Bad Solderless Kit...

[MickeyMouse]

I don't understand these companies shipping these kits. My brother has now ordered a 2.6CE Solderless kit just like mine, but he ordered from mod-chip.com because I had problems from where I ordered mine. When his arrived, the solderless adapter was screwed up. One of the pins on the bottom is ramed all the way up inside the adapter and it isn't making contact. We took a good picture of the adapter and sent it to Mod-Chip.com, yet all they said in their reply email is that they might do an "exchange". Exchange? They are in Germany and we are in the states... buy tiem we pay for shipping to get a bad part they shipped out back, we could have ordered another one from someone else. You would think they would just ship out another part. The picture we sent was a very good closeup so they know it's broke.

This sucks, specially when you oreder in good faith and the company is on the other side of the world.

Any one else having these sort of problems when their parts show up?

 

[PolyPill]

I had just logged in with the intent of ranting about those solderless things. Total piece of sh*t.

I have no problem soldering, but I figured for an extra $15 I can save myself the time. That was wrong, I spent about 4 hours wrestling with that thing until I finally said screw it and soldered it in. I would have just done solder right away, but I've got a v1.0 and desoldering those holes without a decent desoldering station is a pain. I use copper braid.

Anyways, what I thought would be a time saver turned into a huge head ache and waste of money. Also you still have to solder the LAN, HD, and D0 on the v1.0, so it wasn't quite as solderless as I thought it would be.

4 hours wrestling with the solderless that never worked, 30 min to desolder then solder that worked on first try.

 

[Big_Whoopin]

You still have to solder the LAN and HDD wires regardless of what solderless kit you get or what Xbox you are installing to. There is no kit that includes these connections. They are optional, but I think it's sharp having them attached.

On the solderless adapters there shouldn't be any need for soldering D0 unless there is a problem with the adapter itself. All that I have seen include some sort of wire that loops over and plugs into D0.

For 1.0 boxes the easiest way to go for soldering is with the wire install. While it isn't as nice as having the chip on a pinheader it definitely is easier than removing the solder from the LPC holes. I cleared out the holes on my 1.0 (supported the board on edge, iron on one side and solder sucker pump on the other) but if I had to work on another one I would likely just use the wires.

On 1.6 boxes though the LPC rebuild that Xecuter includes with their chips is a godsend. If you've never used one before don't fear it. Installation is really much easier than you think.

-Whoopin'