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XBOX Live vs. Firmware Flash


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XBOX Live vs. Firmware Flash  

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I've never personally played on XBOX Live. I never even tried it when I owned a regular XBOX. However, now that I see they are selling games, movies, etc. on XBOX Live, it got me thinking that it may not be all that bad. Most of all, I really want to try it out to see what all the hype is about. I'm also interested in purchasing and/or playing SF2Remix, which will soon be released.

 

However, I have a dilemma. If I do buy an XBOX 360 again, I want to flash it with the latest custom firmware so I can play my backup games. However, if I do firmware flash it, I could potentially get my XBOX 360 console and my IP address banned on Microsoft's servers if I decide to pay for and go on XBOX Live. This I surely do not want to happen. Now I know there are many work arounds that will allow you to go on Live without any problems if your firmware is flashed. However, no one knows for sure when these loop holes will be banned too. There is no way of knowing how much Microsoft can see when you login via XBOX Live with a firmware flashed XBOX 360 console.

 

The last dilemma I have (although unrelated to the actual topic) are future XBOX 360 upgrades. Do you believe Microsoft would ever create a dashboard update that would render your custom firmware useless?

 

So the biggest question for me is.... is it better to be able to play backup games or have the ability to enjoy and use XBOX Live?

 

P.S. Please don't suggest for me to buy a second 360 for XBOX Live. I don't have the money to do something like that.

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My vote is for Live.

 

I'm sure there are ways you can do both, but assuming you don't want the risk of whatever, stay legit and go Live. With Live you get online play for all games with a great matchmaking service. Even if you don't pay for Live and go with a Silver membership, you still get friends, XBL Arcade games, DLC for games, patches, multimedia and system updates. That's a lot to be giving up. Assuming you don't want to whore out a backup of every 360 game released, it might not be worth it in the long run.

 

Also what do you mean when you say a Dashboard update that will render CFW useless? The Dashboard does get some pretty hefty updates now and again (Divx / Xvid support being one of the big draws of the most recent update) and as far as I can tell you be sacrificing the ability to update without a Live connection. May be wrong, but I don't think Microsoft offers ISO-based firmware updates online anymore.

 

PS. Isn't it only the DVD-ROM drives firmware that gets flashed... not the whole system's? Forgive me if I'm confused on that matter.

 

PPS. And yeh, with no Live, no SSF2HDR for you!

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My vote goes to Xbox live why? read below :blink:

 

Though xbox live charges for online play, there is also the silver membership and what you get with that is access to you're friends list, Downloadable Content, Movies (which are really good IMO, especially the ones you've missed in the movies theaters) you also get updates to games, firmware updates to the dashboard, arcade games that are actually worth playing, achievements which you can show to everyone, you're own gamer zone, if you are a casual person or a hardcore gamer. However if you are a silver membership user you get new content about a week after they were released i believe.

 

If you do happen to flash your drive's firmware you will mostly be at risk of getting your console banned and also, they don't ban you're IP they ban you're consoles serial key. In order to get back online you would need to perform a timing attack and obtain a new key from another xbox 360. So yes this is far different from a normal eeprom.

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it is possible that even when you can flash it you can then revert it to the factory firmware and as long as the console is offline there is no way to get it banned

 

That's not true, you can still be banned even if you're console is offline. It does not matter if your ethernet connection is disconnected or not. Once that console signs to any type of profile all of your records of games you played will get transfered to microsofts servers and they will see the keys if the keys are different from the retail keys then you will be banned just not immediately. Also, in this dashboard firmware microsoft is recording older xbox 1 titles aswell. you will notice that its recorded along with your games played. Even if you decide to use a non live profile. once that console gets connected it gets recorded. The only way you can bypass this is not use any profiles at all.

Edited by LoRd_SnOw
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I tried Live purely to try out online gaming but it didn't draw me in like I thought it would. Still I made a lot of use of the Marketplace and such and didn't regret paying for the subscription. Not to mention downloading additional content for the likes of Oblivion.

 

Being able to acquire whatever 'backups' I wanted ruined the last Xbox for me. Go with Live and hand pick a few quality titles and enjoy. Personally I adored Oblivion, though it isn't multiplayer, there's a lot of extra content for it. As far as multiplayer, the only game I really enjoyed was RS : Vegas.

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