Can I put a CF card in a XBox (1) instead of the HDD ?

[Fudoh]

speaking of a modded XBox without HDD lock. Would it work to replace the HDD with a CF card on an IDE adapter ?? Anyone done this ? Anyone has a link to a working adapter ?

[Endymion]

I have not done this myself. I have not even heard of anyone trying. However, if it is simply a matter of using a converter, there is no reason I know that it should not work. Using serial ATA converters already works to use those kinds of drives, so if you have one for a compact flash card I would expect that should function also. Seems like it would gimp the XBox quite a bit (available space, cost of a large card, etc.), but then I suppose you have a specific purpose in mind that could benefit from it.

[Fudoh]

I only keep the XBox for two games and the HDD's currently broken. A 16GB CF card is still less than a new small parallel IDE harddrive. I'll give it a try.

[dieKatze88]

Be sure to get a CF card with the ATA functionality, not all CF cards have it.

[Sumez]

I'm interested in hearing how it works. And if it manages to speed up things.

[bencao74]

fudoh, good idea. I´ve done this on old Amiga a600 and a1200...

[Sparda]

did you try asking the specialist on x-scene ?

Seems a really good idea, but a tsop or a modchip is needed. ested

[shmuppyLove]

Last I checked, 160GB PATA hard drives were around $50. A 16GB CF card is going to cost you at least that much (for a cheap one), plus the cost of the IDE->CF adapter (probably around $10).

And I can guarantee you that a $50 CF card will not perform anywhere close to what a $50 7200RPM hard drive will do. Even the Extreme IV line from SanDisk is only rated at 45MB/s, and it's about $100. I'm kind of assuming the Xbox could even make use of the additional speed, I think they shipped with 5400RPM drives?

There are some applications for CF as hard drives, but generally they're used where space is a premium (SFF, embedded, CE devices), or environmental factors limit the use of mechanical drives (heat, vibration, etc). They also function well as 'boot' devices, where the contents can be read into RAM first, and then the CF card isn't needed after that. Cost and performance are NOT their strong suits, at least not for larger sizes.

What about using a 2.5" 5400RPM PATA drive instead? You should be able to get an 80GB one for < $60, or pull one from an old laptop (20 - 40GB would be fine, as you said). And a 40->44pin adapter should be < $10. And it would probably still perform better than a CF card.

[nZero]

And I can guarantee you that a $50 CF card will not perform anywhere close to what a $50 7200RPM hard drive will do. Even the Extreme IV line from SanDisk is only rated at 45MB/s, and it's about $100. I'm kind of assuming the Xbox could even make use of the additional speed, I think they shipped with 5400RPM drives?

The Xbox is limited to ATA/33 transfer rates. There's very little that you can put in there that will underperform.

[dieKatze88]

And I can guarantee you that a $50 CF card will not perform anywhere close to what a $50 7200RPM hard drive will do. Even the Extreme IV line from SanDisk is only rated at 45MB/s, and it's about $100. I'm kind of assuming the Xbox could even make use of the additional speed, I think they shipped with 5400RPM drives?

The Xbox is limited to ATA/33 transfer rates. There's very little that you can put in there that will underperform.

I thought you could get ATA/66 out of it if you swapped the cable?

[nZero]

I thought you could get ATA/66 out of it if you swapped the cable?

I just googled for it and looks like you're right, the controller is ATA/100 and the stock hard drive is ATA/66, only the cable keeps it stuck at ATA/33 My mistake! Wonder how much of the software can take advantage of the higher transfer rates?

[shmuppyLove]

The Xbox is limited to ATA/33 transfer rates. There's very little that you can put in there that will underperform.

I think even 33MB/s I think is unrealistic to expect from a $50 16GB CF card.

If Fudoh already has a 16GB CF card, and can pick up the adapter for $10 - 15, sure give it a shot. But if it's a choice between spending the money on a 16GB CF card or a 160GB hard drive ... to me it seems kind of goofy.

[dieKatze88]

I thought you could get ATA/66 out of it if you swapped the cable?

I just googled for it and looks like you're right, the controller is ATA/100 and the stock hard drive is ATA/66, only the cable keeps it stuck at ATA/33 My mistake! Wonder how much of the software can take advantage of the higher transfer rates?

I remember trying this, and running DDR off of the hard disk, I also remember it being worth it when doing FTP transactions.

The Xbox is technically NT5.0 based, so since Windows NT has support for ATA100, and the NT Kernel handles all transfers for the console... I'd imagine all software would feel a boost, but only in load times, which I don't recall the Xbox being the worst thing in the world for.

[BuckoA51]

fudoh, good idea. I´ve done this on old Amiga a600 and a1200...

Makes more sense in the Amiga's case since they use very old IDE controllers that modern CF easily outperform and of course Amiga games are typically a tiny couple of megabytes compared to several gigs for Xbox software. Also as people have found, compatibility with the CF to IDE adaptor can be a bit hit and miss.

[Pocket_Man]

does the xbox write temporary files like any win system? maybe this could kill a cf card due to erasing and writing a lot at the same
memory area.
an Amiga does not write temp files so cf cards last verry long.

[antron]

there are 3 swap partitions, x y and z

[Sumez]

does the xbox write temporary files like any win system? maybe this could kill a cf card due to erasing and writing a lot at the same
memory area.
an Amiga does not write temp files so cf cards last verry long.

The original Xbox did (well, the games did, not the OS!), but the 360 doesn't require a hard disk, mind you, so I doubt it does any of that.

[KoolKolo]

I tried it once, but it didnt work, because it wasn't possible to set my ide-cf adapter to "cable-select-mode".
So you need a compactflash to IDE converter which lets you select "Cable Select" instead of only Master or Slave, otherwise you will get an error, that the xbox can't find any hard drive. The Xbox 1 HDD MUST be set to CS (cable-select) to work.

[dieKatze88]

does the xbox write temporary files like any win system? maybe this could kill a cf card due to erasing and writing a lot at the same
memory area.
an Amiga does not write temp files so cf cards last verry long.

The original Xbox did (well, the games did, not the OS!), but the 360 doesn't require a hard disk, mind you, so I doubt it does any of that.

Pre NXE the Xbox 360 did not require a hard disk, now it does.

I tried it once, but it didnt work, because it wasn't possible to set my ide-cf adapter to "cable-select-mode".
So you need a compactflash to IDE converter which lets you select "Cable Select" instead of only Master or Slave, otherwise you will get an error, that the xbox can't find any hard drive. The Xbox 1 HDD MUST be set to CS (cable-select) to work.

Really? When I did a cable swap I used a bog standard ATA-133 cable, but I had to install it backwards for it to reach, this meant that cable select was effectively broken and I had to set the jumpers on both drives. It seemed to work just fine. Are you sure that your CF card just didn't support ATA mode?

[Endymion]

Pre NXE the Xbox 360 did not require a hard disk, now it does.

No it doesn't. The NXE will function without issue in any XBox 360 that has no hard disk, including older 360s which do not have 4GB of flash storage.

[dieKatze88]

Pre NXE the Xbox 360 did not require a hard disk, now it does.

No it doesn't. The NXE will function without issue in any XBox 360 that has no hard disk, including older 360s which do not have 4GB of flash storage.

Unless you connect a Kinect, want to play a game with avatars, or play any new game that because NXE requires storage for the avatars to work properly, assumes the storage will be there and attempts to use it.

[Endymion]

Until Kinect and Kinect games are NXE, NXE does not require a hard disk. When NXE was new a storage device large enough to download the update completely was required. Many took this to mean "NXE requires hard disk," but it doesn't. Once NXE is installed it happily functions with no memory device at all as it is resident in the firmware and the update could be deleted. And that includes Avatars, memory is only required for customization. Kind of like any other storage device for saving game data known to man.

[moozooh]

CF cards and 1.8" HDDs work with a 1.8" IDE-to-USB adapter. I have such an HDD (a very old 20 GB Toshiba GAL2004 or something, I've taken it from an iriver H320 DAP) working this way, although I can't say the performance is better than running the game off a disc. Still, less wear and tear on both the optical drive and discs themselves, so it's worth it.

[KoolKolo]

Really? When I did a cable swap I used a bog standard ATA-133 cable, but I had to install it backwards for it to reach, this meant that cable select was effectively broken and I had to set the jumpers on both drives. It seemed to work just fine. Are you sure that your CF card just didn't support ATA mode?

Yeah, this was what happened with my XBOX when i tried to replace my hdd with an cf card. I can't speak for all XBOX models, but this is what happened with me and other people on EVOX forums...