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2007 Year in Review
>> This has become an Annual XS Tradition. Been doing it so long now that I forget how it got started. During the Xmas (x.. hehe) Holidays I sit down in-between Turkey day and News Years Day and collect and gather my notes from the year. I then re-read every single news post to put things and the timing into perspective. I will say one thing the way you guys read the news is a lot better than how I had to do it. Reading the daily news segments is a great way to absorb all of this. Reading a years worth in a sitting or two felt like cruel and unusual punishment.
It's not that it's boring, (ok.. sure.. some of it is..) but so much of the news (no fault of XS) is very repetitive. This is how I saw 2007. People, places, discoveries, announcements and events of interest and importance, at least they were to me. Like you, not every story was important to me, and clearly this review is slanted towards what I felt was important. With that in mind, I present the 2007 Year in Review.
January 2007 started the year with a bang with the interesting news and taped footage from the CCC Day 4 meeting showcasing the King Kong exploit. It was the first visual teaser that hinted at the future possibilities that only now, a year later are we really starting to realize.[Link] Talk and rumors about HDMI coming to the 360 were all the rage with the first leaked photos showing the built-in HDMI port revealed [Link] ,[Link] Robinsod over at the XBH forums found a way to boot his 360 with the original Kernel [Link], early work that later would give birth to other advancements like downgrading and upgrading to an exploitable Kernel that we can all rejoice in.[Link] We (XS) also hit another milestone with our 325000th member joining the forums.[Link]
February 2007 was a relatively quiet month, with the exception that new hardware started to appear. The then new BenQ drives arrived, appearing with some frequency in new production 360's.[Link] The new Hitachi-LG drives started appearing as well.[Link] The wireless receiver for windows makes it to market, promising to allow us to connect our wireless 360 devices to the PC.[Link] It works, but a lot of people claim it causes them more trouble than it's worth. Since the launch of the 360, MS has faced near constant media coverage of hardware issues, February was no different with the BBC exposing the 360 and damning it.[Link], [Link] The first Third party 360 power supply arrives, a welcome alternative to paying ridiculous prices for parted original power supplies.[Link] Interesting non-xbox news in February centered around the continuous efforts to backup HD-DVD and Blu-ray, successfully finding the "processing key"[Link]
March 2007 was the month that we saw real progress in exploiting the 360 emerges with "Hello World.." running via the Hypervisor Exploit [Link] and MS immediately react and attempts to block it.[Link] Homebrew starts making tangible appearances, with Mame360 and ScrummVM.[Link] Lots of Linux news including new Kernels, new Loaders, and booting Ubuntu and Live Live CD's [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link] First modchip (Infectus) with potential 360 hacking functions appears.[Link] (not limited to 360 functions however)
Microsoft also had a number of press releases and announcements in March. First up was "dream, build, play" initiative to encourage new game development, with a prize of $10000 U.S. to kick it off.[Link] Later in the month LIVE reached a record subscriber base with 6 million members.[Link] Games for Windows LIVE was announced, the first merging of a console and pc game world.[Link] The 360 Black Elite with HDMI rumours appeared, and were later confirmed with articles, interviews and photos.[Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link] the last of the MS news that month focused on the reports of Hacked LIVE accounts. Turns out it was mostly social Engineering and relaxed rules at MS that allowed people to get tricked out of their LIVE accounts.[Link]
April 2007 was all Microsoft with little else. Due to constant scrutiny and complaints from it's customer base and the media, MS launches the Disc Replacement Program [Link] in which they will replace only a few select titles trouble free from a list. MS then extends the console warranty to 1 full year plus some enhancements.[Link] Too little too late for some in my opinion as the 360 hardware is pretty much thought to be defective as a whole. In better news, rumours and confirmation about the Spring Dashboard Updates start hitting us, with the new Marketplace Blade, Messenger Integration, H.264 and MPEG4 Support, and PlayforSure announced.[Link], [Link], [Link] In news I'm sure MS wasn't pleased about, The Specialist graced us again with a newer version of his HDDHackr(info)(info)(info)(info)(info) tool, this time allowing us to buy affordable 120Gb drives instead of paying double for what MS wants us to use.[Link], [Link]
May 2007 was a big month for anyone who had, or intended to mod their DVD drive firmware to allow them to play backups. Commodore4Eva announces he's poised and prepared to combat potential MS bans with new features and functions of his upcoming firmware.[Link], [Link] Good timing too, as shortly thereafter MS strikes, and LIVE starts banning 360's from accessing LIVE [Link] and c4Eva strikes back with his new firmwares.[Link], [Link]
June 2007 MS finally responds to the EU requests for info as to why 360's are dying and why they are damaging disks. Funny thing though as they deny the 360 is damaging disks [Link] despite creating a program months earlier to replace scratched and damaged disks. MS finally starts to do something about heat issues in 360's with the addition of a second Heat Sink in repaired and new production 360's.[Link], [Link] Ironically, MS doesn't admit there is a heat issue in 360's either. Yet, they "fix" the heat issues they don't admit to.
360GameSaves.com released a Resigner that allowed the Game Saves trading scene to recover somewhat from the MS effort to stop it.[Link] Doesn't MS get the fact that you can't stop the scene from finding new ways to enjoy their Xbox, despite what MS intended?
Last but not least, XBINS, the central repository for all things homebrew or hackish in this scene reaches it's 5th year of operation.[Link] I can say with great confidence that without Xbins, we wouldn't have had the successful xbox homebrew scene. Other console scenes are highly disorganized, and suffer from a lack of support, backstabbing, and outright site wars. With Xbins blazing the way for Homebrew support, and Xbox-Scene.com and XBH doing what we do best this scene continues to thrive in harmony. Speaking of XBH, huge progress was made in June as XBH members figured out how to downgrade consoles with blown "efuses".[Link]
July 2007 wasn't a good month for Microsoft. Retailers were starting to get vocal, and citing high defect and return rates some as high as 33%.[Link] MS responds, while not admitting to what is actually at fault, they offer up the new 3 Year Warranty policy.[Link], [Link] However, it's really limited to the 3RLOD error. Any other issue is still limited to the 1 year warranty announced months earlier, unless you are fortunate to be in a country where 2 years is the minimum warranty allowed by law. Manufacturers start to speak out, and cite MS being far too cheap.[Link] In what I can only call the biggest shock of the year Peter Moore leaves Ms/Xbox days after E3 for greener pastures at EA.[Link], [Link], [Link] XBH members close the month out with more breakthroughs including changing the DVD Key/ Game region [Link] and begin research into the all important "Timing Attack".[Link]
August 2007 brought with it the single largest blow to hacking and modifying consoles scene, and this site for that matter. US Federal Agents raided 30 or so modchip shops over a dozen states using and abusing the DCMA and ICE.[Link] MS, ESA, and Nintendo respond, with the smell of the scene's blood fresh in the air.[Link] Alot of people had comments, ideas, and concerns, and voiced them at that time including XS staffer TwistedSymphony [Link], TeamXecuter [Link], and even I took a turn at the wheel with my interview with FallsInc regarding his ordeal with the Feds.[Link] In a separate unrelated raid in the UK, a well-known modder was raided and the local authorities there netted over 400 consoles and well over 5000 copied disks, as well as a cache of modchips.[Link] It was clear that times have changed and that it has become increasing harder to acquire modchips and/or modchipping services in parts of the free world.
August wasn't all doom and gloom however. XS made another milestone reaching 350000 members. While the scene had changed a lot, we were still pulling in 1000's of new members each and every month.[Link] The good news didn't end there, as the Timing Attack to downgrade any Kernel was successfully completed.[Link] Gotta love those guys. :)
September 2007, the month Master Chief Landed. Was anyone else as sick of the Halo 3 News as I was? The most hyped and anticipated game for Xbox ever launched on the 25th, with news pretty much all month long. Halo 3 generates revenue of 560 Million U.S.[Link] Halo 3 disc defect rates launch night [Link], and MS admits to the problem.[Link], [Link] Halo 3 registers biggest single day of sales in entertainment history [Link] and later records more than 300 million USD in first week sales worldwide.[Link] While the world is enthralled with Final Episode of the Master Chief trilogy, not everyone is ecstatic. MS confirms Halo 3 Launch caused LIVE downtime [Link], Bungie had to admit that Halo 3 didn't run in the advertised HD resolution [Link] and last but not least people were not happy with the gaudy Halo 3 controllers.[Link] Oh yeah, something outside of Halo 3 happened. Schematics and details for the Timing Attack PIC Interface [Link] were released, and the tools to perform the attack as well.[Link]
October 2007 continues the 24/7 all Halo related coverage, with rumours beginning and later confirmed by MS that Bungie had earned its freedom from Microsoft Game Studios.[Link], [Link], [Link]. The planned Halo Movie dies before ever getting started.[Link] Bungie threatens LIVE users with a ban [Link] preparing to deal a blow to cheaters. Major Nelson chimes in, and warns (unrelated issue) people to not share LIVE accounts for any reason, as it violates the Live TOS.[Link]
Law Enforcement worldwide didn't sit still in October either. Supreme Factory Hong Kong was raided by the authorities [Link] in a huge 3 day raid. Unrelated, but in the same vein news about Mr Modchips getting convicted of 26 modchip related offences is exposed.[Link] Now that I'm thinking about it, other modchip news of importance was the worlds first pics of the Infectus PIC that allowed for the downgrade of Kernels on a 360 was revealed.[Link] Does anyone else remember the days when TeamXecuter or TeamXodus were the names making news in the chip scene? C4Eva closes the month out with news that made BenQ owners quite happy, a new firmware.[Link]
November 2007 was a mixed bag of events and non-events. XBOX LIVE turned 5 years old.[Link]. A limited selection of Xbox 1 Games were now downloadable form the service. (yawn) [Link] Rumours of DivX and Xvid video support in the December dashboard update roll ashore [Link] and later confirmed making a lot of people really happy.[Link]
We've waited since Launch for this support. More so, it's definitely affected my usage of the 360 (increasing it) and of the Original Xbox modded with X3/Panel and XBMC (decreasing it). XS was proud to announce the long await return of the XS T-Shirts.[Link] Commodore4eva releases 1.4 firmware for all drives, and comments and speculates on the November Ban wave, suggesting people wanting to make reliable backups do so with the following: "use samsung with schtrom 360 xtract or XBC for the most reliable replica possible!!!! This *could* mean the difference from being banned on xbox live, or not." [Link] Shazam, shortly thereafter LIVE drops the third wave of LIVE BANS [Link] but MS without admitting anything starts unbanning some [Link]. Iriez clarifies with the current speculation from the inner circle.[Link]
What happens after you turn 5 years old.. stuff breaks down? Around December 21st LIVE started to really go downhill, with random disconnects from LIVE, problems with matchmaking in top games, and other hiccups. Broken [Link] and a week later still broken [Link] and rumours of compensation.[Link]
That pretty much sums up what I felt were the big events of the year. In many respects, a far quieter year then the last few. Maybe it's because the scene has matured with many of the volatile parties now retired or content to sit on the sidelines. Maybe it's because of the lack of progress in the homebrew scene. (or the appearance of a lack of progress.) Like last year, I didn't focus much on the month to month progress of the Kernel Hacking, or the DVD drive Firmware hacking. Same can be said for Linux and for some other areas. XBMC doesn't really get mentioned either, and XBMC is still a cornerstone of development in this scene.
The honour roll for important teams and individuals this year looks much like last years in my eyes. Firmware/Backups/Homebrew/Linux/Tool and Apps people and sites of importance during the year in no particular order: BadSheepy, Commodore4Eva, Tmbinc, Robinsod, Redline99, Schtrom, Ivc, Kreon, Caster420, Garyopa, Klutsh, Schtrom, Arnezami, Maximus, Team Modfreakz, Free60.Org and Xboxhacker.net for continuing the research and forward movement necessary to continue to grow the scene. For those I've missed who feel they should be included, my apologies. It is however the year as I saw it.
Let's all have a great new year, cheers to those listed above for making this scene what it is today. Thanks for sticking with XS year in and year out.
Screw the Warranty!
HSDEMONZ, admin
Xbox-Scene.com & PS3Scene.com
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