Timing Attack XBox 360 Kernel downgrade

posted Sep 22nd 2007 11:40pm by Will O'Brien
filed under: xbox hacks

[Xantium] let me know about the latest from the XBox Scene. The attack that was just a proof of concept is now a fully released hack. [Robinsod] released details on how to perform the ‘Timing Attack’ in order to downgrade the 360s kernel to a hackable version. The hack requires an infectus mod chip, a PIC interface built around a 16F876A and a software package to get things rolling. The big deal is that you can now downgrade your 360 from any kernel to an exploitable version. Considering the previous limitations, this is pretty exciting news for the homebrew crowd.

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Comments [11]

Reader Comments

I have a modded xbox (not 360). I love it, xbox media center allows me to put games, videos, emulators, anything I want on it. With a 250 gb hard drive upgrade, it is a home media pc.

I’d buy a 360 immediately if I could do the same (so I could play 360 games).

Do you think this is going to happen? (hard drive upgrade and access similar to the 1st gen xbox)

Posted at 12:01 pm on Sep 23rd, 2007 by dave

I want to mod my xbox (original), but I have no idea which mod chip to use or where to buy it. Any suggestions? It’s pretty ironic that XBMC on the original xbox can do so much more that the crippled xbox 360 media center XD

Posted at 2:24 pm on Sep 23rd, 2007 by Greg

@greg
You no longer have to buy modchips for the original Xbox. Follow the softmod technique and you won’t even have to open your box up. I’ve ran XBMC on my box for ages and have never installed a modchip.
Google xbox softmod and you should find all the info you need.

-steve

Posted at 5:38 pm on Sep 23rd, 2007 by Steve

@dave
no i dont think there will be any big scene for xbox360.
XBMC has said that they wont port to the 360 becus it’s to much hassel to run anything on it. even with this you still need to exploit it with the game crack at every boot and the security is pretty god so you cant switch dashboard and such tah you could with the old xbox.
however the xbmc port to linux is starting to get some where and a media pc isnt that expensive if your not heavy in to gaming that is

Posted at 5:58 pm on Sep 23rd, 2007 by dizzey

I still haven’t bought a PS3, or X360, and probably won’t till GTA IV or another open play next gen game is published. It’ll be fun to mess with the firmware though.

From what I read this exploit doesn’t handle bad blocks well, and in some cases corrupts itself.

I personally find the testing being done on the latest firmware interesting. If the chip interfaces support dumping and restamping -in theory more streamline solutions should be possible. There’s also memory corruption attacks which are just plain fun to mess with; especially with obscure shellcode.

Posted at 9:48 pm on Sep 23rd, 2007 by TJHooker

If you want media features buy a ps3 and run linux on it , thats what it is designed to do.

Posted at 3:53 pm on Sep 25th, 2007 by Brandon

#6 you have a good point, but the PS3 hardware is slower when it comes to 3D arithmetic from what all the bench testers are saying.

I’m still sticking with my v14 PS2 with a DMS4 S.E. chip. It plays the same non-fps titles as a PS3. I’ve always went with sony prior to my current x360 preference though.

If it wasn’t for the supposed bottleneck in BUS bandwidth I’d still be with sony.

Posted at 1:46 pm on Sep 26th, 2007 by TJHooker

Yes! but do you have any guesses?

Posted at 6:38 am on Sep 27th, 2007 by Allison

lmao..My reply to number 7 which was number 6 is now above his, and my post took his place. That has to be a bug.

Posted at 1:52 pm on Sep 27th, 2007 by TJHooker

I think the 360 homebrew/hacking community will never get anywhere near as big as the original Xbox. I had a softmodded Xbox that went tits-up on me (probably a heat issue from leaving it running all the damn time), which I loved — XBMC is probably one of the best media solutions you can find for any price. The difference is, even when it was current-gen, you could get a used Xbox for a lot less than 200 bucks. The 360 is coming down in price, but the cheapest recertified Core system is still about $215 + shipping, then you’ve got to add a hard drive, which now uses a proprietary connector, so add $$$$.

And you’re pretty much stuck getting a new one to hack, if you’re a gamer, because hacking invariably breaks Live, and nobody wants a 360 without Live these days — and I can’t blame ‘em. If you have to choose between hacking and two or three free demos a week, plus Arcade, plus movies/tv shows, all for free (not to mention online play if you have Gold)… well, the sad fact is, you’re not going to find a lot of people that choose Linux, at least not for their “primary” 360.

Back when I softmodded my Xbox, things were different. Nowadays, for $250 I can throw together a PC that’s perfectly capable of running something like Ubuntu at a good clip, with a DVI output, as my on-the-cheap HTPC. I don’t need to go running any timing attacks on my 360. For better or worse, I think the PS3 is the hacker’s choice for this generation, and will probably stay that way.

Posted at 4:46 pm on Sep 27th, 2007 by James

I wanna downgrade to find my true console serial ?

Posted at 6:08 pm on Nov 15th, 2009 by crazy Friedrick