How-To: Turn a standard Xbox 360 video cable into a VGA cable for make benefit your wallet

Every so often, that console-modding Benjamin Heckendorn wanders away from his lair at benheck.com to share some interesting projects with Engadget.

Recent Xbox 360 updates have allowed the system to spit out resolutions up to 1080p, and with the new HD DVD add-on drive there's more reason than ever to use a high quality VGA signal instead of the more standard 3-cable component. However there's a bit of a catch -- VGA cables for the 360 cost about $40. According to my calculations, that's about 2 pizzas and a case of beer less to game with. WE don't know about you, but we find that a pretty scary proposition -- yours buddies that swing over for game night probably do too.

In this How-To we'll describe how you can turn your existing Xbox 360 video cable into a "multi-out" device capable of VGA. You don't even need to hack inside the Xbox itself, just the cable. Total cost is around $7, including the Radio Shack project box shown above. Ready to save some cash? Let's get in there!

The following mod allows you to use a standard Xbox 360 cable to create a special VGA cable that would normally be purchased separately. The reason we can hack the standard cable in this way is because Microsoft was kind enough to put every pin in the normal connector, even ones the cable doesn't use. Standard plugs on other systems (notably the PS2 and Gamecube) only have the pins the plug needs.

Thank you Microsoft.

Main Tools You'll Need:

• Small pair of tweezers (very useful).
• Metal cutting pliers, tin snips, something along those lines.
• Soldering iron. A lighter powered, 15 watt range one is best.
  
• Solder... WITH lead works best. We know that sounds awful but it'll help you "convert" the lead-free solder inside the Xbox connector and make it much easier to work with.
  
• Multimeter, with circuit testing option. The kind where if you touch the two probes it beeps to indicate a connection.
• Hot glue. Oh yeah, that's right! Don't leave home without it.
• Small, thin flat-bladed screwdrivers, a larger flat-bladed screwdriver.
  
• X-Acto Knife
• Desoldering iron (optional, see instructions).
• Dremel (optional, see instructions).

Where is the "Parts I need" section, you ask? We'll cover them specifically later on, depending on which type of VGA cable you'd like to build. (Breakout box, as shown, or straight VGA cable depending.)

Alright let's get going on this sucker.

Step 1 - Take Apart Your Xbox 360 Video Cable

The Xbox 360's video cable assembly doesn't use screws but luckily it's still pretty easy to take apart. Here's how:

• Insert a small, thin screwdriver at the seam shown in the above photo.
• Press in and towards the label (also as shown) to get around the inner lip.
• Once you breach the lip you should hear a crack. You're in!
• Make a few more breaches like this next to each other, then insert a larger screwdriver as shown below. Twist it and the casing should pop open nicely.

Next, insert the big screwdriver at the seam near the main cable, and twist the case open at this place as well. You can now pull off the bottom portion of the plastic, and then pull the guts out of the top portion. The "TV / HDTV" switch will fall out at this point, save it if you ever plan to revert the cable to its original form (which is becoming less and less likely as this progresses).

Use your small screwdriver to pry up the metal near the TV/HDTV switch, as shown below.

Now pry the metal up and right off the optical audio jack, and bend it down on the right side, as shown below. You can now pull the main piece of shielding metal up away from the rest of the jack. Snip the shielding free of the main cable using your metal cutters.

Now you should come across a piece of material that looks amazingly like electrical tape. (Don't worry, we're sure it's certified next-generation electrical tape.) Remove it and the jack should now look like the below photo. On the left you can see the little circuit board containing the optical audio port and TV/HDTV switch, on the right is the connector itself with all the wires going to it.

Next we need to remove the circuit board from the metal. It is held down by 3 tabs. You can desolder the tabs with a desoldering iron, or wedge your small screwdriver under the board and pry up as you heat the tabs with the regular iron. Since everything on the Xbox 360 uses that lead-free solder, it might help to mix some fresh (ahem leaden) solder onto joints to help them melt. Once you get to the side with 2 tabs (near the TV / HDTV switch) you'll need to snip the metal shielding free of the cables before you pry up the PCB.

• Once the circuit board has been desoldered from the tabs you can unplug the little connector on it and pull it from the main assembly.
• Finally, take your thin screwdriver and stick it between the black plastic and the thin top shielding as shown below. (Sorry the photo's a bit blurry, bigfoot musta been nearby.) Pry the metal up a little and you'll be able to pull the black plug out from the shielding. Be sure to save this piece of shielding for later.
  

The plug pieces should now look like the following.

Finally, cut the end portion off the metal shielding and lay down some electric tape inside it as shown below:

Step 2 - Make the wiring connections

Before we start making the wiring connections you'll need to carefully remove the glue stuff covering the pins, as shown below. Use your tweezers and be sure not to pull the blank pins up with the gunk. If they do bend up, simply push them back down. The glue is pretty easy to remove.

With the glue removed you can remove all the wires from the plug. Simply heat up the solder on each wire until it easily pulls free.

At this time you should put a small bit of fresh, new solder on each of the pins. This will make attaching new wires much easier.

Shown below is the end view of the now wireless plug and a drawing of which pins we'll be using for this VGA mod. Keep in mind this pinout refers to the WIRE end of the plug, looking at it from behind as it would go into the console. The numbering might look a bit weird but it refers to how the connections are labeled on the 360's motherboard.

Note how every pin is either long or short, and almost every other pin goes to ground (GND)

Before we go any further, here's the wire-end view pinout of a VGA port. Pins that we don't need for this project are simply called N/C (no connection). Most VGA-type ports also have the pin numbers etched into the plastic for your added reference.

Download a large PDF version of these pinouts, suitable for framing.

Since we're going to start re-attaching the wires to the connector, you should now decide what sort of VGA cable you'd like to build...

• Breakout box type adapter. As shown at the beginning of this article. Requires buying a few parts (the aforementioned seven bucks worth) but is more useful in the long run.
• Single cable coming off the Xbox. For this you can use an old VGA cable. Slice off the computer end of the plug so you can connect the wires directly to the Xbox 360 video connector. You'll also need some left and right audio cables, plus a yellow cable if you'd still like the option of using composite video.
  

Figure out which is best for you (I recommend the breakout box 'cause it's cooler, but that's just me) and use the directions below:

Method 1: Soldering wires to the connector port for a straight VGA cable (sort of like the one that costs $40 at Best Buy)

Parts you'll need:

• 2 position selector switch (if you want the cable to switch modes). You can use the Radio Shack Catalog #275-409, or just desolder the switch from inside the Xbox component cable.
  
• Left and right RCA phono plug audio cables, such as those from a stereo system. You'll need these since the VGA plug doesn't carry audio. If you plan to just use the optical audio, we'll describe how to wire it in the breakout box section.
  
• Yellow composite (crap) video RCA phono plug cable. You'll only need this if you want the cable to switch modes. A great source for both this and the audio cables are old PS1, N64 or GameCube cables.

What to do:

1. Cut off the computer end of the VGA cable if you haven't already. Strip the main coating off to reveal the wires inside. The main connections you'll need are red, green, blue, horizontal sync and vertical sync. They may or may not be color coded. H and V sync may be a shade of white. Put a little solder on each wire to keep the strands together. This will also help when attaching it to the Xbox connector.
   
2. Using the multimeter, test which wires in the cable go to the correct pins on the end of the VGA cable and connect them to the Xbox connector accordingly. (Use the above VGA pinout for reference.) Please note, they'll be several wires inside the VGA cable that you won't need to connect to the Xbox, such as the data lines used for monitor ID detection. (Labeled N/C in the pinout drawing.)
   
3. All the shielding around the wires you find inside the cable is ground. Also note that a lot of the pins on the VGA connector are ground.
   
4. Solder the wires from the VGA cable to the Xbox 360 connector using the pinouts provided to match up the signals. You can connect all the VGA ground shielding to a single ground spot on the Xbox connector to make it easier on yourself.
5. Strip the ends of the audio cables to reveal the inner wires and copper shielding. Attach the inner wires to the left and right audio spots on the Xbox connector (pins 16 and 15) and the outer shielding to any ground.
6. If you're attaching a composite video option, strip and attach the composite (yellow) video cable in the same way to pin 7 of the Xbox connector.
   
7. The selector switch (either the Radio Shack model or the one from the connector itself) has 3 leads on it. Connect the center lead to ground and the side leads to pins 20 and 24 on the Xbox connector. The switch can now "ground out" one of those two connections to set the video mode. Pulling pin 20 to ground sets the Xbox to VGA mode, putting 24 to ground sets it to composite.
8. If you don't want the cable to select a video mode and just be VGA, connect pin 20 to any ground. This can be done by simply blobbing solder from it to pin 18 or 22 (they're both ground)
   
9. Note: You HAVE to select a mode regardless, if you don't the Xbox won't boot and you'll get 4 red lights as a "Video Cable Missing" warning. (Strange that 3 lights is worse than 4, but whatever.)

You can now insert the black plastic Xbox connector back into the metal shielding we removed earlier and plug everything in to see if it works. (See "Setting the Xbox to VGA", below.) If you have a problem, check out the Troubleshooting section at the end of the article.

Method 2: Making a VGA/Composite Breakbox Box

Parts you'll need:

• Breakout Box. I used Radio Shack Catalog # 270-1802 cause it was the smallest and cheapest.
• D-sub 15 female connector (VGA port). Radio Shack Catalog #: 276-1502, Digi-Key: T815FE-ND Mouser: 523-G17S1510110EU If you have an old PC video card you can desolder one off that if you wish. But a new one is pretty cheap and easy to use.
• 2 position selector switch, if you want the box to switch modes. You can use the Radio Shack Catalog #275-409 or just desolder the switch from inside the Xbox component cable.
• 3 RCA phono jacks, for the audio and composite video. This is the type found on the back of DVD players. Radio Shack Catalog #274-346, Digi-Key: CP-1413-ND (red) CP-1414-ND (white) CP-1415-ND (yellow) Mouser: 161-4319-E. As with the VGA port you may have some old electronics you can pull these off.
• Shielded wires from inside the Xbox video cable.
• Some standard thin wire. Old floppy/IDE drive cable works great and is, best of all, free. Free is great -- it saves you money for things that aren't. Like beef jerky.
• Standoff screws from a PC. These are the type with a "screw within a screw" that are often used under the motherboard.
• Some drill bits. Sizes of 1/8th, 3/8th, and 1/4th-inch will be helpful.

Supplier websites:

www.radioshack.com
www.mouser.com
www.digikey.com

Start by slicing open your Xbox video cable. Remove the main metal shielding to find the individual shielded wires inside:

The shielded wires from the Xbox 360 cable, or as I call them "Buck Rogers Spaghetti."

These will work great for the inside wiring of the breakout box. Cut each wire to about 6-inches long for now, we can trim them shorter later as needed. You'll need 8 of them.

Start by sliding off some of the shielding and stripping the end of the inner wire. Dab a bit of solder onto it to lock all the strands together - this is called "tinning" and will make soldering it to the connector much easier. You can also put a little solder at the end of the shielding to keep it from fraying apart.

Solder a shielded wire to each of the following pins on the Xbox connector, or a regular thin wire as noted. Attaching them in the order specified works best, or reverse if you're left handed.

Top of connector:

1. Red (pin 3)
   
2. Composite video (pin 7)
   
3. Horizontal Sync (pin 11)
   
4. Right audio (pin 15) -- shielding not essential
5. Optical audio data (pin 25) -- use a regular thin wire for this.
6. Optical audio ground (pin 27) -- regular wire
7. Optical audio +5v (pin 29) -- regular wire

Bottom of connector:

1. Green (pin 4)
2. Blue (pin 8)
3. Vertical sync (pin 12)
4. Left audio (pin 16) -- shielding not essential
5. Set VGA (pin 20) -- regular wire
6. Set Composite (pin 24) -- regular wire

When everything is wired the connector should look as shown below:

Now you can slide the black Xbox connector inside the metal shielding. Be sure there's a layer of electric tape inside in case any connections hit the metal shell.


Step 3 - Install ports in your Breakout Box

With the wires soldered to the connector we can get the breakout box itself ready.

• Set the connector against the lid of the box and trace the outline of it with your knife. About 1/4 of the way from the side is best, as shown below.
• Cut out the hole using either a Dremel or by making several deep cuts with an X-Acto knife and then "popping" the shape out by pressing on it with a screwdriver.

The lid of the project box with the trapezoid connector hole.

• Stick the connector through the hole and see how it fits. Adjust the hole as needed. Test this rig by plugging into the Xbox 360 and adjusting the tilt of the lid to the curve of the Xbox, as shown.
• Once it fits fully into the Xbox 360, put some hot glue (yes!) on the inside of the lid to temporarily secure the connector in place. (Don't worry about the hot glue, your 360 is fully accustomed to heat.) Once it's cool and secure, remove the whole shebang from the XBox.
  

• On the bottom of the main portion of the box carve and cut a hole for the VGA port. Once the hole's big enough stick in the port and drill 1/8th" holes in the plastic to match its mounts. Then you can screw in some standard PC motherboard-style screws to hold down the VGA port, just like on a computer. For added security screw on somes nuts on the inside (or just dump in a bunch of hot glue if there's no room for that).
  
• Drill (3) 3/8th-inch holes for the audio and video RCA ports. Space them evenly.
  
• Be sure to keep these ports on the side of the box away from the Xbox 360 connector. That way you know they'll be enough room inside.
  

• Desolder the optical audio port from the small circuit board from the connector. It may help to "freshen up" the solder first before you try to remove it.
• Make a square hole for the port on the opposite side of the box from the VGA port. This can be done by drilling a 1/4th-inch hole and then carving corners from it.
• Insert the optical port as shown below. The pinouts of the 3 center pins are also provided for when you attach it to the main connector. The two side tabs of the optical port don't need to be connected.
• Secure the optical port using... get this... hot glue! Hey, it works.

The business end of the optical audio port. We actually think it's called a TOSlink but optical audio port sounds more... um, universal. TOSlink sounds like some dude from Lord of the Rings.

• Drill a hole between the optical port and the audio ports that will fit the shaft of the selector switch. A 3/8th-inch hole will work for the Radio Shack switches mentioned above, or a slightly smaller one if you're using the switch from inside the connector itself.
• Install the switch using yet more hot glue. Of course be careful not to cover the 3 pins of the switch. Even though it'll be near the Xbox connector this switch isn't big enough to cause a space problem.

The inside of the breakout box should now look like this, give or take 5 pounds of hot glue. As you can see I've wired the grounds of all the ports together.

We can now wire the Xbox connector to the various ports on the breakout box using the pinout charts located several stories above. Some notes:

• Place the pieces of the box together as shown and begin by wiring up the optical port. Cut the wires as short as you can so it's easy to stuff everything in the box.
• Connect ground to the center pin of the three pin selector switch, pin 20 of the Xbox connector to one side, and then pin 24 to the other. This allows the switch to select between VGA and composite modes.

• Connect audio (pins 15 and 16) and composite video (pin 7) to the middle pins of the RCA ports next. The outer rings of the RCA ports should all connect to ground.
• After wiring the RCA ports cover the connections with electric tape. This keeps them from shorting out on all the shielding around the main VGA wires.

• Speaking of that, connect the 5 VGA wires next. Red, green, blue, H-Sync and V-Sync. Check the above VGA port pinout for reference.
• You can now close up the box. Smush the halves together, arranging the wires as you go to make sure everything will fit.
• Screw the case shut -- you're done!

Step 4 - Setting the XBox to VGA

• Ok, plug in the breakout box, or cable, or whatever you ended up making, to your monitor / VGA-enabled TV and Xbox.
• Make sure the selector switch is to "VGA" (pin 20 grounded)
• Switch all your stuff on. You should see the Xbox boot up (it might take a hair longer than usual). If not, skip ahead to Troubleshooting.
• Once you're in, go to Dashboard, then goto the System blade and hit "Console Settings", and "Display"
  
• You can now select a resolution and aspect ratio to fit your screen. The 360 works best with widescreen displays although you can still make it work with square monitors as well. Strangely enough it'll letterbox the game whilst the dashboard and message panels will take up the whole screen. Weird, huh?
• Boot up Gears of War or some other awesome looking game and drool 50% more than usual.

Just think -- now you might be able to read the text in Dead Rising.


Addendum - Troubleshooting

Oh noes! You followed all the instructions but something isn't quite right - is it any of the following by chance?

• 4 red lights (but not of death). Since we've all heard of the dreaded "3 lights of death" a whopping FOUR lights could cause instant heart failure. But don't worry, it's actually just a "Video Cable Missing" warning. Check that the Pin 20 and 24 connections are correct. If neither of them are switched to ground the Xbox doesn't know what video mode to use and assumes there's no cable at all.
  

• Inversed, Andy Warhol-esque colors. Suddendly the Dead or Alive girls all have blue skin... Anime? A strange STD? Nope, you just got your some of your RGB wires mixed up. Now we bet you're glad you didn't slather all the connections in hot glue yet - right?
  

• Ghosting. If you see some ghosting of images on the screen you probably have insufficient shielding. Make sure all the shielding is connected to a ground someplace. If you use a decent VGA cable this really shouldn't be a problem, unless you live in the Bermuda Triangle or something.
  

• Optical audio problems. Be sure you have the ground, +5v and data pins wired to the connector correctly. Is the Xbox set to output this type of signal?
  

Alright well sorry if this how-to seemed a bit long, we just wanted to make sure you knew exactly what to do. Enjoy your sparkling new, crisp, hi-def, life-like (insert your own superlative here) video!

[benheck Posted Nov 15th 2006 12:28PM]

Actually I'm not sure where the S-video is. It's possible the S-video cable has a RGB to NTSC S-video conversion IC in it.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 15th 2006 12:36PM]

ben,

so the way you have it wired up, you can switch between hd - vga and sd - composite. i see that you've explained sd - component in the comments but what if you wanted the option to switch between sd - component, hd - component, hd - vga.

to go a little further, what would the best way to make an ultimate breakout box. one that would include ALL video outputs (sd and hd). and how would you switch between them? is there a way to make it so when you plug the desired connector into the port it would automatically switch the signal path?

great work, btw!

[benheck Posted Nov 15th 2006 12:42PM]

To switch to all 3 you'd need a 3 position switch. Or just use 3 switches, almost like DIP switch or jumper settings.

Or (I just thought of this) you could hook the ground (shield) of the composite jack to pin 24, ground shield (metal case) of VGA port to pin 20 and one of the shields of a component jack to pin 28.

This way, ground would be returned to the selector pins when that cable set is plugged in and automatically switch to the mode. (Composite would get ground from the audio cable, assuming they're plugged into the same TV)

Give that a shot... Alright catch ya'll later!

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 17th 2006 11:03AM]

great work on doing that project, sounds and looks fun but i also think i prefer to spend the $40-$7=$33

Also FYI for xbox 360 and HD DVD drive:

games = 1080p or less
movies = 1080i or less less

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 16th 2006 3:21PM]

1) really this is WAY too much work for $40.

2) "What's the big deal with 1080p?" Because now I am using my 37" 1080p set as a 37" computer monitor. Try doing that with 1080i or 720p, and try to argue that it is usable every day for real work (like programming).

http://paininthetech.com/1080p_hdtv_and_the_westinghouse_lvm_37w3

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 16th 2006 8:52PM]

Another fine job ben!!! I'll definitely give this mod a try but I think I'll go another route to have the option of using VGA, Composite, or HDMI.

The box could be made vertical and a usb extension could take care of covering the original usb port currently in place. A lot of silliness, but, that's the purpose of mod's: making something fun and having a great time.

All those that complain either have no experience, are little spoiled brats, or don't appreciate the 'art' of mods. Funny thing is why are they even on this site if they are going to complain about something.

Oh well...still, nice job!!! =)

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 17th 2006 11:44AM]

Nice tut mate.
Glad to see the homebrew spirit living on.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 18th 2006 9:39PM]

I have a question for the creator of this hack.
Is it possible to convert the HDMI cable to DVI and then use a DVI to VGA adaptor?
I don't know how sound would be output in a setting like this one but I assume that picture-wise you would get the same results.
Am I right to think this?

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 4th 2006 6:01PM]

LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!

THIS IS THE BIGGEST WASTE OF TIME I HAVE EVER SEEN! THANKS FOR THE LAUGH NERDS! YOU MIGHT AS WELL DUCK TAPE IT BACK TOGETHER, REDNECKS LOL!!

ANONYE who does this, is stupid. One word that I can only think of to describe this is, PATHETIC.

Get a fuckin life will ya? The cables are only 20 bucks. Fuckin jerkoffs.

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 6th 2006 12:33PM]

I Love YOU!!! Genius

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 7th 2006 11:58AM]

Sam - Does the Xbox actually output 1080p over component though?
I thought that it only output 1080p digitally, i.e. VGA (future HDMI) only.

I tried flipping to 1080p through component, but I just got a black picture, not the distorted scan lines picture you'd get when you're in the wrong format.

-Chris

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 8th 2006 11:58AM]

hey great tutorial
i just finished doing this and it works great
i can finally play on my high def monitor

and it was so easy to do took about an hour and a half

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 26th 2006 12:03PM]

If whoever made this or can make one of this for me I would gladly pay 10 dollars for it because i really need one of these. So if you can email me at [e-mail]

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 3rd 2007 11:22AM]

I can't believe how useless the majority of comments are here; "I can't do this it looks soooo hard, and i only save my mom 40 dollars"
Listen if your too damn physically/mentally inept/lazy to do this mod then STFU. Seriously hearing you rich pansy ass nerds complain is really annoying.
I bet most of the people talking &%!# about this mod couldn't even complete it.

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 2nd 2007 1:43PM]

Great trick !

I'm trying to do something like this but for adding an S-Video connector.
I know that the composite PIN will be used but i'm searching for the LUMA pin to complete the signal...
Do you have an idea ? I don't see it on the pinout...

(sorry for the mistakes, I'm french and I can't speak English fluently ;)

Thx for any answer ;) !

[benheck Posted Jan 2nd 2007 7:00PM]

I don't believe there is a LUMA output. Well, maybe... It can do component (3 wires, Red Green Blue) and these are actually Y (luma+sync) Pb and Pr. So Y would be Luma, but you'd still need color. You could try using Composite for this. I have never actually experimented with S-video hacks on the 360.

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 11th 2007 9:45PM]

do u need a HD cable to do this or dus the composite cable for the 360 work also?

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 11th 2007 9:49PM]

i have the red,white, and yellow cable.. will that still work or no?

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 22nd 2007 11:05PM]

i just thought of an idea. could you use a switch to make the composite turn into component then back to composite if you wanted to save space? see, im wondering if i should get a used composite from the store to rip up, because i dont really want to rip up my nice clean stock cable, because i have an HDTV that i like to use it on anyway. if you could easily put the component and composite into the same jacks, please tell me how. thx

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 24th 2007 5:53PM]

@ pntballer669:
yes, you can do it with a composite only, but its much harder. the plug must be cut open with a knife, then there is this fill stuff like hot glue that floods the plug. you dont get a optical audio out, and you have to get shielded wires from the cable part, which is time consuming. i would recommend to go out and buy a used component cable cause its waaaay easier.

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 15th 2007 7:49PM]

Is there a way to still retain the component selection with this? I have a projector and it does DVI but not VGA so of course I need an adapter, but my other TV is just component.
I have little to no desire to EVER use composite; especially when component is availabe; so is it possible to wire it with a VGA/Component switch?

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 23rd 2007 8:38PM]

can't you just post the wire colors in the xbox360 cable jacket so we can just carefully slice the cable jacket itself with a razor, attach your vga connections and switch in the cable jacket itself instead of messing up your xbox360 connector plug? that'd be easier and cleaner i think...

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2007 11:28AM]

hey Ben awesome tutorial, cheap and fun! can't wait to crack that sucker apart

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 26th 2007 3:13AM]

Hehe, did this, it wasnt that hard, took me twho hours tho, I have some problems with it, the text is not sharp enough on 480 but when trying to put on 1024 or higher, my eyes just start burning, its impossible to read, btw, I didnt remove me compnent compsite cables, just added VGA to it, I guess that has to be the problem.
I also I have to connect the cable only half-way into the 360, if I conncect it all the way, it switches to composite...
weird....
wouldnt mind help!
but I will probably desolder the composite/component and it will solve the problem (I hope)!

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 9th 2007 11:40AM]

oh,its wus a small black wire that connected ground to unused, doesnt know what does it too, but anyway, its cool now!
lol, actually, I modded this mod and made my cable multi-cable, it has VGA,Component,Composite!
this is cool!
Thanks to the autor!

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 23rd 2007 9:10AM]

works great tanks i am just trying to use a dreamcast vga box to connect all my consoles p(ps2 xbox gc WII) to my monitor if someone knows where can i get some info to mod this box ......

[(Unverified) Posted Jun 7th 2007 11:36AM]

is there a way to include component connections in the box with the composite and VGA video?

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 5th 2007 11:04AM]

hey man the vga project is all that and then much more....i started 12mid last night stopped at 6am,for some zzzz,started again at noon finished at 8pm.i had the vga cable in my hand at circuit shitty,money is not an issue coulda bought 12of them,but to make the box is an awsome project, cut 6 vga cables(ends off) make a long as- cable to run out of my box to go acrossed the room to my epson projector, hey man thanks for your diy post...i was playing my 360 on a 104inch screen that kicked as-,and that was with the rca jack.whoaa, see it now...yo.you wouldnt believe it,"resembeling a 104inch plasma tv"seriously...oh and my daughter is really tripping now how good surfsup,shrek,and tony hawk look so damn real.
only quibble is my color is a bit too yellow,im sure its something silly,if you can help me with that,thanx,but all in all.i got an A-,on the project bcus of it.thanks a million. JIM T

[(Unverified) Posted Aug 11th 2007 11:27AM]

thanks for the detailed description. i was looking for this for a long time... thankx onces again.. :)

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 26th 2008 8:18PM]

dude you are incredibly smart but very cheap. only you can to this shit. its probably better to just go and spend $40 rather to mess up.

[(Unverified) Posted Aug 18th 2007 5:42PM]

Looks like I'm not the only one still coming across this post.

I'm planning on using a variation of this mod to give me a separate digital optical audio jack (basically the same as the little adapter that the Xbox 360 Elites come with that you can use alongside the HDMI output), since I have one of the new 360 Premium systems with HDMI output. My TV has an HDMI input (which I'll be connecting both the 360 and my HTPC to via a HDMI switch box), but I need an optical audio out to run to my A/V receiver (which does not have any HDMI inputs). Kinda complicated, but it'll work, and my universal remote can take care of selecting all the right inputs on the various devices.

I just need to pick up another component video cable, since I don't really want to mangle the one that came with my shiny new toy.

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 29th 2007 6:25PM]

hi ,i just bought a projector for my 360 but when i turn my 360 on i have no colour. but when i play a DVD i have colour but when i play a 360 game i have no colour to so please help me

many thanks!!

[(Unverified) Posted Oct 20th 2007 3:27AM]

I have a SONY TV only with AV MULTI as PS2 A/V connector. It can use for RGB.
Does you know how to make a cable from xbox 360 A/V connector to SONY(PS2) AV MULTI in RGB mode?
[img]http://i66.photobucket.com/albums/h258/samsifu/20071020003.jpg[/img]
[img]http://i66.photobucket.com/albums/h258/samsifu/20071020004.jpg[/img]

[(Unverified) Posted Oct 23rd 2007 3:25AM]

I have a SONY TV only with AV MULTI as PS2 A/V connector. It can use for RGB.
Do you know how to make a cable from xbox 360 A/V connector to SONY(PS2) AV MULTI in RGB mode?
[img]http://i66.photobucket.com/albums/h258/samsifu/20071020003.jpg[/img]
[img]http://i66.photobucket.com/albums/h258/samsifu/20071020004.jpg[/img]

[(Unverified) Posted Oct 28th 2007 8:47PM]

I have a question, I just built my connector following the great step-by-step guide! When I boot up, everything's fine (as noted, about a second slower). When I go into display settings, I can only set the resolution and the third display option (which has to do with the settings of your monitor/tv). I can't select or access the "high definition" modes, so I'm basically in standard mode with a resolution of 1920x1080. To note, I neglected the switch, the composite, and the optical port. I also used the standard Microsoft 360 RCA cable to do this mod instead. The colors are right (not as vibrant as component) and I can't tell of any ghosting so far, though it doesn't appear as crisp as I hope (I'm comparing to my official component cables). I took a wire and linked pin 20 (VGA) to the ground next to it, pin 18. Anyone have a clue?

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 27th 2007 10:01AM]

1920x1080... You're already using a high def mode in that case.

The 2nd option selects widescreen and standard screen ratio, but since 1920x1090 is 16:9, the 360 won't allow you to select a 4:3 screen mode, it wouldn't make any sense.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 25th 2007 11:51PM]

If i make that VGA cable or buy the one xbox sells in stores,, i saw one today .. on a computer monitor screen will it play in HD quality. i was just going to buy an HDTV but made dad researched it and was looking into this.. would the computer monitor play in HD quality??

[(Unverified) Posted Jun 22nd 2009 8:52AM]

I bout a cable to connect a computer screen to my xbox and it has an awsome pic, I don't no if it's hd but the picture is really good

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 26th 2007 10:07AM]

This was kinda fun to do. I did this mod over the weekend with that 360 audio cable you get with the elite. One problem was that it only had the audio pins. So I had to shift them from their original positions to the ones I needed. I took the VGA port from an old broken video card. My experience with soldering is next to nil, so that made things a little harder. The individual "shielded" audio cables were just long enough to make a few inch-long cables...

I didn't have enough material to ground everything though, but connecting the metal coverings of the xbox plug and the vga port together seemed to get the job done... I also had to remove most of the shielding because of the impossibly short cables I had to work with.

The end result is still amazing considering the hackjob I did. All that's left are the 2 pins for analog audio, add hot glue to the entire assembly and make some kind of box to house everything.

[thrashist Posted Dec 11th 2007 10:20AM]

Apparently the guy that wrote this guide never heard the phrase "time is money". For all of that work, if you are not experienced with wiring at all, you're going to ruin your existing 360 cable, waste a bunch of time, AND have to buy a new cable. Thanks, but no thanks.

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 17th 2007 10:06AM]

Hi i tryed doing something like this but what i did was i bough an HDMI to DVI adaptor then on top of that i put a DVI to VGA adaptor then straight to my monitor and i got no image any comments or help?

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 17th 2007 10:06AM]

I connected my 360 using a HDMI to DVI adaptor plus a DVI to VGA adaptor together but i got no image any comments and suggestion plz im a newb :D

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 14th 2008 10:56PM]

unfortunalty that is inposible to do.

VGA is an analog signal were as DVI and HDMI are both Digital.

DVI can be used to carry an analog and is used in some case's thats why u were able to get a vga to DVI connector...

this wikipedia articul should help you:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DVI