Billet Machining A Special Xbox

September 15, 2022 by Jenny List 12 Comments

The world of console modding has delivered us some amazing projects over the years, usually rendering an original into a completely different form factor. [Modified] has done a special bit of console modding on an Xbox Series X, with the unusual result of keeping exactly the same form factor. What makes it special? His Series X has been given a new case, almost identical to the original, but instead of molded plastic it’s machined entirely from a single billet of aluminium stock.

From one perspective it’s a slightly crazy endeavor — pushing the limits of his mill to remove 90% of the stock. But from another it’s an interesting tale of how to approach such a project, of the challenges in reaching further into a workpiece than the tooling is designed for, and also of the cooling for the Xbox itself. Sure he could have made it from aluminium plate and screwed it together, but in doing so he’d have denied us the chance to follow a machining adventure.

The result is an Xbox that’s nominally the same as when it left the factory, but which looks so much cooler. Oddly the aluminum doesn’t act as a heatsink because the console is air-cooled, but particularly on the bottom there are more holes than were found in the original. On the front is an engraving of Master Chief from Halo 2‘s cover art which really puts the finishing touch on the build — though we wonder whether it might benefit from a little resin to make it stand out a bit.

Hungry for more Series X case mods? They don’t come bigger than this one!

Continue reading “Billet Machining A Special Xbox” →

The controller being held in its creator's hand after the modification's been done. The controller is painted in blue-white-black camo-like style. Analog sticks are sticking out where the buttons used to be

Oops! All Analog Sticks

September 3, 2022 by Arya Voronova 1 Comment

Knowing his friend is a first-person shooter enthusiast, [Solderking] came up with a unique modified XBox controller as a gift. Tongue in cheek, you could argue that this controller is fully analog, as all of the buttons have been removed and replaced with analog sticks — each stick emulating four different buttons with its four different directions.

For this mod, he picked a controller known to have button connections available on testpoints. The controller’s buttons are digital inputs, but a bit of additional resistance wasn’t a problem for the IC in charge. Having tested that to be extra sure, he started the rebuilding work. As any self-respecting one-off mod, the bulk of this project involved JB Weld, point-to-point soldering of wires and taking a Dremel to the shell. That said, this project pays attention to detail, with portions of potentiometer track material carefully scraped off so that contact couldn’t be made in center position, and 3D printed spacers keeping the looks within the “gift-worthy” boundary.

After finishing the controller, [Solderking] tested it to confirm that it was absolutely atrocious to use, and breathed a sigh of relief, with yet another mod well done. We’ve already covered a few of his other fun efforts, like this Pokemon Ruby Nintendo cartridge restoration project where some delicate soldering was called for, or this broken mouse turned 12-key macropad.

Continue reading “Oops! All Analog Sticks” →

Giant Xbox Series X Works Like A Real One

June 25, 2022 by Lewin Day 10 Comments

Like most home consoles, the Xbox Series X was specifically designed to fit neatly in the average home theater unit. [Michael Pick] thought that wasn’t quite big enough, and set out to build the world’s largest working Xbox Series X himself.

The build was in part inspired by a Microsoft creation: a large fridge in the shape of an Xbox Series X. However, [Michael] wanted to go further, maintaining the gaming functionality and more faithfully recreating details like the divot on the top of the console.

Carefully positioned servos press the Xbox’s buttons

The first step was to build a big wooden frame, with wooden panels screwed on to create the basic form of the console. Creating the lovely curved and perforated top was done by 3D printing a series of pieces that were all glued together to emulate the feature on the real console itself. The back was also given fake giant ports that look just like the real thing.

The real hack is inside, though. The Xbox hardware itself just sits inside the frame on a little shelf. There’s a handful of servo motors set up to press the real console’s buttons when the corresponding buttons are pressed on the giant Xbox itself. It goes a long way to making the build feel “real” to the user.

The final build measures over 2 meters (6.5 feet) tall and 1 meter wide, weighing in at a total of 113 kg (250 lbs). It was good enough to win [Michael] a Guinness World Record for his trouble. The build was later donated to a local youth center in Georgia.

We’ve seen [Michael]’s giant builds before, too; his 300%-sized Nerf Gun was a particular highlight. Video after the break.

Continue reading “Giant Xbox Series X Works Like A Real One” →

Picture of the modification as it's being performed, with an extra chip stacked on top of the original, extra magnet wire connection going to the chip select line pin

Original XBox V1.6 RAM Upgrade Stacks TQFP Chips

June 6, 2022 by Arya Voronova 11 Comments

RAM upgrades for the original XBox have been a popular mod — you could relatively easily bump your RAM from 64MB to 128MB. While it wouldn’t give you any benefit in most games written to expect 64MB, it does help with emulators, game development, and running alternative OSes like Linux. The XBox PCB always had footprints for extra RAM chips, so RAM upgrades were simple – just get some new RAM ICs and solder them onto the board. However, in the hardware revision 1.6, these footprints were removed, and RAM upgrades on v1.6 were always considered impossible.

[Prehistoricman] brings a mod that makes RAM upgrades on v1.6 possible using an old trick from the early days of home computers. He’s stacking new RAM chips on top of the old ones and soldering them on in parallel. The overwhelming majority of the RAM lines are shared between chips, which is what makes this mod possible – all you need to connect to the extra chips is magnet wire for extra RAM chip select lines, which are, thankfully, still available on the board. He shares a tutorial with plenty of illustrations, so it should be easier for you to perform this mod, in case you’re stuck with a newer console that doesn’t have the RAM chip footprints left onboard.

We just covered an original XBox softmodding tutorial, so this is as timely as ever! If you’re looking to read about the 128MB mod, this is a good place to start.

We thank [DjBiohazard] for sharing this with us!

Softmod An Xbox, And Run Your Own Software

June 5, 2022 by Donald Papp 17 Comments

The original Xbox might be old hardware, but that doesn’t mean it’s not worth messing with. Wonder what it takes to softmod an original Xbox? Modding is essentially jailbreaking, and softmodding is doing it using an entirely software-driven process, with no need to crack open the case or mess with electronics.

Don’t let that fool you into thinking the process requires nothing more than pressing a button; it’s actually quite involved, but more accessible now that [ezContents] has published a comprehensive walkthrough for softmodding an original Xbox, complete with loads of screenshots and photos.

The process uses a softmodding tool but that’s only the first step. Making the magic happen comes from installing a carefully crafted save file to the console, booting with an exploited game disk, and then installing software that the manufacturer doesn’t want on the hardware, via a process that the manufacturer doesn’t want to happen. Considering that, it’s expected to have to jump through a few hoops.

Now that your original Xbox is freed from its shackles without having to crack open the case, maybe crack it open anyway and check it for leaking caps and internal RTC batteries before it dies a corrosive death.

Xbox Flexure Joystick Puts You In The Pilot’s Seat

August 11, 2021 by Tom Nardi 6 Comments

With the recent release of Microsoft Flight Simulator on the Xbox Series X|S there’s never been a better time to get a flight stick for the console, and as you might imagine, there are a number of third party manufacturers who would love to sell you one. But where’s the fun in that?

If you’ve got a fairly well tuned 3D printer, you can print out and assemble this joystick by [Akaki Kuumeri] that snaps right onto the Xbox’s controller. Brilliantly designed to leverage the ability of 3D printers to produce compliant mechanisms, or flextures, you don’t even need any springs or fasteners to complete assembly.

The flexture gimbal works without traditional springs.

The free version of Thingiverse only lets you move the controller’s right analog stick, but if you’re willing to drop $30 USD on the complete version, the joystick includes additional levers that connect to the controller’s face and shoulder buttons for more immersive control. There’s even a throttle that snaps onto the left side of the controller, though it’s optional if you’d rather save the print time.

If you want to learn more about the idea behind the joystick, [Akaki] is all too happy to walk you through the finer parts of the design in the video below. But the short version is the use of a flextures in the base of the joystick opened up the space he needed to run the mechanical linkages for all the other buttons.

This isn’t the first time [Akaki] has used 3D printed parts to adapt a console controller for flight simulator use. A simplified version of this concept used ball-and-socket joints to move the Xbox’s analog sticks, and he even turned a PlayStation DualShock into an impressive flight yoke you could clamp to your desk.

Continue reading “Xbox Flexure Joystick Puts You In The Pilot’s Seat” →

Morrowind Rebooted The Original Xbox Without You Ever Noticing

April 14, 2021 by Lewin Day 14 Comments

The original Xbox was well-known for being based on basic PC hardware, and among developers, well known for having just 64 megabytes of RAM which even at the time wasn’t a lot to be working with. In a recent podcast, [Todd Howard] of Bethesda related an anecdote from the era, claiming that Morrowind occasionally invisibly rebooted the Xbox without user’s knowledge in order to free up RAM. [Modern Vintage Gamer] wanted to determine if this was true or not, and began an investigation.

The investigation begins with the aid of an Xbox Development Kit. Noting that the original anecdote mentioned the reboots occurring during the loading process, the devkit Xbox was soft rebooted after executing a load. Rather than going back to the title screen of the game, it kicked straight back into the loading screen and brought up the last save game instead. This suggested that the game was indeed capable of rebooting in the midst of the loading routine.

[Modern Vintage Gamer] had a hunch that this was being achieved with the use of a routine called XLaunchNew Image, a piece of the Xbox API that could be used to soft-reboot the console and start an executable. Upon decompiling Morrowind, a call was found that fit the bill. Further analysis showed that the game was indeed calling XLaunchNewImage upon loading and launching a new game, and was confirmed by finding an *.ini file that contained flags to enable this behaviour.

Presumably, the reason for this behaviour was that it was simpler to boot the game fresh when loading a save, rather than trying to unload all the game assets in memory from the current game. It’s a neat trick that likely made the development team’s lives much easier once they implemented it.

We don’t often talk about The Elder Scrolls series around here, though we’ve seen someone modify an exercise bike to work with Skyrim. Video after the break.

Continue reading “Morrowind Rebooted The Original Xbox Without You Ever Noticing” →