Fix Arrives for Banned Xbox 360 Consoles

Modders recently discovered that their customized Xbox 360 consoles were banned from Microsoft's Xbox Live service. The latest sweep took out around 600,000 to one million consoles, hunting down modified firmware and locking the units off the network Microsoft said that in order to get back online, modders would need a new Xbox 360 console.

However, website 360Mods says different, providing a fix to get those custom consoles back on Live. The new workaround, iXtreme LT (Light Touch), tries to make the altered firmware appear as the original, Microsoft-certified version while keeping the modded information. The fix may even allow gamers to play backup disks under Microsoft's nose.

Unfortunately, the workaround isnt simple. Xbox-Scene reports that the fix is somewhat complex and requires the user to have access to the CPU key of a second, un-modded Xbox 360 console. Still, the update relies on free tools provided online, however modders should be aware that both the modded console and the un-modded console cannot access Live at the same time (as both use the same CPU key).

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Kevin started taking PCs apart in the 90s when Quake was on the way and his PC lacked the required components. Since then, he’s loved all things PC-related and cool gadgets ranging from the New Nintendo 3DS to Android tablets. He is currently a contributor at Digital Trends, writing about everything from computers to how-to content on Windows and Macs to reviews of the latest laptops from HP, Dell, Lenovo, and more.

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52 Comments Comment from the forums

great... so they found a way of making the banned xbox work on live by making the other one stop working on live (when logged on at the same time).

I wouldn't really say 'hurrah' but nice to know they're trying.
Reply
tayb

And what happens when Microsoft see's the same CPU key being played by two different consoles?

I wouldn't really call this a "fix."
Reply
yang

I actually wanted the console pirates to flourish to show game publishers that they can't always push the blame of loss profit on PC users. In reality, it's easier to pirate console games than some pc games.
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redkachina

Its way to complex for average banned 360 users..
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brendano257

Well you'd have to buy a new console either way so it's not exactly a "fix", but, if you bought a new console and re-modded it, you'd be back in the same place, kicked out of XB Live again. However this provides a way for you to still mod and not get kicked out.....although still not the greatest of options regardless.
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Honis

Finally, a use for all of those BRICKED XBOX'S filling our landfills that WILL NEVER HAVE ACCESS TO XBOX LIVE ever again!

Just incase you can't ignore the lower case part:
Bricked Xbox's will never have access to xbox live.
Reply
thackstonns

i wonder if there is anyway to get a cpu id off of my rrod console. that way i can buy a banned one cheap and just use this fix.
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matt2k

aaaargh matey, just call up, we fix things
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ok its not the CPU key, its the DVD key, which is signed to each console individually. you can spoof the DVD drive to change the key to the actual console ID. iExtreme LT hasn't even been released yet, its still in the making and we are awaiting it. iExtreme LT is just the simplest form of firmware possible, and it will boot games that arnt correctly patched. so if you dont know how to properly stealth patch a 360 game, dont even bother modding it. as of now, dont play burnt games on LIVE and dont hook up to LIVE wit4h modded firmware!
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choujij

This article is a bit deceiving. Quoted from xbox-scene:

This method has been known for a long time (since the King Kong Exploit days) and does indeed 'work'. Basically you swap the Keyvault (or 'KV' in short, it stores stuff like console certificates, per-box private keys, DVD key, etc) inside the NAND with the KV from an unbanned console. While technically very different you could somewhat compare it to swapping eeprom data during the Xbox1 days.

However there's a (really) big 'IF' (besides the required tech knowledge) ... you need the (unique) CPU key of your banned console - without it you can't correctly write the new KV data in the NAND bin of your banned console.
Now you wonder how to get the CPU-key ... well by running XeLL of course!
To run XeLL u need to perform the JTAG hack (or the King Kong exploit, but that's even more outdated) ... and if you got banned the last few weeks it means you updated to the latest dashboard/kernel (else you can't get on LIVE).
And that's the problem... Microsoft patched the JTAG hack since kernel 849x (July 2009) ... so no way to boot up XeLL (= no realistic way for you to get the CPU-key atm) and thus no way to swap the KV data in your NAND image.
And then there's also added KV protection (hashing) on newer motherboards (Falcon+ ?), but if you can't even get your CPU-key it doesn't matter much to do deeper into this problem.
The only way it would work is if you retrieved the CPU-key of your old banned 360 before you updated to anything over 849x. If you did that you probably know about all of this and I'm not telling you anything new ;)
Downgrading kernel is not an option either, older kernels won't boot as both kernel and CB fuses were burned during the various updates MS performed.

Which means that if you were banned from xbox-live within the last half year, there is no way of "unbanning" your xbox to get back on.

Jason
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