How to use a cheap 2.5 drive as an Xbox 360 Slim drive

(Tips & tutorial on upgrading the Xbox 360 Slim 4G with a cheap 2.5 laptop drive – particularly to those who bought the 4G console in Singapore)
note: this is not for the faint of heart. it will get quite technical.
oh! and use at your own risk)

Out of a whim, i just got myself a new Xbox 360-Slim 4G Kinect bundle!
(And yes, that just killed what ever budget i have planned for my supposed small-form-factor PC gaming rig i have been daydreaming about)

Anyhow, i got the 4G version, not the 250G bundle. 4 Gigabytes (actually just around 3Gb) is fine for game saves and all but once you start downloading apps and game demos on the Xbox (like i did, the very day i got the console) – you’d know that it’s just not enough.

The official Xbox drive sells at around S$150~200. You can get it at 250 or 320Gb versions. That’s quite a hefty price for me. Thankfully, i found 2 alternatives: buy a cheaper ‘compatible’ Xbox drive (not the official Microsoft drive) or buy a much cheaper 2.5 (laptop) drive and set it up as an Xbox drive. We’ll we know which route i took.
(this post will probably be moot soon enough with the new Xbox coming out, but a friend ask me for details)

IMPORTANT: i didn’t invent the instructions here!
i actually just followed the already awesome tutorials from these sites/links:
http://digiex.net/guides-reviews/console-guides/xbox-360-guides/3152-how-hack-250gb-320gb-sata-drive-work-xbox-360-xbox-360-slim.html
and this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGGXwMd248Q

Okay, before you go head to those sites let me add in a few tips of my own (for 360 Slim) and a run down of steps.

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Things You Need:
1. Xbox 360 Slim – i don’t have any tips for 360 phat
2. a desktop PC (that you can open up)
3. a USB flash drive (1Gb is fine) – this will be formatted later
4. a supported drive

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Get the correct Drive:
You can’t just use any 2.5 drive here!
It must be one of the following Western Digital drives:
WD Scorpio Series BEVS/BEAS
WD Scorpio Blue Series BEVS/BEVT/BPVT (forget the rest, get this one)
WD Scorpio Black Series BEKT/BJKT
WD VelociRaptor Series
WD AV-25 Series BUDT

I got the WD Scorpio Blue Series 320Gb from Sim Lim Square at S$65. Now, that’s less than half of what i would have paid for if i got the official Microsoft drive. IT should look like this:

When buying the drive, just check for the blue label at the bottom (the most obvious indication). It should brightly say “WD Scorpio Blue”. The drive is 320Gb, 5400rpm, 7mm with a model number WD3200BPVT. You can probably get this drive in roughly the same price at Funan Digital Life mall.

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What To Do:

1. Download the following files :

• rufus tool
  Rufus is a very light-weight portable utility (meaning no need to install) that formats a USB drive and make it bootable.
• HDDSS.bin file
  this is the security sector that needs to be flashed to the WD drive.
  if you’re not using the 320Gb drive please refer to the original tutorial for the correct files.
• hddhackr tool
  a tool needed to flash the file above to the drive.

2. Make your USB drive bootable to DOS: 

Plugin the USB drive to your PC.
Run rufus.
Select the USB drive in rufus.
Tick Quick format.
Tick "Create a bootable disk using: FreeDOS”.

Click Start.

*in the original tutorial, they recommend MS-DOS instead of FreeDOS, but FreeDOS seems to work just fine and has better chance of booting.

 

 

3. Extract download 2 and 3 to the USB drive.
Extract and copy HDDSS_320GB.bin file (2nd download) to the USB drive.
Rename it to HDDSS.bin.
Extract and copy the hddhackr.exe file (3rd download) to the USB drive.

4. Reboot your PC to the USB drive.
Reboot your PC and go to the BIOS setup.
If you don’t know how to do that, then this tutorial is not for you. Ask someone else to help you.
Please take note of the bios settings before changing them as you need to restore them later.

In the bios, look for “USB Legacy Support” or “Legacy USB” and enable that. If the bios has tabs, this could be under “Integrated Peripherals” or “Advanced”.

Again in the bios, look for “SATA” settings and set to “IDE” or “disable AHCI”. Depending on the bios, this setting might be called one of these:
SATA
SATA AHCI Mode
SATA Mode
Configure SATA As
If the bios has tabs, this could be under “Main” or “IDE” or “Advanced”.

Or if you have the fancy EUFI, it will look like this:


Now, also enable booting to USB. This is usually enabled by default. If you have to, rearrange the order of boot up so the USB flash drive gets to boot first.

If you can’t find these settings or if they are disabled, then your bios setup does not support changing them. This is true for most laptops or All-in-one desktops. For this case, you need to find another PC that supports it.

Save the changes in the bios and reboot. In some PCs you can press a key to select which device to boot from, usually F12. Choose to boot from the USB drive.

If it succeeded, then you should see the FreeDOS command line prompt.
Nice. We just want to make sure we can do this before physically opening up the PC.

5. Power off the PC and plugin the WD drive.
Completely shutdown your PC and unplug the power cord.
Open up the case and plugin the 2.5 WD drive. The drive is a SATA one, so take the SATA data cable and power cable from your main drive and plug it into the WD one.
As suggested from the original tutorial, it is better to unplug all your other drives just to be safe.

6. Boot once more to FreeDOS.

7. Type in hddhackr.exe and press enter.
It would show you the list of drives. Look for the WDC drive that matches the model number. If you removed all your other drives then you would only see a single WDC drive in there. It will ask:

Enter the number of ATA drive:

Type the number on the left of the drive and press Enter (i.e. 1)
It will ask you again:

Type [D] to dump Sectors, [F] to flash or [R] to restore firmware:

Type “F” and press Enter.
And yet, another confirmation:

Information in file HDDSS.BIN does NOT match the drive’s firmware info. Do you want to flash XBOX360 compatible firmware (Y/N)?

Type “Y” and press Enter.
If it asks you to make an UNDO.BIN, just say yes (Y) again.

If all is well, then you’d get the “Firmware flashed successfully!” message.

8. Restore your PC back to it’s original state.
Shutdown your PC.
Remove the WD drive (which is now an Xbox drive).
Reconnect all your original drives back to the PC.
Cover your PC back up.
Unplug your USB drive and boot back to BIOS setup.
Restore all the things we’ve modified in Step 3 back to the original settings.
You did take note of the original settings, didn’t you?

9. Now, onto the Xbox 360 Slim.
Turn it off (and unplug).
Turn it over (if you use it standing up).
At the side of the console nearest where you plug the power cable, look for a lid that has a latch on the grills. hold the latch to free up and remove the HDD cover. For the 360 4G bundle, you’ll find that there’s just space where an HDD should be. Peek inside and you’ll see the SATA data and power port connectors.

10. Plug the WD drive directly to the port connectors inside.

Just plug it in slowly and carefully making sure that the connectors match and snugly fits.
The connectors would actually hold the drive in place even without a drive case. It will be sturdy enough considering that it’s at the bottom (and that you shouldn’t normally move the Xbox in the first place). Or, you always have the option of buying a cheap HDD XBox enclosure. I think it’s also available at Sim Lim for around S$5.
In my case, i secured with it one of the foams i found in the Xbox packaging. I didn’t really have to, though.
Put the lid back on and turn your Xbox right-side up again.

11. Boot the Xbox and format the drive.
On the Xbox, go to Settings > System. (You need your controller for this).

Go to “Console Settings” > System Info. Then get the console’s Serial number (write it down).

Go back to “System Settings” and select “Storage”

It will list the available storage on the System. Select the “Unformatted” drive (this is our WD drive).
And press “Y” on the controller to format it.

When it asks for the serial number, enter the serial number that you wrote down.

After formatting, you would now be able to see the new drive. Congratulations!

From here you can now use your custom Xbox drive as if it were an original Microsoft Xbox drive.
You can move your existing saved games, profiles, etc and you can now download game demos and all to your heart’s content! Well, at least you run out of space again. Lol.

Thanks for reading!