upgrade hdd on softmod

[sixties keith]

hi, i know this has been covered before but im just wondering what the best way to upgrade a hdd on a soft-modded xbox is. i know there's xbox hdm but the version i have seems quite old but i have heard of others such as chimp? sorry if im wrong only ever upgraded a chipped xbox.

If im right is hdm the best? from what i remember you copy the eprom and your c folder i think into the hdm files then use a program to burn in iso format then set a computer with the hdd installed to boot the op on the hdd?

im wanting to use between 160gb and 250gb hdd's so i know once they are in the xbox i will need to format them to see more than 137gb? i had a chipped 750gb xbox and once i went over 250gb the xbox hdd crashed (something to do with cluster sizes or something) so i don't want that to happen again .

cheers guys

[chunk1982]

Your pretty much right. Copy your eeprom to the eeprom folder, C: to c folder and E: to e folder in xhdm, then run it so you get your linux iso. Burn that to a dvd, connect hdd to pc and boot from your linux disc. Cant remember the number of the option you need but your building a new hdd from scratch. Follow on screen instructions till your hdd is done then reboot from your linux disc and this time select the option to lock it. Its really very easy and im sure there is a video tutorial floating around this site somewhere

All the best

Paul

P.S also note that on the 1st pc I did this with everything went fine right up till I came to lock it and I kept getting some error message and it failed but that was my old pc so I used another pc and now I have no issues what so ever

[sixties keith]

@chunk1982

thanks for the quick reply mate and cheers for the info. glad to know im at least along the right path. ah forgot about locking it so thats useful. after the operation has completed do i use xbpartitioner etc so that the xbox can pick up over 137gb?

also do you have a copy of that xbox hdm or can you post a link to somewhere on the forum that has it? the one im using is quite old now so want the most up to date one to remove any possible problems from that. cheers

[chunk1982]

Not sure about xbpartitioner as I only have an 80gb so iv never used it, but I will be fitting a 320gb this evening so maybe able to shed some more light on it tomorrow lol
I use xbhdm 1.9 not sure where I got it from now lol I can upload it to mediafire but wont be able to do it till around 8.30pm (gmt) im sure I just googled it

All the best

Paul

EDITED:
iv just uploaded xboxhdm 1.9 to mediafire here is the link...
http://www.mediafire.com/download/xq3h4 ... m_v1.9.zip

EDITED:
also when i say copy your E: to the E folder i meant everything except games and emulators folders, if i copied them 2 id have over 70gb so would not fit on a dvd

[whufclee]

Sorry on phone at moment so cant do a big reply but I personally prefer the v2.2a USB version. It gives you a proper GUI, you can run from USB and use the HDD on any socket. If you need me to upload my image let me know as I should be home soon.

[chunk1982]

Yeah please lee that be awesome

All the best

Paul

EDITED: lee how the hell did you make that post in 1970 hahahaha

[kozmo2k4]

You can find the 2.2 version here:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/xboxhdm2/
I'm getting ready to upgrade my softmodded Xbox HD to WD80GB myself...

[captainsensation]

@chunk1982

thanks for the quick reply mate and cheers for the info. glad to know im at least along the right path. ah forgot about locking it so thats useful. after the operation has completed do i use xbpartitioner etc so that the xbox can pick up over 137gb?

also do you have a copy of that xbox hdm or can you post a link to somewhere on the forum that has it? the one im using is quite old now so want the most up to date one to remove any possible problems from that. cheers

You wont have to worry about that formatting. Anything over 137 GB goes to the G drive. If your hdd is smaller than that you can have an F drive that is 130 or so gigs with no G drive. Now if you want to have 2 partitions that are bigger than 137 than yes you will need xbpartitioner to format them.

[chunk1982]

Well I used xboxhdm 1.9 only due to having the disc containing the eeprom already burnt.
It built the hdd and gave me a 290gb F: drive. So that was pretty easy lol now for the long chore of ftp'ing everything

All the best

Pa

[Xphazer]

Make sure to use proper size clusters, else you will endup with data corruption.

|Partition size           |Required Cluster Size
         >256GB           | 16KB
256GB <> 512GB   | 32KB
512GB <> 1024GB | 64KB

Now you need to reformat F:/ with XBpartitioner (1.3). First format the F:/ partition to a smaller size, then reformat it to is normal size. If you dont resize, cluster size might not change.
Then just to be safe I would manually check the cluster size. Boot into EvoX. Take note of the partition size in Bytes. Now upload a 1-10KB dummy file to the partition,
and see by how much the free space dropped. If you upload a 5KB the free space should drop by the size of 1 cluster, so here it should drop by 32KB (32768 Bytes).

Here is a 5KB dummy file. (Attachment, unzip it!)

[nidge]

Make sure to use proper size clusters, else you will endup with data corruption.

|Partition size           |Required Cluster Size
         >256GB           | 16KB
256GB <> 512GB   | 32KB
512GB <> 1024GB | 64KB

Now you need to reformat F:/ with XBpartitioner (1.3). First format the F:/ partition to a smaller size, then reformat it to is normal size. If you dont resize, cluster size might not change.
Then just to be safe I would manually check the cluster size. Boot into EvoX. Take note of the partition size in Bytes. Now upload a 1-10KB dummy file to the partition,
and see by how much the free space dropped. If you upload a 5KB the free space should drop by the size of 1 cluster, so here it should drop by 32KB (32768 Bytes).

Here is a 5KB dummy file. (Attachment, unzip it!)

A related question, I have an Xecutor 3 (X3 build 3294, X3 kernel 1.0.50.34.1). I have used X3 Live to set up my hard drive, a 250gb IDE, with no problems F=120.55gb, G=104.89gb.
But my question is, is the X3 bios capable of setting the right cluster size for bigger hard drives, or would you still recomend using XBpartitioner 1.3?

[Xphazer]

I don't know if the X3 live config is using the correct cluster size, I never tried to format a HDD with it.
I would use XBpartitioner for bigger partition (256GB or more). You should be fine now, as you only need 16KB clusters.
No problem for most if not any tool to format using 16KB clusters.

Personnaly I prefeer to have no G:/ and a bigger F:/, but that is a personal choice.

[chunk1982]

well i used xbpartioner to format my f drive, first i highlighted the 290gb and pressed green this changed it to something like 160gb so formatted to that then pressed green again so it went back to 290gb and formatted again took all of about 1.5 minutes lol

many thanks

paul

[whufclee]

Sorry Paul I got home and fell asleep then forgot all about uploading that image. If you still want it let me know but it looks as though you've got it sorted.

[chunk1982]

yeah im sorted now thanks lee

all the best

paul

[sixties keith]

Thanks for the replies guys this is great. Had a go myself to find out the 250gb had I had was cooked flip sake but I have another one coming by the end of the week.

I only ever use 250 Gb or below now so cluster sizes seems to be no problem with me anyways. As for the partitions I'm not too bothered. I would rather have it all on f but I could live with the emulators on f and the games on g.

Thanks again guys ill report back once I've received the hdd and had another go

[professor_jonny]

[quote="nidgeA related question, I have an Xecutor 3 (X3 build 3294, X3 kernel 1.0.50.34.1). I have used X3 Live to set up my hard drive, a 250gb IDE, with no problems F=120.55gb, G=104.89gb.
But my question is, is the X3 bios capable of setting the right cluster size for bigger hard drives, or would you still recomend using XBpartitioner 1.3? [/quote]


no it will stuff it for sure with a big hdd > 512gig dont know with a mid size tho as you are 32 k clusters.

i'd use xbpartitioner or try from x3lc and then do the file test to check