Xbox 360 firmware hack boots copied discs
Remember back in February when some clever hackers figured out how to embed code into the firmware of the original Xbox's DVD drive, allowing it to bypass the security measures and boot copied discs without checking the veracity of that disc? Well, at the tail end of the console's life span, the impact wasn't nearly as devastating as it could have been; unfortunately, a nearly identical hack has been performed on the Xbox 360, as long as it uses the Toshiba-Samsung TS-H943 DVD drive.
The hack allows your 360 to boot both Xbox and Xbox 360 "backups" while retaining the ability to boot original games. It also allows the drive to be run under Windows, streamlining the ripping process. As Eliot reminds us, the success of this bootlegging effort will take much of the steam out of the homebrew pursuit to run executable code on the console. Will Microsoft be able to remedy this remotely, or is a hardware change in order?
[Via hack a day]
