More on XBox Live Bans, HDD Crippling, Possible Ban Causes

Reports now indicate that the fresh wave of Microsoft bans on modified consoles has resulted in systems not only being banned from XBox Live, but also removing the ability to install games to the HDD, forbidding the use of Windows Media Centre extender, and not allowing the retrieval of achievements from backups without corrupting profiles.

[ZombieAutopsy]

that sucks, glad i dont pirate.

[CptBach]

People will start selling Banned X360 consoles

People are gonna get screwed.. Nothing new from MS

[StanLee]

If you choose to have a modded console and pirate games, you deserve whatever punishment you get. I'm not going to feel sorry for these persons.

[Montrealien]

good job basha, Pirates are douches and a pain for our beloved industry and as MS fights back, they are still to blame.

*golfclaps*

[_hiphopgamer_]

Go Micro.

[meepmoopmeep]

@Montrealean

Do you sell used games at your store?
the industry loses to that as well

[Montrealien]

wow, that being said, the used car business hurts the car industry also right?

enlighten me, how exactly does selling used games hurt the industry? I really want yoyu to explain it to me. And I`ll remember your explenation when I have 150 people standing outside my store tonight for Call of Duty modern warfare 2, most of them trading in games to get it.

There is no margin in selling only new stuff, its impossible to have a only new games store and pay the bills, its always been like this. Have you ever walked the streets of Tokyo for games? yeah, the used game market is hurting the industry, gogo internetz logic.

edit: just a little detail of the business meepboop, and I have a busy store in Montreal. For Call of duty 4 we bought around 40k of stock alone for a return of maybe 6k, that`s if we sell it all. I mean, its all cool and hip to be against the man online but at the end of the day a store like ours is a business that is in the real world and there is simply no way in hell we can run a succesful business in this industry if we did not sell used games or rent them for that matter. You want us to dissapear and you just order your games magicaly online from wharehouses, fine, but for me and many like myself, I still prefer actually going to a store, chatting with people and finding rare gems in the flesh that I can hold in my hands. If I want that kind of business to still work it will be by selling used games, and as long as our business model works, it is GOOD for the industry cause if our stores close down, it is BAD for the indusrty.

ffs, instead of staying on topic and really talking out about the pirates that are truly bad for the industry you dare attacked us? you are wrong man just plain wrong.

/end rant, sorry guys I am wired on caffein and its the calm before the storm of a big midnight event here.

[Greywulf]

hmm, holidays are coming up.

[sbstncstllo]

I used to be a PS fanboy untill I played Gears of War 1 on my brother's xbox, as I became addicted to it I bought myself an xbox 360 and the game.
Unfortunately the gears of war DVD would work for 1-3 months only then I'll get the can't read disk error.
I ended up buying Gears of War 3 times, when Gears of War 2 came out I was very busy playing Gears1 on the computer (loved using keyboard and mouse on my favorite game).
So I didn't rush in to buy Gears2 especially because alot of my friends said that it was nothing like gears1 etc etc.
When the pc community for gears1 was almost dead, I went ahead and bought gears2 for xbox 360.
At that time they did not have the option for the HD install (could be wrong) at least I wasn't aware of it.
So one day I was browsing through the ads on my local craigslist and saw and ad for flashing xbox's to ixtreme firmware for only $25 and I called the guy and had him flash my xbox, I believe was ixtreme 1.5 or 1.4 can't remeber... anyways I ended up never making a backup of the original gears of war 2 game as I traded to gamestop a few days after I beat the campaign because I really HATED the multiplayer compared to the first gears.
So I read somewhere about the abgx360 and the new 3/4th wave games... and decided to update de firmware to 1.6 like 2 weeks ago and even though I haven't played a single backup in the 3-4 years old xbox I was banned from live yesterday.
I know I broke the TOS agreement when I decided to mod my xbox but, I still think that there should be a legal way to make AND play your legitimate backups!!

[IdleLeeSiuLung]

I'm not denying you didn't have the problem, but your experience is likely in the minority. Probably more common than issues on the PS3, but far from the majority.

If you modified your Xbox 360, you broke the agreement. If you have a beef with a game that the console broke, and it is a faulty design you are free to sue them or complain online.

There is no other country in the world, where suing is like a lottery in the US. There is no repercussion if you loose, unfortunately.

-------------------

Pirates are parasites and threaten the industry and the people that work in it. In the end of the day, game developers are just people that expect a paycheck at the end of the month.

[YLOD Service Tech]

Ban those pirates!

[4point7BillionLoss]

exactly $4.7 billion in the last year

[komp]

When a big game comes out MS bans modified XBOX's. Default action.

If these banned people foolishly purchase a new one they are doing themselves an injustice.

If MS ban you then buy a PS3 instead. Achievements from modded xbox are no longer going to work so why bother. Move to the future before it leaves you behind.

[Bereaver]

Most of Microsofts 360 sales are from people not wanting to repair their 360 and buy a new one. And now they are going to get more sales because the 360 they had was banned. Lol, man those bots that did this are stupid. No, not all 360 fan's are bots. Just the stupid ones.

[_hiphopgamer_]

you are missing the point of modded 360's. People dont want to pay for games, how the hell are suppose to burn a Blue Ray disk?

[kikicub]

Man, YOU are missing the point. I don't want to pay for a Ferrari, should I go out and steal it?

I'm not too crazy about MS, but they're doing the right thing.

[DelbertGrady]

If I wanted a PS3 I would have gotten one already. If I was a pirate and my 360 was banned I would rather get a new 360 and play it safe. I chose it in the first place because I prefer it's games, online, controller etc over the PS3's.

[Kushan]

With a Blu-ray burner? You know, they do exist. Sure, the disks aren't cheap but back in the PS2 days, neither were DVDs and that didn't stop those pirates.
Same goes for the PS1 days. Even if it works out only $5 cheaper per game, enough people will want to pirate stuff.

[PirateThom]

And, even then, having a Blu-ray burner is useless, since only debug PS3s will run burned game discs.

[CptBach]

Back when I had a PS2 the first thing I did is mod it..
In my home country everybody does that...
you buy any game for 3$ instead of 60$

Sony did the right move with the PS3
Piracy free!

[ReBurn]

Piracy free so far. When it's cost-effective to pirate the pirates will figure out how to do it. I guess the answer is to use technology that is too expensive to be worth it to the average pirate. You may also prevent some paying customers from buying your product, but sooner or later you'll get the price down enough for people to catch up.

It's only a matter of time before someone cost-effectively mods a PS3. I doubt Sony is the only company to ever figure out how to prevent it. If they did then PS3 revenues would be chump-change compared to the money they'd be making in the IP security biz.

[Troll_Police]

This is all a sad attempt by M$ to get these people to buy new 360s because the PS3 is outselling the 360 now and will continue to from now on. They suddenly want to ban everyone all of a sudden when the 360 is being outsold by the PS3. Nice try M$, but even if they buy new 360s the PS3 will still outsell the 360.

[Salvadore]

"This is all a sad attempt by M$ to get these people to buy new 360s because the PS3 is outselling the 360 now and will continue to from now on."

You have got you be kidding me?

[Troll_Police]

Why now? Piracy has been a problem on the Xbox for years and M$ turned a blind eye up until now. Why?

[ps360master]

dude my 4 year old cousin is smarter than that....you should just stop trolling

[v1c1ous]

to say what you just said

[siyrobbo]

@ Troll_Police

Ms have been banning 360's this time of the year every year since 2007, its nothing new. Only this time theyseem to be going for it, banning everyone and crippling there 360's

Its about time they did something

now they just need to disable modded controllers

[Montrealien]

Time for a new account Troll_Police.

May I suggest Fail_Police?

[Baka-akaB]

What is there to explain ? you are just silly here .

Once you follow the proper procedures and dont act like a moron , 360 piracy is easy , but it's still a chore . you have to deal with various hardware , especially dvd drives , and constantly be on the outlook for firmware updates , new protections and verifying your iso is safe online .

Microsoft never turned a blind eye to piracy , and this hardly even stop . It's the usual banhammer only far harsher this time .

Like the stupid MW2 player pretending they got a copie from he broken street date , and getting caught for using hacked copies too early or unverified .

360 piracy was hardly open , the door were forced with a roundhouse kick , and contrary to popular believes microsoft fight it , especially when every dlc is available for free to pirates ... they have just been their usual incompetent self , like on PC .

Anyone thinking they benefits from from having their console so cracked open people dont even have to hide offline is deluded at best .

PS : I'm just informed , as know people like everyone else . I even actually considered doing it , since my sole games on 360 are a few jrps and solo stuff .

But given that i'm a huge jrpgs fan, and remember the dire era when japanese devs wouldnt bother translating any non high profile jrpg or obscure japanese games , i refuse to , and support the us-eu versions .

But i'd be more tempted if i care for the big fps guns such as halo or cod like many others . Especially when activision jerks announces proudly more COD MW players than copies actually sold .

[_hiphopgamer_]

LOL...I hope for your sake you were joking.

Are you really that ignorant to believe what you wrote and still have the b@lls to argue your point.

[lsujester]

There IS reason they do the banning this time of year... they have their heavyweight games out. They've likely been sitting on many of these names for months now, just waiting for this time. Been playing ODST and looking forward to MW2... then bam, you're banned. The only way to get that game you've been playing or wanting is to buy a new console. Even if you mod it again and get a copied version, they still just sold you another 360.

[-epidemic-]

Ps3 news site giving 360 news...lol

[va_bank]

So you design an easily-hacked system, market it to the age group that's never been know to think of the long-term consequences and then start mass executions because the players toook advantage of your weakness.

That's like forgetting your wallet on the counter at McDonalds and complaining later that someone took it. Sure they shouldn't have done it, but holy cow, keep your $#!t together!

[EmperorSupreme]

@va_bank
It's how MS does business. They do the same thing with their software in other countries where they don't lead the market. They will offer it and intentionally let people pirate their software. Once they get the majority of the market they bring the hammer down.

[OmarJA]

Bad PenisWagon & his boyfriends.

[zerocrossing]

this is a rare occurance im actualy learning something interesting on N4G

after having read all of your comments it looks as if this isnt realy that new for MS theyre just being more harsh for some reason, like some of you have stated it may just be away to force people to buy more 360's in order to keep up with the sales of the PS3 i highly dout though that MS cares to much about pirates seing as theyre allready a mutli-million $ company those people making coppys here and there MS will barely feel the pinch, but i guess they cant be seen to be doing nothing.

[Baka-akaB]

Oh no they do care . Call of duty alone is a lot of money slipping by . It was a lot when the count of active cod4 players didnt match the amount of sold copies .

It was when many didnt buy fallout 3 and gta dlc and got it free . No ones pays 50 millions of exclusivity for DLC and shrug piracy off as some harmless mosquito sting .

Without easy to quantify and verify data , and the impossibility to trust numbers from game publishers , many dismiss piracy as something that isnt common among the masses , an something for the game aficionado and expert .

it couldnt be further from the truth imo . Piracy is quite widespread and easy on DS , Psp , Wii , 360 , and obviously PC .

The irony is that , even if what they are doing is wrong , Hardcore and dedicated pirate gamer often buys lots of games , while pirating those they cant afford or dont want to blow money upon . Yet they are often the hunter target .

While many others among the general public with no profound attachement whatsoever just dont want to pay anything at all .

[SIX]

Seeing so many banned consoles for sale on craigs list and Kijiji.

[dabri5]

My xbox got a e74 yesterday while I was playing on live. I'm still under warranty so I called up Microsoft to get the repair process started. Microsoft is refusing to repair my console though because they have it flagged as being banned. I can get on live without any issues. I can log into my live account via the website as well. They say the console is the part that is banned.
I have not modded it. Don't even know how.
The lady did tell me that the last time I sent my console in for repair, they sent me a different console back and that it could be the reason (maybe the console they sent me was someone else s refurbished modded system?). She talked to her managers and all they did was send me a link to the website explaining why consoles get banned.
Now I have to buy a new 360 in order to play COD:MW2 tonight. :(
At least now it will have a hdmi port.

[dabri5]

I asked if I could send my console in so they could look at it and verify I haven't opened it and modded it. They still refused.
They said, when they get a console in for repair, if the account is flagged, they wont even look at the console. They just send it back.

[zerocrossing]

damnn that realy sucks it looks like MS just screewed you over, not only was there a problem with your original 360 but you send it to be fixed and they replace it with a modded one, and all the help they are basicaly theyre just fobbing you off, this is why i never have anything good to say about MS they should be giving you a brand new elete console for all the trouble they caused you, i realy hope you have no troubles with the next console you get.

[Baka-akaB]

I feel for you ... however ..

Dude you're not some heroin addict . They treat you like crap and you're buying a new 360 ?

And this isnt about taking sides in a war or whatever ... if they gave me the same crap on any other console they'd get my middle finger .

At some point , and at the risk of sounding insensitive .. you , and others feeding into the habit of bying again 360 for such reasons , gotta ask yourself if you aint getting the treatment you deserve ?

If they know you'll come back anyway , why would they bother treating you with the proper respect ?

[silvacrest]

pirates will just buy another box off ebay (its not like they need the cables/hard drive etc so it will be cheap)

and in case anyone is wondering, if you end up buying a dud paypal will take care of it assuming you used them and of course, that will always be cheaper then buying original games

im not advocating this, just telling the truth

[dazzalfc]

I applaud any company that fights against piracy. Anything that makes the industry better is a good thing

HOWEVER......

I do feel that this move will hurt alot of gamers, both current and newcoming. Banning the console seems a decent enough idea, but how would you feel if you bought a 360 over next few weeks, or even several months ago second hand, only to be affected by the ban? And its not even reversable either. Any of you could, quite easily, be sitting on a modded Xbox 360 without even knowing it (well, those who bought second hand anyway) and once the ban comes, thats it. Its either a new console or do without the majority of the 360's features.

I give credit to MS for fighting this, i really do. But i do feel they could have handled it differently. I know two people already who have second hand consoles here in the UK, who have been banned without even knowing that the console was modded in any aspect. One has been on the phone several times to Microsoft, and is now even thinking about possible legal action.

It'll be funny to see the reaction from some 'hardcore' 360 fans on this site who i know pirate 360 games (BO WALEED being one of them) and how they will react. It makes me laugh when i see these people praise a company and its products to death on here, yet they can;t show legitimate support for it. And trust me, there's quite a few on this site who do it

[Baka-akaB]

Personally , i dont see what the hell is anyone doing buying a used 360 to begin with .

if it's a money issue , you're wasting as you're actually gambling on "how much shorter" will be the lifespan of that used 360 .

By now if you buy a 360 you probably already knows the ptential risk , high or not of it having a malfunction .. and now you add the uncertainty a used system without much knowledge of how it was treated ?

Sorry but if you get shafted with a banned or soon to be banned used 360 , the only one to blame would be you , and the unscrupulous vendor .

The case above is obviously different , as it was microsoft imcompetence's at fault , for not even checking if the console is modded to begin ith , before sending it as replacement .

Chances are most of those buyers would buy it BECAUSE they are modded and wanna tempt the ban fate , given how cheap they are , and how the prospect of free games sounds .

[zerocrossing]

i agree with you that fighting anything that hurts the gaming industry is a good thing, however how many of you have any idea how much piracy actualy effects the industry let alone damages it? let me tell you its a lot less than Sony, MS and Nintendo want you to think, so far the attempts to fight piracy by these companys has done far more damage to the industry than piracy has been doing,

lets start with the GC it used smaller discs in order to combat piracy however it was dificult for dev's to create games for the disc format also there was dificulty in fitting larger games on them thus causing Nintendo to miss out on some high profile games, Nintendo learnt from this mistake and went back to using reguler size discs unfortunatly they left us all for the casual market.

the PS3 has a special format disc known as the blue ray disc wich was another step to fight piracy also it is what is responsible for giving us great graphics without sacrificing the games length, however most of you may have noticed since the PS3's release the price of games has gone up by a good amount what in the UK would have been £35:99 now is £45:99 or even £50:00 it mite not sound like much but that £10:00 or £15:00 extra is enough to stop some people from buying new games causing them to purchase them later from a second hand store, alot of people now do this but by doing so the developers will not see as much profit and we are less likely to see sequels of our more obscure but beloved games,

now MS they have done the least to prevent piracy in the console gaming industry thus far, still using reguler DVD's theyre method seems more to allow piracy to go on untill there are enuogh people making and using pirated discs and moded 360's, creating somewhat of a publicity stunt by deleting accounts and causing many inocent buyers of 2nd hand 360's that have been moded unknown by them to lose the use of there console, this will inevitably cause damage to the industry wher many 360 usrers decide enough is enough and drop there 360's completly, if this is to happen the sales of many high profile games will drop sharply causing damage to the industry,

i personaly disagree with piracy but can see that many people who do pirate have theyre reasons usualy to do with the cost of gaming in this age, for the most part pirate gamers are not hardened criminals if you truely want them to stop then make games affordable otherwise this will continue,
i hope i have made my point that trying to stop pirating the wrong way like many have tride has actualy caused more damage to the gaming industry than pirating has caused.

[dazzalfc]

"Sorry but if you get shafted with a banned or soon to be banned used 360 , the only one to blame would be you "

Sorry? So its perfectly acceptable for people to be banned for buying a second hand console that they didn't know was modded? And they should take the blame, and sacrifice, for that? Right, ok. I think your forgetting that not everyone is stinking rich, nor is everyone a hardcore gamer. Trust me, the 'hardcore' are in the minority when it comes to gaming, and i doubt the common person on the street knows that the 360 can even be modded. As i said, i applaud MS for fighting this, but many will be punished for simply doing nothing wrong, and many will now be in a situation where they are buying a used console and finding out hours/days/weeks later that it cannot be used online, or many of its features cannot be used.

@ Zerocrossing - I wouldn't blame discs just for price hikes, but a combination of things. From disc formats, larger development teams with longer development times, higher skilled people demanding bigger wages, higher advertising costs.....there are tons of factors outside of just 'BLUray' to blame, and even then, good prices for new games aren't to find. Tomorrow i can buy Modern Warfare 2 on either 360 or PS3 for as little as £26, and can buy the likes of Fifa2010, PES2010, Uncharted 2 etc for as little as £30.

All i think is that Microsoft could have handled this in a more delicate way than just banning every console that has been hacked. Hell, its not even stopping piracy given you can still play downloadable games on a modded 360, you just cant take them onto xbox live

[zerocrossing]

i had alot to right and didnt want to go in to to much detail but what you siad is very true, the industry has grown a substantial ammonut so i guess it is only natural to be paid more for doing a big job thanks for picking me up on that one,

btw if you dont mind letting me in i would like very much to know wher your purchasing your games?

[dazzalfc]

Simples, the very places that are killing genuine game shops.....supermarkets! Sainsburys, Tescos, Asda, Morrisons...all sell games at stupid prices. Many of them are selling Modern Warfare 2 for under £30 tonight/tomorrow. Shopto.net is also a good source for games

[zerocrossing]

i gota say i havent realy checked many of those places out properly for games, like most ive been paying full price for the must have games and i try to get the others 2nd hand i'll definatly be checking around though even though the industry may suffer that little bit extra now lol anyway thanks very much apreciated =)

[Baka-akaB]

Not everyone is rich ? Guess what ? i'm far from it , wich is what i'd rather spend months getting the money for the cheapest new one , rather than gambling on a possibly faulty system , with the end prospect of having to buy it again .

If you buy used without any kind of knowledge of how the material was actually treated (unlike say buying it from someone you actually know , and a console you saw working multiples) , of course it's your fault if it blows up your face .

It's a meh analogy , but if you are buying a used car you'll check if everything is all right i guess ?

But to each their opinion anyway

[No FanS Land]

Have a question here: Can the 360 now detect non-genuine MS HDD's? (like putting a 250Gbwestern digital)

Good to take care of the pirates. I laughed at the first comment on the website. "why don't MS just make the console go RROD?"

[dazzalfc]

Yes, they can detect non official hard drives. I've read about people receiving bans for using non official ones on other forums, and i'm sure its been mentioned by certain officials within Microsoft that they can detect them. They regard this as bad as the whole modded firmware stuff, as they link it all to piracy, or other hacks to profiles, achievements etc

[jack who]

ps site running xbox new kool

[heihoosilver]

About six months ago my 360 had E74 error, send it to micro and they send me fixed, said in the paper they change the mobo and the disc drive. Sunday, after 3 days of not even have the internet cable connected to xbox360, when i try to login to xbox live,BAM, "your console is banned"???. No mod, no copy games.???.Nothing can be made to undo the ban, they said. OK, if i´m banned for not playing pirate games, it´s time to mod the xbox360 and don´t buy more Original games . The games i want to play online are Bad Company 2, so ill buy a Ps3 and this game when it´s available and play all the xbox360 games on modded xbox360.No more support for micro.

[tweet75]

thats how you prevent nonofficial software from being used

[sbstncstllo]

You got it wrong, "I didn't have a beef with a game that the console broke as you said". I HATED the multiplayer version of gears2 compared to the first one and that's why I traded it in gamestop.
Please read my previous post again, I know my english sucks but I'm positive it is understandable.
As I said before if I would of had the chance to play the game from the hard drive I would of never modded my console.
Then when I heard about the new ixtreme 1.6 and the new 4 wave games I updated the old ix to make sure I was using the latest/safest firmware and not get banned!

Anyways like I said before never played a single backup on my modded console and I was a little upset (with myself) that I was hit by the ban hammer, though I knew very well the risk when I decided to mod it and brake the TOS doing it.

ADVICE: don't want to get banned ? DON'T BRAKE THE TOS agreement[.]