Xbox 360 Hangs On Startup "Can't Access Storage Device"

[surfgurujeff]

Problem; my friend's xbox 360 hangs at the startup for several minutes before returning an error to the effect of, "Can't Access Storage Device; The console will restart"

First thing I did was take out the hard drive; it boots fine without the hard drive (into the dashboard).

I've been trying a few things to reformat the hard drive (20GB Hitachi);
-- Tried xplorer360... backed up the profile folders and theme folder, but I see no option for formatting
-- Tried using hddhackr, but it is meant for WD HDD's and will not recognize the original xbox 360 hdd
-- Tried deleting the cache from the cache folder, and it still hangs at startup.

Obviously I cannot format the drive from the console, because I can't get to the dashboard, so how the hell do I set this thing back to factory default from my PC!?!

Please Help!!!

[surfgurujeff]

Not too many brainyacks out there, I guess..... I actually solved the problem about 2 minutes after I posted this.

I went back to Partition 3 and deleted the Folders $System Update and $Titles Update and it worked. I assume the console downloaded new updates and it screwed everything up.

Hopefully this is of some use to somebody with the same problem.

[surfgurujeff]

Alright... this only solved the problem of booting the xbox 360 into the dashboard with the HDD installed, but it still says "No storage device found" when I go to Settings>Memory

Who knows how to reset/format this drive?  What files might be missing from these partitions?

[surfgurujeff]

OK... After long long hours of searching and losing hope, I think I'm the first person to ever fix this.  Here is what I did;

-- using xplorer360 extreme 2, I created a hddss.bin file, but it didn't work by itself when restored. I also backed up the gamer profile folders in Partition 3 > Content

-- I followed the directions here ---> http://www.xboxhacker.net/index.php?topic=12062.0;wap2 to wipe my 20GB Hitachi HTS541020G9SA00 clean. 

-- After those steps I used hddhackr with the command "hddhackr c FD00(address of drive may differ) A00" to create the 0,2, and 3 partitions.

-- I downloaded various hddss.bin for 20GB HItachi hard drives, but looking in WinHex, none of them were the same model as my drive. 

-- After restoring every 20GB hddss.bin image I could get my hands on, none of them made my 20GB Hitachi HDD recognizable inside of my xbox 360. The original hddss.bin obviously didn't work, either, since it was made while the hdd was having problems.

SO! Here's where the important bit comes in!!!

-- First, I wiped the hard drive clean for the 10th time (UGH!), and partitioned it using HDDHACKR.

-- I then opened my old hddss.bin backup using WinHex and went to Position > Go To Offset and type "2000" and selected the blocks from 00002000 to 00002CC0 (my theory is that this is the important drive model and firmware information) then went to Edit > Copy Block > Normally

-- Next, I opened the downloaded Hitachi 20GB HDDSS.BIN (not from the same model of Hitachi drive) and placed my cursor at the very first block of 00000000, and clicked Edit > Clipboard Data > Write

       --Now I have a hybrid HDDSS.BIN image file.

-- I then clicked File > Restore Image, selected the hybrid hddss.bin file, then selected the physical drive (Hitachi HTS541020G9SA00), with the options "Simultaneous I/O" and "Copy Entire Medium" selected, and in the box "Start Sector (Destination)" I entered "16".

-- After restoring the image I put the hard drive into the xbox 360 and BAM!  It recognized it!!! I formatted using the console option, then hooked it back up to my PC and restored the game profile folders and now everything is 100%!

I really hope this helps somebody else that had given up on their drive!  Contact me if you need the hddss.bin for a Hitachi 20GB HTS541020G9SA00 hard drive!