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Microsoft Banning Modded Xboxen
An anonymous reader writes "Since the release of Halo 2 (ed: and just before), Microsoft has been banning modified Xboxes from Xbox Live. Some have even been banned with their mod-chips turned off. Previously many users had been able to use Xbox Live provided they disabled their mod-chip. There are a few theories floating around as to how MS is doing this: from scanning the hard-drive for non-MS material to being able to check if the DVD-drive/Hard-disk serial number is from stock or not."
I agree completely.
You are entirely entitled to do whatever you want to what is indeed your property.
However, if you sign up for Xbox Live you're signing a service contract that states somewhere in there that modded machines aren't allowed. MS is perfectly within their rights to make that requirement a part of the deal. In fact, I appreciate it. Knowing that a modded cheater isn't going to be gaming with me is a reassurance.
I get a little frustrated when people decide that just because they bought one piece of a puzzle, they own the whole damn puzzle too.
Buying an Xbox doesn't mean you get to decide how they run the Live service. Buying Diablo 2 doesn't give you the right to run your own Battle.net server. Read the fine print before you sign on the dotted line.
Let's say I go to Gamestop and buy a used unit. If I buy into the Live service, and find out the box is banned, does Gamestop have to replace with another unit? This is assuming that it was used with a removeable mod, of course, and that it was removed before Gamestop accepted it, etc., or that its EEPROM was used to reflash another unit.
Also, what good is the Live service if I don't play multi-player games? Do they do any kind of software updates, etc., through the service?