Microsoft Starts New Ban Wave on LIVE Against Modified Firmwares

Kazu

>> We don't have a lot of information yet (it just started, but we try to warn you all as early as possible), but it looks like Microsoft started a new wave of bans against modified DVD firmwares or DVD+/-R DL discs.
Several users on our forums and on IRC report their Xbox 360 has been banned from LIVE today. We get reports of Toshiba-Samsung and Hitachi-LG drives banned with both Xtreme and even the newer iXtreme firmwares. However we also see many reports of people who are currently on LIVE and have no been banned (yet). No reports of banned BenQ drives yet (but few of these drives have been flashed yet).
We don't know yet if Microsoft is detecting the modified firmware or the discs (or maybe only with a specific game?).
If you have the 'Z Code' 8015-190D it means you are banned. As always Microsoft bans the console serial from LIVE, not your LIVE account.
If your console is banned or if you have been playing on LIVE today with modified FW without getting banned, report you findings in this thread (include at least your live status, full drive model (swapped drive?, spoofing?) and firmware version used).

So until we have more info we HIGHLY suggest you don't log in to Xbox LIVE and don't play any games from DVD+/-R DL (even offline, incase MS flags something) if you have a flashed DVD drive.

coolhandc

shouldnt have them in the first place.good enuf for yez

tman

Or just stop being a dirty pirate and just buy your games and use an unmodified console if you want to use live... can't have your cake and eat it too

Fingleberries

As a mighty philospher once said:

Nelson Muntz wrote:

Ha! Ha!

Guess all that shady stuff doesn't really pay in the long term. Don't think there's a lot of sympathy out there.

Helix

im happy enough with having a flashed, banned 360

mainly coz i have a ps3 for online games, but still

it also allows quality control, in that ill buy whatever i think is really good for the ps3 anyway and i can avoid dodgy purchases by playing them first on the 360 and seeing if theyre worth buying or not

ongarite

So are you saying you download illegal copies of game to try them out on 360 then if they're good enough buy them for PS3?
Thats a kind of flawed logic? Why not rent it or read some reviews, opinions on it?

brianon

Helix wrote: »

im happy enough with having a flashed, banned 360

mainly coz i have a ps3 for online games, but still

it also allows quality control, in that ill buy whatever i think is really good for the ps3 anyway and i can avoid dodgy purchases by playing them first on the 360 and seeing if theyre worth buying or not

I love when people say that. I even say it myself. "I download music yeah but you know if I like it I buy it".

Bullsh*t
Maybe some small percentage of people do. Maybe! But for most, they will just d/l the games and never buy.

Retr0gamer

Have no sympathy, the only reason to have a flashed 360 is to play illegal copies of games.

Helix

brianon wrote: »

I love when people say that. I even say it myself. "I download music yeah but you know if I like it I buy it".

Bullsh*t

ive had my ps3 a month and i have 12 games

trust me, if i like it and theres decent multiplayer or online aspects, ill buy it

also, for the record i dont pay for music, ever. nor do i charge for mine, ever

Helix

ongarite wrote: »

So are you saying you download illegal copies of game to try them out on 360 then if they're good enough buy them for PS3?
Thats a kind of flawed logic? Why not rent it or read some reviews, opinions on it?

dont really see how its flawed logic tbh

reviews are untrustworthy for the most part, and renting costs money

granted if a mate has a game im interested ill just get a lend of it off him and save the 7gb download

brianon

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Have no sympathy, the only reason to have a flashed 360 is to play illegal copies of games.

You saying you've never burnt the odd Dreamcast or Saturn game ?

Retr0gamer

brianon wrote: »

You saying you've never burnt the odd Dreamcast or Saturn game ?

I'd always make sure my money is going towards the developers or publishers. There's no way I could justify giving 250 euro to some random ebay seller for some obscure game especially when it's not going to the industry. It's also sometimes the only way you can get your hands on games since they just can't be found nowadays. If I find it at a decent price I'll pay for it.

There's no point arguing that pirating new games on a new system is the same.

coolhandc

Helix wrote: »

for the record i dont pay for music, ever. nor do i charge for mine, ever

well i get the impression that no one would actually pay for your "music" either!

brianon

Retr0gamer wrote: »

There's no point arguing that pirating new games on a new system is the same.

Was only kiddin'

mcgovern

brianon wrote: »

I love when people say that. I even say it myself. "I download music yeah but you know if I like it I buy it".

Bullsh*t
Maybe some small percentage of people do. Maybe! But for most, they will just d/l the games and never buy.

Well I don't have a modded 360 or intend on getting one, but I do download TV shows and Music.
If its good, I'll buy it.
Hence why I have unopened boxsets of BSG S1 +S2, Rome etc and CDs that have never been in a player yet I've listened to them 50 times.

Games, CDs, DVDs etc cost too much these days to write it off if its a load of $h!t.

MrVestek

Aye that's very true. Personally though I've no sympathy whatsoever.

the_god_swan

Personally i do own a modded 360 and i couldnt care less about this wave of bans becasuse thats an attribute that goes with setting up the 360 to play back-up games.
I understand many people love playing on Live, for me I never got into it. I am happy enough playing at home alone or with flatmates.

Also there is no-one (so far) on this thread with a modded 360 complaining about being banned so all the 'can't have your cake and eat it too' comments are unneccessary I say.

Would I reverse time and un-mod my machine?? Hell no :rolleyes:

Helix

coolhandc wrote: »

well i get the impression that no one would actually pay for your "music" either!

the labels ive had releases on would beg to differ im sure

ongarite

You should check out Xbox-Scene then. The thread on the ban-hammer there is very funny. Most are in total denial that they have done anything woring and its all MS money grabbing fault.

the_god_swan

ongarite wrote: »

You should check out Xbox-Scene then. The thread on the ban-hammer there is very funny. Most are in total denial that they have done anything woring and its all MS money grabbing fault.

Yeah i seen that Ongarite, and these people need to put the scenario into perspective. But here luckily people are more accepting and rightly so.

tman

Helix wrote: »

also, for the record i dont pay for music, ever. nor do i charge for mine, ever

Didn't you put some kind of copy protection in your kernkraft 400 remix? seems that you do mind people stealing your music whether you like to admit it here or not...

Helix

tman wrote: »

Didn't you put some kind of copy protection in your kernkraft 400 remix? seems that you do mind people stealing your music whether you like to admit it here or not...

nah i just distorted it a bit so that if people wanted a good quality version theyd to ask me basically,. because as you know, nobody ever actually bothers giving feedback these days. i also turned down money for all my releases

i couldnt care about people stealing my music, see:

http://www.h3lx.com/tracks.html

13 of them were meant to be relased before i decided to cancel all my deals

thebman

People saying Ms aren't doing anything wrong are technically wrong. I don't have a modded 360 but people are entitled under law to play back ups of their games and its wrong for Ms to try to prevent that and to ban people from the online service for changing the console so it can play their legal back ups.

It doesn't automatically mean piracy although it does for 99.9% of people I'd say but there are legitimate reasons to want to play non-official games.

If Ms don't want to allow people to play back up games, all users should be able to return a scratched game to the store they purchased from and get a replacement without question. Just try do that with a scratched game and see how many stores do it without a fuss.

I know Ms allow you to do it with first party games like Gears of War but in general they don't do it especially for third party titles.

I'm not really disappointed they did this but I would like the EU to step in and clear this issue up as people are entitled to have backups of the software they have purchased that is playable.

Pacifico

In fairness, i doubt anyone uses their modded 360 to play backups of games that they own :rolleyes:

Nerin

Have no sympathy, the only reason to have a flashed 360 is to play illegal copies of games.

lol
this is the type of comment i laugh at when its said about psps and homebrew.
theres a multitude of things one can do with custom fw other than piracy.
of course theres loadsa pirates (yarrrr) but theres also loadsa people who want custom themes,or homebrew games or applications etc.
ah the old days of people giving out about cheat discs like ar max with its big bad emulators and loaders.
back to the good old days
ps.

In fairness, i doubt anyone uses their modded 360 to play backups of games that they own

games saved to a harddrive or memsticl load faster than a disc,so you could be wrong there.

savemejebus

nerin wrote: »

theres a multitude of things one can do with custom fw other than piracy.

what sort of homebrew applications are out there for the 360? (genuinely interested question, not sniping )

Nerin

when its said about psps and homebrew.

sorry i cant help u there,i dont have a 360 (boo hiss *cowers*)
my housemate does,but hes anti modding and pro everything special edition.
im sure there should be apps and the like for the 36o cfw, and if there isnt,there should be,the psp scene thrives, the 36o has alot more power to punch than a psp.
im sure someone out there can answer your question about the possibilties,im just here because of cfw comments

ongarite

nerin wrote: »

lol
this is the type of comment i laugh at when its said about psps and homebrew.
theres a multitude of things one can do with custom fw other than piracy.
of course theres loadsa pirates (yarrrr) but theres also loadsa people who want custom themes,or homebrew games or applications etc.
ah the old days of people giving out about cheat discs like ar max with its big bad emulators and loaders.
back to the good old days
ps.

games saved to a harddrive or memsticl load faster than a disc,so you could be wrong there.

While that may be true for PSP there is no homebrew or scene for the 360. The rest of the console besides the DVD drive is locked down tighter than my ass so the only reason to flash DVD-drive is to play copied games. Plain and Simple.

lee_baby_simms

Helix wrote: »

mainly coz i have a ps3 for online

Heh, good luck with that.

Helix

lee_baby_simms wrote: »

Heh, good luck with that.

it works fine to play games against people

i dont need the bells and whistles xbl offers for what i want from the ps3

i just put in a game, hit online, and hit ranked match

simple

thats not to say i wouldnt pay for an xbl standard system, but once i can actually play the games online, im happy

TheDoc

it would be tempting since my 360 is a huge part of my media system, and the 360 doesnt play dvd-r or copied discs, that contain alot of my digital photos and camera videos from nights out holidays etc which is a bit poor.

You cant REALLY hit down on those that use pirating tbh, they save alot of money, and the internet provides an easy accesible base to get pretty much anything you need for free.

I myself do not have a cracked 360 its fully legal and i buy all my gaming software.

But come on honestly, if there was no xbox live to be banned from, everyone would have a cracked 360 like most people had cracked ps2/1 etc.

Plus I am a major supporter of homebrew and the people that make these cracks(which i dont support illegal use of games i go pay 60 brick on) are also major developers and helpers i nthe homebrew scene.

I really am hoping the 360 gets some homebrew, i dont want to be paying out money to be playing golden axe, when psp can do it all for free, as can my pc


but i do fully support microsoft in their attempt to ban these machines from xbox live, as i dont agree with people not purchasing games getting online benefits.

Fair enough if your playing offline single players and with your mates thats fine by me, but when im paying for an xbl service, idont want to be playing against those who are illegal using the system.

As of now the only homebrew system for the xbox 360 is like a snes or something,. but it has no sound. Its a very poor piece of software. In time when more people have media centre or they abolish that block completely we will see plenty of homebrew.

IMO microsoft should support it, it would get more people on their side. Imagine they enabled xbox live co op capabilities for homebrew, instead of having to fork out money for golden axe and the likes