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Microsoft Xbox Modding Guide - Part 2

Date Published:
04-14-2005

Written By:
Capn

Sponsored By:
N/A

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5

Wiring up the USB:

Now to get down to the hard part, wiring it into the USB of the Xbox. Each USB port has its own set of 4 standard colored USB wires for a total of 16 wires. Each controller port has 5 wires coming out the back, 4 that follow the standard USB coloring scheme and an additional yellow wire that provides the controller with the extra voltage needed for the rumble and other additional features. What will happen is we will cut the 4 USB wires from the controller ports and cut the wires form the USB bracket and splice them all together with a little bit of solder and heat shrink tube. Are you confused yet? It’s easier to show you what I mean so follow the pictures. Make sure cut off as much of the excess wires as possible. Also note that I put the motherboard and power supply back in the case so that I wont do any wiring that will interfere with the mounting of them when its all done. I didn’t screw them in just sitting there is good enough.


Before	During	After


The Controller port	The wires	Wires cut

Above are pictures of the controller ports striped. Below is a picture of the USB bracket wires striped and soldered to the controller ports. Remember do not cut the yellow wire as that’s just for the Xbox controllers and not used in USB. I accidentally cut the yellow wire on one of the controller ports and had to solder it back together. Before cutting and striping the wires that go to the USB you should put the base Xbox components back in, the mother boards, psu, and the shielding so you can make sure to get the lengths as long as you need them. You don’t need to screw them in, just set them in place. You don’t want 5 inches of unnecessary wire, space in the Xbox is tight enough without extra cable.


Wires from the USB ports and heatshrink	Soldered and covered

After wiring it all up and throwing the DVD drive and the HDD in I noticed the bottom of the HDD tray needed to be cut away a little to allow the cables to fit. I just used some pliers and ripped a section off and that worked fine for me. With all the components in and the control ports in you can make sure everything fits fine like shown.

Modding The Jewel:

Now with that tedious part done we can move on to more fun modding: The Jewel

If you remember from the previous part I got a blank jewel from the generous people over at http://shop.craxtion.com. I didn’t want a blank jewel in my highly modified Xbox, but I also didn’t want the somewhat generic selection you find at the jewel retailers, so I decided to make my own. I like etched jewels but their a little overplayed now so I chose to do a full color graphic for mine. First I drew the made the graphic in Photoshop and printed it up using glossy photo paper as seen below:

TuxBox!

If you look closely I made a light circle 2” in diameter. That’s how big my jewel is so I cut the picture out on the line, then with the help of my lovely girlfriend glued it to the back of the jewel. I was afraid the glue might not come out clear even though the package said it would so I just glued the edges to be safe. Here are a few pictures of the process. I think it turned out really good and I like the end result better than any etching I’ve seen thus far.


teh_gurl	The glue	The jewel

Doesn’t that look nice? It gives the Xbox a nice custom look. Yet it’s not quite flashy enough. What can we co too make it stand out more? That’s right, light it! How you may ask? Well what I found is the easiest way, is also the best way. Now that doesn’t happen very often. Well what is it? An 80mm cold cathode fan!

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