I have modded 10 or more xboxes with no solder chips. Never had a problem really except for some people are a bit rough, and if kids move them from house to house or room to room things can be dislodged. Time to learn to solder. I have practiced on some old circuit boards but a good XBOX soldering class would be nice. Is there (I have looked tirelessly) a good site to show exaclty what tools to use and has some really good pictures? I have seen one time someone using some little loop thinggys that were easier to solder in, and then soldered the wire thru the loop instead of str8 to the board. Anyway, thanks for any info!
Hey, which solderless chip is the best in your opinion? Also, can you play backups on LIve with any of those chips? I heard that your account will be cancelled if you go on Live using a backed up CD. Or do you have to disable the chip?
I have used several, but I find the new X-Chip to be the most user friendly. (havnt done a v6 xbox however) As to my knowledge, any modchip has to be disabled to use xbox live or you will be permanantly banned from xbox live. There are chips that have a remote switch in order to disable the chip.
Go the soldering, if you just buy yourself a nice low powered soldering iron it is incredibly hard to screw up badly enough that you do damage. Hell, I did my first ever modding the other day and accidentally got a MASSIVE drop of solder covering and connecting two capacitors, but with a bit of solder wick and patience with the cooler iron it was a breeze to even fix a cock up like that up. Even the d0 isn't that bad, just remember to go slowly, only use as much solder as you need and use a low powered iron and you'll have no worries. And do a pin header install if you have the option, it makes troubleshooting MUCH easier if you can completely remove the chip and check that the box boots without the mod chip having anything to do with the system. For some good info on the Xenium chips (what I used in mine), go to www.teamxodus.com (i think that is it), they have some nice instructions.
