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From http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/28180.html...
MS accused of banning mod chip Xbox from Live service
By John Lettice
Posted: 19/11/2002 at 15:39 GMT
Microsoft's campaign against Xbox mod chips has ratcheted up a notch with the launch of the Xbox Live online gaming service. According to a posting at Got Mod?, (there's a site that's going to be pretty concerned about the issue) the company is attempting to detect mod chips when users connect, then placing them on a banned list - forever.
If this really is the case then it means we're already seeing how unique hardware IDs could be used in anger by certain companies. Because it's the unique ID of the Xbox that's claimed to go onto the banned list.
The Got Mod? poster says that after persistent connectivity problems (which we hear exist for people who don't have mod chips fitted too) he called up the support line and confessed to a rep that he'd modded his Xbox. The rep seems to have been equally upfront; he said he'd been issued with an 'idiot sheet' (these exist in practically all front line support callcentres) intended to deal with questions in this area.
He explained that the mod chip is detected when you connect to Xbox Live, and that your machine's ID is then read, and added to a banned list. Even if you remove the mod chip, he said, your machine cannot be unbanned, as it's Microsoft's belief that it can never be seen as trustworthy again.
Which is actually reasonable, if you were to start from Microsoft's premise that banning mod chips is reasonable. An earlier posting at Got Mod? suggests that it's possible to run a mod chip provided it's one that can be switched off, and provided of course that you remember to switch it off before you connect. So if you're the sort of person who mods, then no doubt you'd be the sort of person who'd move to modding with a switch, if you heard that worked.
This posting also includes information that can be viewed as a cautionary tale about the evils of automatic online updates. On initial connect to Xbox Live an update is downloaded, and this includes the software that detects the mod chip. Note also that the posting claims frequent connect failures for machines that haven't been chipped as well.
It's not at this point clear whether these failures are in any way collateral damage of an anti mod chip campaign. The Microsoft rep, however, said that the company's actions weren't being taken because of piracy; the primary concern is to "sell a 'fair' service to normal people." If people use mod chips to cheat, then ordinary people will be less likely to sign up.
Which again is fair enough, although it additionally provides an alibi for control-freakery, and could come in handy for DVD (and other) regionalisation purposes. But, erm, isn't there a problem with systems of this sort? Skipping whether or not Microsoft is really casting Xbox units into outer darkness forever, we'll go hypothetical for the moment.
Imagine such a piece of cheap and readily-available consumer hardware exists, and imagine you're an evil modder who's fitted a chip and consequently got it banned forever. Imagine you're a particularly evil modder who then sneakily sells it through the local paper. So what about the sucker who bought it from you?
That sucker's comeback is probably against you rather than the original vendor, because you'll have voided the warranty by opening it. You probably don't care because you're particularly evil and he can't find you, but once this gets around it'll sure as hell knock the stuffing out of the second hand market, won't it? Which would probably be convenient for the original vendor.
If you broaden this out a tad, more towards Palladium territory, you still have unique IDs on trusted machines, but in this case Microsoft expects that some Palladium machines will be sold on, and therefore there will be a necessity for zeroing trusted status to that which obtained when you first took it out of the box. Why Palladium and not Xbox? Palladium is intended to be fairly proof against hardware attacks, whereas Xbox isn't. Would you want to mod chip a PC anyway? No, because it's a fairly open box.
But, erm, if it's got a unique ID maybe it's not open after all, in which case maybe you would want to mod it. Well, yes, but by Palladium time that's going to be a lot harder, for sure. ®
Personally, I think this is really poor. I've got a modded Xbox, but I don't play copied games or anything like that. I modded it to play import games, such as Tony Hawk's 4 which I got two weeks ago. I doubt they'll succeed in doing this, but I hope they don't.
You could check here: http://www.gotmod.com/#0000000096 for some more replies and thoughts on the situation. Anybody with a mod-chip will understand my particular dismay. But the fact is, no broadband in my area for a long time, and I've got a nice PC for KOTOR anyway :).
MS accused of banning mod chip Xbox from Live service
By John Lettice
Posted: 19/11/2002 at 15:39 GMT
Microsoft's campaign against Xbox mod chips has ratcheted up a notch with the launch of the Xbox Live online gaming service. According to a posting at Got Mod?, (there's a site that's going to be pretty concerned about the issue) the company is attempting to detect mod chips when users connect, then placing them on a banned list - forever.
If this really is the case then it means we're already seeing how unique hardware IDs could be used in anger by certain companies. Because it's the unique ID of the Xbox that's claimed to go onto the banned list.
The Got Mod? poster says that after persistent connectivity problems (which we hear exist for people who don't have mod chips fitted too) he called up the support line and confessed to a rep that he'd modded his Xbox. The rep seems to have been equally upfront; he said he'd been issued with an 'idiot sheet' (these exist in practically all front line support callcentres) intended to deal with questions in this area.
He explained that the mod chip is detected when you connect to Xbox Live, and that your machine's ID is then read, and added to a banned list. Even if you remove the mod chip, he said, your machine cannot be unbanned, as it's Microsoft's belief that it can never be seen as trustworthy again.
Which is actually reasonable, if you were to start from Microsoft's premise that banning mod chips is reasonable. An earlier posting at Got Mod? suggests that it's possible to run a mod chip provided it's one that can be switched off, and provided of course that you remember to switch it off before you connect. So if you're the sort of person who mods, then no doubt you'd be the sort of person who'd move to modding with a switch, if you heard that worked.
This posting also includes information that can be viewed as a cautionary tale about the evils of automatic online updates. On initial connect to Xbox Live an update is downloaded, and this includes the software that detects the mod chip. Note also that the posting claims frequent connect failures for machines that haven't been chipped as well.
It's not at this point clear whether these failures are in any way collateral damage of an anti mod chip campaign. The Microsoft rep, however, said that the company's actions weren't being taken because of piracy; the primary concern is to "sell a 'fair' service to normal people." If people use mod chips to cheat, then ordinary people will be less likely to sign up.
Which again is fair enough, although it additionally provides an alibi for control-freakery, and could come in handy for DVD (and other) regionalisation purposes. But, erm, isn't there a problem with systems of this sort? Skipping whether or not Microsoft is really casting Xbox units into outer darkness forever, we'll go hypothetical for the moment.
Imagine such a piece of cheap and readily-available consumer hardware exists, and imagine you're an evil modder who's fitted a chip and consequently got it banned forever. Imagine you're a particularly evil modder who then sneakily sells it through the local paper. So what about the sucker who bought it from you?
That sucker's comeback is probably against you rather than the original vendor, because you'll have voided the warranty by opening it. You probably don't care because you're particularly evil and he can't find you, but once this gets around it'll sure as hell knock the stuffing out of the second hand market, won't it? Which would probably be convenient for the original vendor.
If you broaden this out a tad, more towards Palladium territory, you still have unique IDs on trusted machines, but in this case Microsoft expects that some Palladium machines will be sold on, and therefore there will be a necessity for zeroing trusted status to that which obtained when you first took it out of the box. Why Palladium and not Xbox? Palladium is intended to be fairly proof against hardware attacks, whereas Xbox isn't. Would you want to mod chip a PC anyway? No, because it's a fairly open box.
But, erm, if it's got a unique ID maybe it's not open after all, in which case maybe you would want to mod it. Well, yes, but by Palladium time that's going to be a lot harder, for sure. ®
Personally, I think this is really poor. I've got a modded Xbox, but I don't play copied games or anything like that. I modded it to play import games, such as Tony Hawk's 4 which I got two weeks ago. I doubt they'll succeed in doing this, but I hope they don't.
You could check here: http://www.gotmod.com/#0000000096 for some more replies and thoughts on the situation. Anybody with a mod-chip will understand my particular dismay. But the fact is, no broadband in my area for a long time, and I've got a nice PC for KOTOR anyway :).
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From http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/28180.html...
MS accused of banning mod chip Xbox from Live service
By John Lettice
Posted: 19/11/2002 at 15:39 GMT
Microsoft's campaign against Xbox mod chips has ratcheted up a notch with the launch of the Xbox Live online gaming service. According to a posting at Got Mod?, (there's a site that's going to be pretty concerned about the issue) the company is attempting to detect mod chips when users connect, then placing them on a banned list - forever.
If this really is the case then it means we're already seeing how unique hardware IDs could be used in anger by certain companies. Because it's the unique ID of the Xbox that's claimed to go onto the banned list.
The Got Mod? poster says that after persistent connectivity problems (which we hear exist for people who don't have mod chips fitted too) he called up the support line and confessed to a rep that he'd modded his Xbox. The rep seems to have been equally upfront; he said he'd been issued with an 'idiot sheet' (these exist in practically all front line support callcentres) intended to deal with questions in this area.
He explained that the mod chip is detected when you connect to Xbox Live, and that your machine's ID is then read, and added to a banned list. Even if you remove the mod chip, he said, your machine cannot be unbanned, as it's Microsoft's belief that it can never be seen as trustworthy again.
Which is actually reasonable, if you were to start from Microsoft's premise that banning mod chips is reasonable. An earlier posting at Got Mod? suggests that it's possible to run a mod chip provided it's one that can be switched off, and provided of course that you remember to switch it off before you connect. So if you're the sort of person who mods, then no doubt you'd be the sort of person who'd move to modding with a switch, if you heard that worked.
This posting also includes information that can be viewed as a cautionary tale about the evils of automatic online updates. On initial connect to Xbox Live an update is downloaded, and this includes the software that detects the mod chip. Note also that the posting claims frequent connect failures for machines that haven't been chipped as well.
It's not at this point clear whether these failures are in any way collateral damage of an anti mod chip campaign. The Microsoft rep, however, said that the company's actions weren't being taken because of piracy; the primary concern is to "sell a 'fair' service to normal people." If people use mod chips to cheat, then ordinary people will be less likely to sign up.
Which again is fair enough, although it additionally provides an alibi for control-freakery, and could come in handy for DVD (and other) regionalisation purposes. But, erm, isn't there a problem with systems of this sort? Skipping whether or not Microsoft is really casting Xbox units into outer darkness forever, we'll go hypothetical for the moment.
Imagine such a piece of cheap and readily-available consumer hardware exists, and imagine you're an evil modder who's fitted a chip and consequently got it banned forever. Imagine you're a particularly evil modder who then sneakily sells it through the local paper. So what about the sucker who bought it from you?
That sucker's comeback is probably against you rather than the original vendor, because you'll have voided the warranty by opening it. You probably don't care because you're particularly evil and he can't find you, but once this gets around it'll sure as hell knock the stuffing out of the second hand market, won't it? Which would probably be convenient for the original vendor.
If you broaden this out a tad, more towards Palladium territory, you still have unique IDs on trusted machines, but in this case Microsoft expects that some Palladium machines will be sold on, and therefore there will be a necessity for zeroing trusted status to that which obtained when you first took it out of the box. Why Palladium and not Xbox? Palladium is intended to be fairly proof against hardware attacks, whereas Xbox isn't. Would you want to mod chip a PC anyway? No, because it's a fairly open box.
But, erm, if it's got a unique ID maybe it's not open after all, in which case maybe you would want to mod it. Well, yes, but by Palladium time that's going to be a lot harder, for sure. ®
Personally, I think this is really poor. I've got a modded Xbox, but I don't play copied games or anything like that. I modded it to play import games, such as Tony Hawk's 4 which I got two weeks ago. I doubt they'll succeed in doing this, but I hope they don't.
You could check here: http://www.gotmod.com/#0000000096 for some more replies and thoughts on the situation. Anybody with a mod-chip will understand my particular dismay. But the fact is, no broadband in my area for a long time, and I've got a nice PC for KOTOR anyway :).
MS accused of banning mod chip Xbox from Live service
By John Lettice
Posted: 19/11/2002 at 15:39 GMT
Microsoft's campaign against Xbox mod chips has ratcheted up a notch with the launch of the Xbox Live online gaming service. According to a posting at Got Mod?, (there's a site that's going to be pretty concerned about the issue) the company is attempting to detect mod chips when users connect, then placing them on a banned list - forever.
If this really is the case then it means we're already seeing how unique hardware IDs could be used in anger by certain companies. Because it's the unique ID of the Xbox that's claimed to go onto the banned list.
The Got Mod? poster says that after persistent connectivity problems (which we hear exist for people who don't have mod chips fitted too) he called up the support line and confessed to a rep that he'd modded his Xbox. The rep seems to have been equally upfront; he said he'd been issued with an 'idiot sheet' (these exist in practically all front line support callcentres) intended to deal with questions in this area.
He explained that the mod chip is detected when you connect to Xbox Live, and that your machine's ID is then read, and added to a banned list. Even if you remove the mod chip, he said, your machine cannot be unbanned, as it's Microsoft's belief that it can never be seen as trustworthy again.
Which is actually reasonable, if you were to start from Microsoft's premise that banning mod chips is reasonable. An earlier posting at Got Mod? suggests that it's possible to run a mod chip provided it's one that can be switched off, and provided of course that you remember to switch it off before you connect. So if you're the sort of person who mods, then no doubt you'd be the sort of person who'd move to modding with a switch, if you heard that worked.
This posting also includes information that can be viewed as a cautionary tale about the evils of automatic online updates. On initial connect to Xbox Live an update is downloaded, and this includes the software that detects the mod chip. Note also that the posting claims frequent connect failures for machines that haven't been chipped as well.
It's not at this point clear whether these failures are in any way collateral damage of an anti mod chip campaign. The Microsoft rep, however, said that the company's actions weren't being taken because of piracy; the primary concern is to "sell a 'fair' service to normal people." If people use mod chips to cheat, then ordinary people will be less likely to sign up.
Which again is fair enough, although it additionally provides an alibi for control-freakery, and could come in handy for DVD (and other) regionalisation purposes. But, erm, isn't there a problem with systems of this sort? Skipping whether or not Microsoft is really casting Xbox units into outer darkness forever, we'll go hypothetical for the moment.
Imagine such a piece of cheap and readily-available consumer hardware exists, and imagine you're an evil modder who's fitted a chip and consequently got it banned forever. Imagine you're a particularly evil modder who then sneakily sells it through the local paper. So what about the sucker who bought it from you?
That sucker's comeback is probably against you rather than the original vendor, because you'll have voided the warranty by opening it. You probably don't care because you're particularly evil and he can't find you, but once this gets around it'll sure as hell knock the stuffing out of the second hand market, won't it? Which would probably be convenient for the original vendor.
If you broaden this out a tad, more towards Palladium territory, you still have unique IDs on trusted machines, but in this case Microsoft expects that some Palladium machines will be sold on, and therefore there will be a necessity for zeroing trusted status to that which obtained when you first took it out of the box. Why Palladium and not Xbox? Palladium is intended to be fairly proof against hardware attacks, whereas Xbox isn't. Would you want to mod chip a PC anyway? No, because it's a fairly open box.
But, erm, if it's got a unique ID maybe it's not open after all, in which case maybe you would want to mod it. Well, yes, but by Palladium time that's going to be a lot harder, for sure. ®
Personally, I think this is really poor. I've got a modded Xbox, but I don't play copied games or anything like that. I modded it to play import games, such as Tony Hawk's 4 which I got two weeks ago. I doubt they'll succeed in doing this, but I hope they don't.
You could check here: http://www.gotmod.com/#0000000096 for some more replies and thoughts on the situation. Anybody with a mod-chip will understand my particular dismay. But the fact is, no broadband in my area for a long time, and I've got a nice PC for KOTOR anyway :).
I think it's a good move.
Whether people with Mod Chips will be able to cheat on Xbox Live or not, I don't know. But if people think that mods will enable people to cheat, then people with non-modded Xboxs may not sign up to Xbox Live.
At the end of the day, what's the point in modding your console?
Whether people with Mod Chips will be able to cheat on Xbox Live or not, I don't know. But if people think that mods will enable people to cheat, then people with non-modded Xboxs may not sign up to Xbox Live.
At the end of the day, what's the point in modding your console?
Hmmm...
Try and find a cheap standalone Xbox (second hand perhaps) and do the modding on that. You can still use all your prephirals (from your unmodded Xbox) on it...
I wanted a modded XBox to play emulators on it, but I wouldn't choose that over Xbox live. I suppose it's for the best in someways because although most mods will be just to play import/CDR's, if it lets them through, it'll let the mods that can be used to hack and cheat in online games, and that is the LAST thing LIVE needs.
Try and find a cheap standalone Xbox (second hand perhaps) and do the modding on that. You can still use all your prephirals (from your unmodded Xbox) on it...
I wanted a modded XBox to play emulators on it, but I wouldn't choose that over Xbox live. I suppose it's for the best in someways because although most mods will be just to play import/CDR's, if it lets them through, it'll let the mods that can be used to hack and cheat in online games, and that is the LAST thing LIVE needs.
There is someone at my school who fits a larger hard drive and mods it so that you can download games to it!
I'm up for it, they set the rules for their system, the mods are NOT authorised and if they don't want you on the system then they don't have to let you!
It's your own fault for it!
I'm up for it, they set the rules for their system, the mods are NOT authorised and if they don't want you on the system then they don't have to let you!
It's your own fault for it!
It's about time one of the big three started hitting back at the modders and pirates. Whilst a very small, almost negligible, number do chip their console to play legal import games, the largest proportion do so to play cheap copies.
I've never had, or bought, any pirate games or modded a console, even when I was little and didn't have many games I never wanted it done to my console. Piracy harms everyone, and denying that is simply the buyers of the pirated stuff's way of easing their conscience, if they have one. Pirates, modders, and those who buy the illegal stuff aren't evil, but they should be stamped out of the industry as fast as possible - congrats to Microsoft for doing this.
Effects on second hand market ? Most mod chips are non removeable - no one is going to buy a console not knowing a mod chip is fitted, and if they knowingly buy a mod chip fitted console then we can all pretty muhc guess why they've chosen to do so....
~~Belldandy~~
I've never had, or bought, any pirate games or modded a console, even when I was little and didn't have many games I never wanted it done to my console. Piracy harms everyone, and denying that is simply the buyers of the pirated stuff's way of easing their conscience, if they have one. Pirates, modders, and those who buy the illegal stuff aren't evil, but they should be stamped out of the industry as fast as possible - congrats to Microsoft for doing this.
Effects on second hand market ? Most mod chips are non removeable - no one is going to buy a console not knowing a mod chip is fitted, and if they knowingly buy a mod chip fitted console then we can all pretty muhc guess why they've chosen to do so....
~~Belldandy~~
Half pint, I understand your concern, But Microsoft are'nt going to let you come onto their service as you claim not to play pirated games, But import ones.
That would be every modders excuse. Its great that MS have decided to stop Chipped machines onto the excellent online service, its about time aswell.
Hey I chipped all 3 of my PSones (i had to get 3, they kept on breaking down) but that does'nt matter, everyone chipped that console, thats how it sold...
That would be every modders excuse. Its great that MS have decided to stop Chipped machines onto the excellent online service, its about time aswell.
Hey I chipped all 3 of my PSones (i had to get 3, they kept on breaking down) but that does'nt matter, everyone chipped that console, thats how it sold...
i want xobx live
I want a pony but we can't have everything in life can we?
gamezfreak wrote:
> Hey I chipped all 3 of my PSones (i had to get 3, they kept on
> breaking down)
Mine didn't! Had the same one for 6 years, sold it on, and as far as I know, it's still going strong!
> but that does'nt matter, everyone chipped that console
I didn't! Never have, never would, never will.
> Hey I chipped all 3 of my PSones (i had to get 3, they kept on
> breaking down)
Mine didn't! Had the same one for 6 years, sold it on, and as far as I know, it's still going strong!
> but that does'nt matter, everyone chipped that console
I didn't! Never have, never would, never will.
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