Geek Speak.

PLEASE NOTE

This tutorial is provided for informational purposes only and is pretty out-dated. You're really better off using my bootable CD and building your Xbox hard drive with that. This method does work, but there are really easier ways now. So use this tutorial at your own risk!

Part 1a (Closed Xbox - 007:AUF Save Game and Font Exploit)
v1.01 (07/13/04) - Minor changes reflecting the new downloads section.
v1.00 (07/06/04) - Original Release

WARNING! As always, perform this modification at your OWN RISK. We have done our best to ensure that the information in this tutorial is accurate, but we can not guarantee that it is. We will not take any responsibility for any damage to your Xbox, your computer, or yourself by performing this modification.

Notes: Although, this tutorial is designed to be completed without ever physically opening your Xbox, this tutorial requires additional hardware other than just your Xbox and a PC (See Hardware under step 1).

This tutorial has only been tested on Xbox versions 1.0-1.4. It has not been tested with versions Xbox's beyond that. If you don't know your Xbox version you can figure it out by visiting the Xbox-Linux website at the following URL: http://www.xbox-linux.org/docs/versionsfinding.html.

This tutorial has not been tested with Xbox Live. There are known issues with modified Xbox's and Xbox Live. Xbox Live has been known to update the dashboard when logged on. Use Xbox Live at your own risk. If you don't plan on using Xbox Live with this Xbox, you can safely continue with this tutorial.

Buttons, icons, menu items, and other things you click or double click on your computer will be formatted like this within the tutorial:

[Okay]

This is simply a visual indicator to you that you should be clicking somewhere on your computer.

1) Requirements:

Hardware:

• James Bond 007: Agent Under Fire Xbox Game (Non-Platinum Edition)
• Xbox Action Replay
• Xbox Memory Card
• Ethernet Crossover Cable or Two Ethernet Cables and a Hub/Switch/Router etc.
• A Computer with an Ethernet Card
• Xbox with the 4920 Dashboard

Software:

• 007:AUF Evox Auto Installer Save Game
• EvolutionX Dashboard (EvoX)
• Ernie and Bert Font Exploit
• FlashFXP
• XBEDump

If you meet all these requirements you are ready for step 2! Obtain ALL of these requirements before you move on to step 2. Trust me on this. You will save yourself a TON of time by simply meeting all these requirements before you start poking around inside of your Xbox.

2) Transfer the Evox Auto Installer Save Game to your Memory Card
Steps 2 through 5 will be preparing your Xbox and PC for FTP access to your Xbox. If you already have access to your Xbox via FTP, you can safely skip these steps.

2.1) Connect the Action Replay to your PC.

2.2) Open up the Action Replay program.

2.3) Go to the folder where the save game is and drag the zip file to the memory card in the Action Replay program.

3) Transfer the Save Game to the Xbox Hard Drive

3.1) Put the memory card in your Xbox controller and start up the Xbox without a game in.

3.2) Go to Memory -> Controller 1 then copy the save game to the hard drive.

4) Starting EvoX

4.1) Restart your Xbox and put in the 007:AUF disc.

4.2) After 007:AUF has started go to Load Mission.

4.3) Select Xbox Hard Disk and EvoX should startup.

Note: If it doesn't then your save game is probably messed up or you have the "Platinum Hits" version of 007:AUF.

INFO: Some background information on the 007:AUF exploit. The save game is a specially designed save game that exploits the poor error handling of 007:AUF. 007:AUF will attempt to load the save game and crash, allowing EvoX to start. This poor error handling was corrected in the "Platinum Hits" version of the game. There is a similar exploit out for Mech Assault. But we have not tested it with this method. It may be very similar and if you wish, you can try to use the Mech Assault method.

5) Configure EvoX and Windows Networking
If you know that your network settings will be different, please change them appropriately. We will assume that you will be using a crossover cable for this network configuration.

5.1) Once in EvoX, go to System Utils->Settings. Change it to look like this:

Static IP: Yes
IP: 192.168.0.2
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway:192.168.0.1

NOTE: You MUST go to the bottom and select Save and Exit when you are done changing these settings.

5.2) Restart the game and load the mission the same way we did in step 4. You should be at EvoX.

5.3) For XP users, on your PC go to the [Control Panel] -> [Network Connections]. Right click [Local Area Connection] and select [Properties]. Right click [Internet Protocol (TCP/IP)] and select [Properties]. Now select [Use the following IP address] enter the following information:

IP Address: 192.168.0.1
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0

Now click [Okay], then click [Close].

Note: These steps may be slightly different on operating systems other than Windows XP.

6) FTP to Your Xbox

6.1) Verify that your Xbox is connected to your PC through the ethernet port If it is not connected, connect it.

6.2) Open up FlashFXP and click [Connect] (the lightning bolt), select [Quick Connect] and put in the following information:

Server or URL: 192.168.0.2
User Name: xbox
Password: xbox

Click [Connect]. You should then see the drives of your Xbox on the right side of FlashFXP. If not, we did something wrong. Start over and verify that we completed step 5 and step 6.2 accurately.

6.3) Make a backup of the C Drive (drag and drop to the left window) to the folder of your choice on your PC. This should take up about 100MB of hard drive space. WARNING DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP. IN THE EVENT THAT YOU SCREW SOMETHING UP, YOU WILL USE THESE FILES TO RECOVER YOUR XBOX.

6.4) On your Xbox in EvoX, go to System Utils -> Backup.

6.5) Goto the E drive with FlashFXP and browse to Udata->4541000d->000000000000 and there should be a backup folder, copy it to your PC also.

7) Copy the Ernie & Bert Font Exploit Files

7.1) Within FlashFXP, browse to the C:\Fonts folder on your Xbox.

7.2) Rename XBox Book.xtf and Xbox.xtf to XBox Book.xft and Xbox.xft respectively.

7.3) Copy the Ernie.xtf & Bert.xtf font files to the C:\Fonts folder on your Xbox.

8) Sign the EvoX XBE

8.1) Rename the XBE file that was in the EvoX archive to default.xbe.

8.2) Use XBEDump to sign the EvoX XBE. The syntax is as follows. "xbedump.exe default.xbe -font"

8.3) XBEDump will create a new file called out.xbe. Delete the default.xbe file and rename the out.xbe file to default.xbe.

8.4) Copy this file back to the directory that has the rest of the EvoX files in it.

9) Copy EvoX to the Xbox C drive

9.1) Copy everything that came with EvoX, including our fonts signed default.xbe, into the root of the Xbox C partition.

9.2) Reboot the Xbox without a game. EvoX should boot.

Note: You need to re-setup EvoX just like we did earlier in the tutorial. If EvoX doesn't load up, go back to step 6 and verify that you completed all of these steps accurately.

INFO: If you are interested, specifically, in why this works or more detailed information on this exploit read this section. If not continue to PART 2. I included this section as it would have helped me enormously to know why I was getting certain errors and to figure out where files were supposed to go in the directory structure.

Your Xbox only requires 3 files on the Xbox hard drive for it to load the EvoX dashboard instead of the Microsoft dashboard. These files are bert.xtf, ernie.xtf, and default.xbe.

Why does uploading these files to the Xbox and renaming the other font files cause the EvoX dashboard to load? When you boot your Xbox it will still attempt to load your normal Microsoft dashboard, this file is called xboxdash.xbe. As it attempts to load, it accesses the files that are located in the "Fonts" directory and then attempts to load them. The fonts that we uploaded into the "Fonts" directory take advantage of the poor error handling of the Microsoft dashboard and send it information that intentionally crashes it. After the Microsoft dashboard crashes, the exploit fonts can then attempt to load a specifically formed default.xbe located in the system directory. This is a fonts exploit signed XBE. If it is there the application will launch and you will be looking at your new dashboard.

If for some reason it cannot find the default.xbe or the default.xbe that is there is not fonts signed. The Xbox will crash completely and will display error 13 if it cannot find default.xbe or error 21 if it finds default.xbe but it is not fonts signed. Error 13 is telling you that the Xbox is missing system files. Error 21 tells you that an application crashed and returned this error as its output.