My replacement modchip arrived today. Installing it was easy, the only tricky bit being removing solder from the holes for the LCP. The pin header went on easily, and the new chip – an Xecuter 2.5 – started up correctly.

I recorded the installation in great detail – including the attempted installation of the broken modchip, and will upload and sort through them later on. The BIOS in the Xecuter is a much more advanced one than in the previous chip. It comes with the Linux-based FlashBIOS installed which has the wonderful feature of flashing over HTTP. A very easy and simple procedure, much better than burning a CD image.

Now, when the previous modcip didn’t work it was suggested by several people that I just softmod my XBox instead. I had a look, but since it requires specific versions of specific games and then a rather lengthy and complicated looking procedure – with the chance of making my XBox unbootable if I did it wrong, I decided to use a modchip. Finding places selling modchips for a 6 year old console is hard enough, but finding specific versions of specific games would seem to be even harder. Installing the modchip was very easy, the hardest part is soldering the D0 line.

I now have an XBox that boots XBMC and, once I’ve made up a longer ethernet cable, can sit in bed and watch films and listen to music across my network.