I know this is more of a repair question than a modding question, but...
I have been fortunate enough to receive three broken -but-repairable 360's for free. I was unfortunate enough to receive them all in parts.
I've been Googling for hours, and granted I might be just really bad at Googling, but I can't find ANYTHING on how to match x boxes with their correct disk drives. Most people assume that the only problem you could have with a disk drive is that it is broken.
So my questions are:
1) How do I match the disk drives to the correct motherboards?
2) Will two similar disk drives (such as two TS-H943A's, one with Part No. X800473-019 and the other X800473-015) be swappable or are there different firmwares?
3) If I can't match them or swap them, what are my other options?
XBox disk drives mismatch
Moderator: Moderators
Re: XBox disk drives mismatch
No 360 drives are straight up swappable, not even the same model/version drives. Each drive is keyed to it's motherboard. Any other 360 drive will work, but it will only play CDs and DVDs, no games will play on it.
You'll have to try the drives one at a time until you get one that will read a 360 game, that will be the correct drive for that motherboard. Unless they all have dashboards that are old enough to be jtagged and you can get the drive info from the motherboard, which is more of a hassle than just plugging them up and seeing which one works with what motherboard.
Now the only downside to that is it's possible that none of the drives will work with any of the motherboards, and if that's the case you'll have a right mess to go thru from cleaning and replacing the Lasers to doing the jtag hack and dumping the drives to match the keys up and figure out what goes with what, again that's if the motherboards are even hackable, and provided that any of them are even the original drives to begin with and weren't messed up or flashed improperly, so it's also possible that you could go thru all of this for nothing. Short of it, try each drive with each motherboard and see if it will play a 360 game, when/if it does that's the drive for that board.
You'll have to try the drives one at a time until you get one that will read a 360 game, that will be the correct drive for that motherboard. Unless they all have dashboards that are old enough to be jtagged and you can get the drive info from the motherboard, which is more of a hassle than just plugging them up and seeing which one works with what motherboard.
Now the only downside to that is it's possible that none of the drives will work with any of the motherboards, and if that's the case you'll have a right mess to go thru from cleaning and replacing the Lasers to doing the jtag hack and dumping the drives to match the keys up and figure out what goes with what, again that's if the motherboards are even hackable, and provided that any of them are even the original drives to begin with and weren't messed up or flashed improperly, so it's also possible that you could go thru all of this for nothing. Short of it, try each drive with each motherboard and see if it will play a 360 game, when/if it does that's the drive for that board.
Screwing up is one of the best learning tools, so long as the only thing you're not learning is how to screw up.
Re-mappable Wireless 360 Controller - The CGnome
Re-mappable Wireless 360 Controller - The CGnome
Re: XBox disk drives mismatch
Thanks for all the juicy information. I can definitely use some of that later.
However, I was just looking at it, and using my superior powers of deduction (which are attainable through a second grade education) I managed to match the drives. Two of the motherboards have matching heat syncs and fan power, and I have two toshiba drives and a benq. The Benq obviously went with the third motherboard. Then I just matched the lower Part No. toshiba drive with the motherboard whose other parts also had lower part #s.
So, yea. I feel kinda stupid now, but at least I know more good stuff for future reference.
However, I was just looking at it, and using my superior powers of deduction (which are attainable through a second grade education) I managed to match the drives. Two of the motherboards have matching heat syncs and fan power, and I have two toshiba drives and a benq. The Benq obviously went with the third motherboard. Then I just matched the lower Part No. toshiba drive with the motherboard whose other parts also had lower part #s.
So, yea. I feel kinda stupid now, but at least I know more good stuff for future reference.