Microsoft Starts Banning 360s on LIVE - MS Confirms

[Meshuggah]

"I can afford a nice HDTV, but games? Pfffft, that's for morons" :p

[OhMuffin]

"I can afford a nice HDTV, but games? Pfffft, that's for morons" :p

LOL, I guess your right..

I don't think of it that way. I tend to think of it "This way I get to play games I would of NEVER even though about buying", plus all these extra games made my Gamerscore and e-penis go through the roof.

Its not like I didn't buy games at all, I did.

Modding my 360 was more of a proof-of-concept thing for me, rather than being cheap.

(I kind of hate that tv... its actually not that nice)

[+vlsi0n Subscriber¹]

Well this is good news but people will just use different methods than the firmware now.

[Meshuggah]

LOL, I guess your right..

I don't think of it that way. I tend to think of it "This way I get to play games I would of NEVER even though about buying", plus all these extra games made my Gamerscore and e-penis go through the roof.

(I kind of hate that tv... its actually not that nice)

You sound exactly like that "friend" of mine. He only plays games for achievement points, so that's how he justifies it.

the TV does suck too. lol. I love you though. Go back to your "Playstation 3 LOL" sig. :D

[OhMuffin]

As of May 17th 2007, there is no other way to "back up" games.

Firmware was the only way to go, and now its detected. Therefore I assume piracy is stopped for now. Although a new exploit could pop up tomorrow.

You sound exactly like that "friend" of mine. He only plays games for achievement points, so that's how he justifies it.

the TV does suck too. lol. I love you though. Go back to your "Playstation 3 LOL" sig. :D

Thanks. Maybe instead of getting a new 360, I'll join the dark side and get a ps3 :o ............ nah maybe not. PLAYSTATION 3, LOLL

[Rodrigo]

LOL, I guess your right..

I don't think of it that way. I tend to think of it "This way I get to play games I would of NEVER even though about buying", plus all these extra games made my Gamerscore and e-penis go through the roof.

Its not like I didn't buy games at all, I did.

Modding my 360 was more of a proof-of-concept thing for me, rather than being cheap.

(I kind of hate that tv... its actually not that nice)

You always learn from your mistakes, so don't worry. :p I think Microsoft will have some troubles after all this. First because they're banning legit consoles and second because well... you have to understand that the 360 market is global and in countries like mine the piracy is rampant and I can tell you for sure that there are more piracy users than original users here in Mexico.

The thing is, I think this is different from the normal Xbox since people are paying for Xbox Live and Arcade games (and other services) and while I don't deffend them I still think they should've only stopped the playing of backup games. But I guess pirates should've seen this coming, although who says they won't get a free service like xlink (which won't be as good as Xbox Live should I say).

[OhMuffin]

Don't get me wrong, I knew the risk of going online with my modded box from day one.

I had a good run and it seems like it was worth it.

I bought 3 arcade games off XBL. By banning me from Xbox Live, I no longer can purchase anything. Already MS is losing money on me.

[Rodrigo]

Don't get me wrong, I knew the risk of going online with my modded box from day one.

I had a good run and it seems like it was worth it.

I bought 3 arcade games off XBL. By banning me from Xbox Live, I no longer can purchase anything. Already MS is losing money on me.

I couldn't be without Xbox Live. I already own 19 arcade games and only 5 of them have been free, lol.

[Meshuggah]

Don't get me wrong, I knew the risk of going online with my modded box from day one.

I had a good run and it seems like it was worth it.

I bought 3 arcade games off XBL. By banning me from Xbox Live, I no longer can purchase anything. Already MS is losing money on me.

3 out of 70 games. I don't think they are losing much :p

[Nashy]

Don't get me wrong, I knew the risk of going online with my modded box from day one.

I had a good run and it seems like it was worth it.

I bought 3 arcade games off XBL. By banning me from Xbox Live, I no longer can purchase anything. Already MS is losing money on me.

They were losing a lot more when you were pirating.

You almost seem proud to be pirating games, and are happy to be banned. Lame.

[laz45]

"My Friends" Xbox is still live and kicking hopefully its still like that by tomorrow :p

[OhMuffin]

3 out of 70 games. I don't think they are losing much :p

70? No no, I didn't have a production line of pirated games. 70 is a crapload of games.

I think I've only played 23 or something (look in my profile on xbox.com)

[Meshuggah]

theres 70 XBLA games HoMuffin.

[hava333]

I've never understood why Microsoft does this. Their main reason is to deter cheating in online games. I honestly don't think they give a crap about piracy because they realize that is going to happen regardless.

They should spend their time creating a fail safe procedure that doesn't destroy your xbox, but yet still maintains an equal playing field. As far as I know having a mod chip isn't illegal so why do they ruin a product that you purchased, simple for money. But they aren't in the console business for money so why **** off people that have their xbox modded to play custom maps? If they spent the time and actually sat down to do something constructive they could create a system that would ensure that your custom content was being used appropriately. I have no idea why they rain on the custom content parade, its a huge untapped resource that they punish users for.

And that ends my rant.

[Meshuggah]

They should spend their time creating a fail safe procedure that doesn't destroy your xbox, but yet still maintains an equal playing field.

They are.

As far as I know having a mod chip isn't illegal so why do they ruin a product that you purchased

In certain places they are.

But they aren't in the console business for money so why **** off people that have their xbox modded to play custom maps?

For the xbox 360, you can't play custom maps. Modification is only possible to the DVD drive, allowing 360's to play pirated games and nothing more.

If they spent the time and actually sat down to do something constructive they could create a system that would ensure that your custom content was being used appropriately.

They are. Check your facts.

[Am_I_Evil]

But they aren't in the console business for money

[hava333]

How are they creating a fail safe procedure that doesnt destroy your xbox?

-Granted it doesnt destory your xbox, as you can still play games with it, but it destroys your ability to play XBL. I should have been more clear. I consider that a destroyed xbox because all I do is play Live.

For the xbox 360, you can't play custom maps. Modification is only possible to the DVD drive, allowing 360's to play pirated games and nothing more.

I'm assuming that if you can run unsigned games you could run unsigned code that you created yourself. In turn that would allow you to do whatever you want to the content on your xbox as far as I understand it.

They are. Check your facts.

I'm gonna related this to Halo because thats the only reason they are banning people; To prevent the halo 3 beta from spreading. They definitely are not supporting custom content. If they were you wouldnt get banned for playing custom games on modded maps.

But they aren't in the console business for money

They have never made money during all the quarters the best they've done i think... is break even. They are in the market to minimize the market share that sony has. They make thier money from office and Windows.

[Meshuggah]

I'm assuming that if you can run unsigned games you could run unsigned code that you created yourself. In turn that would allow you to do whatever you want to the content on your xbox as far as I understand it.

I'm gonna related this to Halo because thats the only reason they are banning people; To prevent the halo 3 beta from spreading. They definitely are not supporting custom content. If they were you wouldnt get banned for playing custom games on modded maps.

They have never made money during all the quarters the best they've done i think... is break even. They are in the market to minimize the market share that sony has. They make thier money from office and Windows.

You're assumption is wrong. The xbox 360 is not the xbox. The only thing the modification does is insert a key into the DVD drive, telling it to load a burned dvd. You can't modify content on the xbox 360 to run unsigned code, because if that was the case, XBMC 360 would be coming out or already out. This also has nothign to do with Halo 3. Microsoft has been hinting for a while that they would not let people with modified consoles play Halo 3, but they are cracking down because of the Spring Update which allows you to "see which game you have in your dvd drive." I personally think that is how they figured out how to see who was modding, although I could be wrong.

They do not ban you for playing custom games or modded maps because that is currently not possible. It is true that they have never made money, but their intentions is to eventually break the market, take the lead and start making money. If you think any company would spend billions of dollars for the sake of spending it, you are completely wrong. The first xbox was to get into the market and this xbox is to go one step further, eventually making them money by establishing LEGIT users who will actually purchase games. They are barely starting to break even on the consoles, and their money is in xbox live arcades/DLC and accessories, not the console itself.

[Heyo]

I wonder what the legality is of what MS is doing in countries that allow modding of consoles?

I mean, MS can go run and cry back to their end user license agreement, but that doesn't necessarily mean squat.

Like MS could say in their license... You are free to use this Xbox 360 product... unless you are black. In that case you can't use it because we don't want it to be used by black people.

That just wouldn't hold up. They would have to prove their restraints against the user's right to use the hardware they have legally purchased (however they want) are reasonable.

Sony had their ass handed to them here (in Australia) over MOD chips before. Region encoding was found to be anti-consumer.

I wonder how long it will be till somebody challenges it here? Say some peeved off owner of a disfunctional 2nd-hand 360 bought at some garage sale, or more obviously a manufacturer or distributer of mod chips who is now sitting on a hill of expensive, useless silicon.

Would be interesting.

[laz45]

I'm assuming that if you can run unsigned games you could run unsigned code that you created yourself. In turn that would allow you to do whatever you want to the content on your xbox as far as I understand it.

Thats not the case, you can only create a duplicate of the original dvd if you change even one single bit it doesn't run unless some of the original content is not signed like King Kong's shader files

[Meshuggah]

Heyo: It isn't a mod chip. A mod chip allows you to do other things than steal games. This is a modification of the firmware to the DVD drive, which circumvents the security of the xbox 360. Do any of you actually know what you are talking about before you go into these rants?

[Heyo]

Heyo: It isn't a mod chip. A mod chip allows you to do other things than steal games. This is a modification of the firmware to the DVD drive, which circumvents the security of the xbox 360. Do any of you actually know what you are talking about before you go into these rants?

Fair enough, but if you actually read what I said, you would understand the differentiation is meaningless.

I was curious about the legal position MS is taking in restricting consumers rights to do whatever they want to with the hardware they have purchased. Whether this is through a Mod chip or flashing the firmware is quite meaningless.

Doing such a thing doesn't necessarily have anything to do with "stealing games" either. I see you have bought into the whole "All consumers are dirty, filthy thieves that must be stopped at any cost" line that is popular with copyright owners and their puppet politico's nowdays.

Just dismissing my curiosity as a ?rant? was being rude, and quite ironic given your own hypocritical little ?rant? about people not knowing what they are talking about before shooting their mouths off.

Oh well.

[Manson_AAN]

Can you get unbanned after you remove all the modifications?

[hava333]

K, I'm a nub. I was for some reason thinking that the Xbox coding extension deally addon to visual c++ express was homebrew and allowed unsigned code to run. I'm retarded on that front.

The whole banning people and then making them buy a new xbox still doesnt make sense. Not only does it **** the customer off, but it also makes them buy another console which (I hope, oh Hope i am right on this. If not i'm done) they lose money on. Its retarded logic; the kind of logic that will forever prevent them from making money in the console market, and happy customers.

Edit: I just checked the cost, and it costs like $320 or something to make a premium console, so probably like $321 for an elite and $280 or so for the basic. This manufacturing cost is fairly new as it used to cost them something like $718 to produce the premium. Notice they didn't ban people then. Now it is economic for them to ban people so they do. This illustrates my previous point that they done give a **** about the consumer and the possibility of custom content, and are therefore doing nothing to support its development.

[The_Decryptor Veteran]

Good.

Only modifications i support are for playing Homebrew, now MS allow that, there is no reason for modding it.

Those poor pirates :laugh:

Edit: as for the legality, they aren't bricking your Xbox, they are only restricting your access to Live, which would be in the TOS, you violate TOS = you don't have a legal leg to stand on (also you're only doing it to play pirated games)