My Xbox 360 Build Thread - Help needed!

[XCVG]

A good solder sucker will pull it off. The ones at my school are really good- they are Soldapullit ones I think. Braid and an iron might work. I'm no expert on this though.

[aj23]

A good solder sucker will pull it off. The ones at my school are really good- they are Soldapullit ones I think. Braid and an iron might work. I'm no expert on this though.

Tried all that, but the iron doesn't melt it to liquidy enough form that allows it to be sucked up, and the braid just doesn't work at all on it.

[rikitheshadow]

This might require an extra hand but i found it easy to heat it up and while keeping the soldering iron tip near the last bit and pry the piece off gently. I tried it on a few connectors on a SNES and it worked like a charm. Problem is they drill the holes a little to big for the prongs and solder finds its way in the cracks and makes a tight fit on it.

OH, and be sure whomever is pulling the piece off to make sure not to burn themselves. CONVECTION!

[aj23]

That would work, if it was only one pin holding it. But that is not the case, there are small amounts of solder on a few pins.

[rikitheshadow]

Then all i can say is keep heating up the solder and sucking it up with the bulb as much as possible.

[palmertech]

The cause of your problems is that the 360 uses lead free solder, which is REALLY hard to desolder. You will either need a 60w+ iron, or you could try melting a bunch of normal soler onto the connection, then trying to suck it back up. Oftentimes, it brings the lead free solder up with it.

[aj23]

Finally got the Front USB ports, the hard drive connector, and the USB/Ethernet port at the back desoldered. I also desoldered all the caps. Can I buy new capacitors and solder them on instead of extending the current ones (so I can flatten them). Also, when I desoldered one, a round plastic coating came up around one of the legs, did I just damage the board? There are small bits of solder left in the holes that I now need to take out, and I was told to just take a small dremel bit and go through it, but wouldn't that surely damage the board as well?

After the last 5 hours I just spent working on the board, I hope I didn't break it. Forgive me if it's hard to understand, I'm too tired to think right now.

[XCVG]

Finally got the Front USB ports, the hard drive connector, and the USB/Ethernet port at the back desoldered. I also desoldered all the caps. Can I buy new capacitors and solder them on instead of extending the current ones (so I can flatten them). Also, when I desoldered one, a round plastic coating came up around one of the legs, did I just damage the board? There are small bits of solder left in the holes that I now need to take out, and I was told to just take a small dremel bit and go through it, but wouldn't that surely damage the board as well?

After the last 5 hours I just spent working on the board, I hope I didn't break it. Forgive me if it's hard to understand, I'm too tired to think right now.

Capacitors: You could buy new ones but it could get expensive
Plastic Coating: Probably solder mask. Means you have to be more careful soldering.
Dremel: Why do you need to get rid of the solder?

[aj23]

Well instead of taking the time to desolder the left overs where I need to replace the caps, since some holes got covered with the excess solder after the part was taken out. The hole is small so it isn't that easy to take it out. How expensive could the caps get? It's a bout my only option now that some have been damaged and lost (since I did this with the intention of replacing them, instead of extending every single one).

[Biased]

How expensive could the caps get? It's a bout my only option now that some have been damaged and lost (since I did this with the intention of replacing them, instead of extending every single one).

It might not get TOO expensive. Broken 360s on ebay are never too expensive and having a console to sacrifice to save the whole project is sometimes a good idea.

If he has a broken one lying around he should be able to pull caps off of that one, right guys?(Unless the caps are different on the different mobo models, which I have no knowledge about, then things might get tricky.)

P.S. - If you have some desoldering braid and you can shift its shape or taper it or shred it a bit and stick it through the hole while you heat the solder, then continue to heat the braid and pull it out while it's still hot, that may fix your problem that you thought you needed a dremel for.

[palmertech]

Most of those caps are just power filtering caps, you should be able to just use anything with equal/higher voltage/capacity.

I can't imagine that costing more than $10 shipped from any good online electronics store.

[Biased]

Most of those caps are just power filtering caps, you should be able to just use anything with equal/higher voltage/capacity.

I can't imagine that costing more than $10 shipped from any good online electronics store.

What he said I guess. I didn't know if they were anything special or not inside a 360. Still, a console to experiment on would be nice to have.

EDIT: How is he supposed to know what specification capacitors to get? Is there a list of the component specs for the xbox 360?

[aj23]

Yea, anyone have any links to things I can use? I don't want to waste money buying the wrong thing, and then time soldering them down, flattening them, and only to find out they will not work. Maybe a spec list so I can get the parts locally as well?

[aj23]

Bump, help anyone?

[palmertech]

I would help more, but I would need specs on the 360 capacitors. If anyone with a 360 can give me the values, I could find a link to the right part.