xbox 360 HDD - can i use any ordinary USB HDD?

[DC906270]

i have a probably very stupid question. i want to download Death Smiles MBL from xboxlive, problem is i havnt got enough memory, so i need to get some sort of memory card/hdd.

what is best to use? do i need to buy an xbox 360 HDD or can i plug in any USB HDD or memory stick and then back up the files on my computer? If i can, which port should i plug it into?

[neorichieb1971]

I believe Microsoft force you to buy proprietory drives for the 360.

Go to your local EB or Game shop and see how inflated the prices are.

[jonny5]

you need to get some hardware to transfer stuff on and off to your PC...forget what its called

[Damocles]

About the closest you'll get without major hacks is the Xport.

[DC906270]

those bummers at microsoft. ive plumped for a used 20gb Xbox HDD £22 inc postage from ebay.

[iatneH]

I looked into this briefly as well and there is another option not mentioned yet. As long as you already have an enclosure (i.e. from a 20GB drive), there is a software tool that lets you convert certain specific 2.5" drives to the X360 format, but I think the drives MUST be Western Digital WDBEVS series or something like that.

It's more of an upgrade for existing HDD rather than a first HDD, but I thought I'd throw it out there.

I'm lucky enough that 20GB HDDs show up on my local craigslist for not too much money, I just haven't bothered to run out to get one yet. Sometimes you can even get them along with RROD'ed units, I've seen one listing of 4 or 5 RROD'ed units each with a 20GB hard drive for $80 or so. Might have been worth it just for the drives.

[Elixir]

There's a whole bunch of (fake) 120GB HDDs on ebay. They're basically the same as the technique of swapping out the current HDD and replacing it with a larger one, but the hassle has already been removed. They're $80-100 each. Pretty cheap considering they retail for $150.

[StarCreator]

Are there any issues such as banning with these hard drives? My understanding was that these are basically drives with the firmware copied (serial number and all) from an existing official drive, and I believe it was possible for MS to track which serial numbers are in use. I could be wrong though...