make sense anymore.  I'm not in need of this card, or else I would have signed up to see.

The card shown at maplin.co.uk looks very generic and doesn't list a brand or chipset or anything.  For those outside the UK, looking for a card in country, the guide posted at the above link (and Easy360Mods) says it must be a VIA6421 chipset.  The specific drivers are on their site and included in the rapidshare link also.

To be clear, I'm not saying that people shouldn't register at the other site.  I'm all for supporting any team when you benefit form their work.  I just didn't have the need for this outside of casual curiosity.  If you guys do use the information and use your laptop to flash, then feel free to shoot over to easy360mods and click an ad to two.  The guide was written by them, not just hosted there.

Oops, that last post should read:

Like I said before, there are no guarantees with a flashed drive

Once you get banned, your console can never be unbanned.  No online multi-player, and no other feratures of Xbox Live at all.  No downloading demos, none of those neat videos from Live, nothing.

You can buy a new console and continue using your profile.  Your profile is not banned.

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As far as I know, all of the DVD-rom drives can be reverted back to their original firmware except the new liteon.  You must have extracted the original and saved it somewhere before you flash.  That being said, there isn't any proof that going back will save you from being banned.  Perhaps, perhaps not.

A few things to think about:  People seem to get banned in waves.  That is, accounts get flagged for playing backups and such, and later MS bans all these accounts at once.  If you get caught, and your account gets flagged for banning, nothing you change after that will save you.  Not going back to original firmware, playing only originals, nothing.  Also, there's no way to tell when you've been flagged.  Could be your very first time.

Also, there's alot of speculation about how much info about your offline activities is stored on your Xbox and uploaded to live on your next connection.  I haven't seen anything conclusive, but the idea is that when you play a backup offline, your console stores what info it wants about that disc, the SS timing and such, and the next time you do connect to play a legit disc, it uploads that info.

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Like I said before, there are guarantees with a flashed drive.  Once you flash it, there is always a risk.  You can lessen your risks by being smart, but there's always a risk.

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Ways to be smart:
1. Back up your own discs, and only play your own backups.
  The reason I say this is that when you download a game, you have no idea what you're getting.  It could be a pre-release, it could have the wrong SS info for the game, or it could not be stealthed at all.  These will get you banned.  If you buy a copied game from someone or get it from a friend, you don't know where they got it or how they ripped it.  Same thing.
2. Don't download pirated crap.
  For the same reason as #1.  Also, the discussion of piracy is not tolerated on these forums.
3. Use the newest firmware/software.
  The newest firmware has the newest anti-detection methods.  The newest backup software makes the images with all the features needed for the firmware.

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I wish I could sticky this thread.  All the first questions answered in one place.

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.

To be clear, there isn't really any difference between xbox models (Arcade, Elite, etc) or it's age as far as flashing goes.  It all comes down to which dvd-rom drive you have in it.  If you bought a new Xbox recently, it probably has a liteon.  You can tell which drive you have without even opening up the case.  You can tell by looking at the trays and/or the color wires visible when you take of the faceplate.  Once it's open, you can just look at the model number on the drive.

Depending on which drive you have, you may want to buy a tool such as the CK3 or the Maximus Extractor.  For the liteon, you have to have a TTL to Serial adapter, and those two products work well.  If you have the technical skills and don't plan on doing alot of drives, you can always make your own.

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Also, when you go to plug the little power cable into the drive make sure the thing isn't upside-down before it goes anywhere near the connector.  Many, many people have irreversibly fried their drive this way.  If the drive gets fried before you have the key, the whole Xbox is useless.  Just pay attention.

99% of people will say it's the inverter.  Probably right most of the time.  I've fixed three laptops that way.

When you say replaced the backlight, you mean... the bulbs?

Also, I know I must be wrong but... Tell me you shorted the fuse because it measured 0.00 Ohms.

That site requires you to register before you can even read.

I'm assuming there is a PCMCIA to eSATA adapter confirmed working for flashing?  I've seen people ask, but never anything confirmed to work.  I'd love to see the model posted here, same for an expresscard solution.

But I'm not registering there just for that.

WOW.  FFS have you even looked at any other thread on this whole forum?!?

*Breathe*

Ok, first find out which drive you have in your xbox.

Second, read up on how to flash your type of drive.  Yes, you have to flash.

Third, get a kreon drive, and Xbox Backup Creator.  Make backups.  Burn with any burner that does dual-layer.  Burn on Verbatims made in Singapore.

As far as playing online... yes and no.  Yes you can, but only until you're banned.  There is no guaranteed way to not get banned except not flashing and playing backups.  If you play backups you take the risk.  You can't have it both ways.  I don't care what you read elsewhere.  I don't care if you unplug the network cable and flash back and forth, etc.  Especially since you can't even flash back with the newest drive anyway.

That being said, if you rip only your own games and don't download pirated crap, you stand a better chance.  But still, not 100%.

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Now, don't ask one more question until you've done some reading.  It's obvious you didn't even look for any answers at all before you posted here.  Don't ask where do I download this, where do I find that.  If you get stuck on something specific, THEN ask.

These forums are great.  You can find info on almost everything  you need to know about the 360 here.  In the rare times that something hasn't already been covered, there are some brilliant minds here that can help.  Sometimes, less than brilliant people (like myself) can point you in the right direction.  The thing that happens too much here and what nobody likes is when so many people on their very first post ask the same freaking questions.  They have been answered.  There are probably 50 threads just like yours, from other people, with the answers to all your questions.  Go look

*breathe*

Maybe there should be a restriction on posting until people have read at least a certain number of threads or something.  I got all the info I needed for flashing my drive from this site and never asked a single question about the process.  I'm not saying that people shouldn't have to ask questions, the people here are happy to help when you get stuck, but you should make an effort to help yourself first.  When you ask questions without so much as an attempt to look, you're basically telling everyone here that your time is more valuable than everyone else's.

The original xbox and the 360 are different animals.

To help you on your way:  On the 360 the dvd-rom is paired to your motherboard by a dvd key.  No two consoles have the same one and the xbox will only play games if the drive and the motherboard have the same one.

If you want to use a different dvd-rom drive, you must read the info from the original drive that came with the box, and write it to the drive you want to use.  There is no way to read or write this info to/from the motherboard.  You must get the key from your original drive BEFORE you flash it with anything.

Also, if you want to use a drive that is not the same drive type as the original, BenQ, Liteon, Hitatchi, etc.  then you must "spoof" the original drive.  That is, make the new drive look like the old drive type in firmware.

There are guides and tutorials around to show you how to do all this, good luck.

If you ripped games with your xbox dvd-rom, wouldn't you have to flash the firmware each time?  Once for ripping, then once back again to play?  Kreon drives are not so expensive that I would want to A go through all the hassle and B brick my drive because I was careless (complacent) on my 20th time.  A kreon drive is a better investment than a blaster for most people just wanting to do backups.  The whole process is faster, doesn't occupy your xbox while ripping, and you don't need to drag your XBox over to a computer.

With a Kreon, the only reason you'd have to reflash your dvd-rom is when a new iX firmware comes out, which would be optional and not very often at all, so the blaster wouldn't be needed.

I'm sure there are scenarios that make the blaster very useful (esp if you're writing/testing firmware) but for most people not so much.

Back to the discussion before, about where to get the MIS Verbatims.  I looked at the 20 pack at newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817130008

and alot of reviews made mention of them being MIS.  I took a chance and ordered a pack, got them today and they were MIS.  The pack was only $23.99 with free shipping (and no tax for me).  I'm not saying that it's 100% guaranteed, but according to the reviews is seems to have been consistant so far.

To clarify, I think what gadget was saying was that the connector that goes from the dvdrom to the motherboard does not have wires in positions 1 & 2.  These are the pins that the serial line go to, so no, even with the bridge, it's still not connected to the motherboard.

It sounds like he was confusing the Official Xbox Harddrive with the USB harddrive on posts about size.  The harddrive that snaps on top of your case can be formatted no larger than 120GB, but the USB drive you plug into a USB port can be as big as you want.  The difference is you can't store games, games demos, save games, etc on the USB drive.

One other thing to mention is that the although the Xbox will play your movies off of the USB drive, it doesn't play every type of video file out there.  Enough for most people, but just something to think about if it plays some movies and not others.

It sounds like you are like me and like to be very informed before you even start a project.  This is not a bad thing, but swapping out the drive's PCB will be very obvious once you take open the case.

The DVD-Roms drives are linked to your motherboard by a security key.  You cannot simply swap out the drive with one that has a different key and have it work straight away.  You can make it work, but you must do one of two things:

1. Like Giga said, swap the circuitboard on the dvd-roms.  The key is stored on the flash on this board.  If you move the board to your new drive, it will have your key and it will work.  You must have the exact same model drive for this to work!  You didn't specify why you were swapping, so I'm going to assume bad laser, or other mechanical failure.  Obviously if the board itself was your problem, this won't work out for you.

2. Read the firmware off of your old drive and flash it onto your new drive.  You should be able to find guides on flashing if you search for them.

WTF?  This is January!  Are you guys south of the equator?