Dual hard drive with DLC question

[Scrufdog]

I no longer see a General 360 forum, but since this pertains to my Demon, I'll ask here.

I currently have a dual hard drive setup in my Xbox 360 E 250GB, CoronaV5. On the Retail side it boots with the stock 250GB hard drive. When you flip over to the Demon side, a relay kills power to the Retail drive, and powers up a 2TB USB drive soldered into the internal USB port on the motherboard.

So, since the glitch side sees the 2TB drive as a USB drive, it only allows 32GB to be used for DLC and such Content. The rest of the drive can be seen in FSD3 no problem, so I can install games the the big partition, however, having 2TB for games and 32GB for DLC blows. I know that I can only install DLC to the 32GB partition for it to be recognized. What I havent found in my Google searches.... is there a way to extend the 32GB partition? Otherwise I may have to change my dual hard drive setup and try the spliced data line method which works for some and not for others.

It's a damn shame there is no internal MU port to tap right into, like the Trinity.

 

[Scrufdog]

Hmmm, cant FatXplorer format for up to 2tb?

 

[morinzo]

It sure can..

 

[Martin C]

It can, however try connecting a 360 formatted HDD via USB to your console and see what happens..

 

[Scrufdog]

It can, however try connecting a 360 formatted HDD via USB to your console and see what happens..

I assume you are referring to either the performance requirements, or it not showing up without the usb patch installed?

 

[Martin C]

Well AFAIK, FSD cannot read FATx partitions via USB. Nor can NXE. I know there's a HDD transfer kit via USB but don't know how that works...

 

[Scrufdog]

Well, if NXE cant see FatX, then what can access it? I was under the impression that when NXE formatted it's 32GB partition it used FatX.

If I ftp/copy DLC onto the 32GB UsbMU0 partition everything works fine.

I guess I need to read up on how the 360 uses file systems.

 

[Martin C]

There's a misunderstanding over Memory Unit allocation on FAT32 HDDs.

There's no partition or reformatting going on at all. A fixed allocation of space is created in the form of multi-part files in a hidden folder called xbox360. That's it!

 

[Scrufdog]

That's where I get confused. I see the files on there. I used FSD3 to create a folder labelled Content/0000000000000000 and copied my map packs for BO2 to that folder, on UsbMu and they work fine. So is there anything actually in the Xbox360 files in there or is FSD3 injecting the DLC into that file system, but also showing it outside of the directory.

I emailed FatXplorer and asked what might be going on with this as well. I will buy it if needed, if it will work.

 

[Martin C]

The MU has nothing to do with FSD. FSD can access the mounted part of your USB device.

Think of it as allocated space, like any *nix mounted volume. the files you see in the hidden folder are only used for storage.

 

[Scrufdog]

By allocated that makes me think that it grabs 32GB of space and holds it for future use, which would tell me that the 32GB should be full.. However, even with the hidden folder there, I still have 32GB of free space on UsbMu. I must be missing something.

 

[Martin C]

By allocated that makes me think that it grabs 32GB of space and holds it for future use, which would tell me that the 32GB should be full.. However, even with the hidden folder there, I still have 32GB of free space on UsbMu. I must be missing something.

Not at all - that's exactly what you SHOULD see.

The USB drive itself will be 32GB lighter as there's a MU container (xbox360 hidden folder) on it.

The 360 (and other tools like Party Buffalo) can address this MU container which will be empty when created, hence USBMU0: being 32GB free.

EDIT:

The best analogy I can think of is a shoe box in a drawer. The drawer is your FAT32 USB device (USB0: ) and the shoe box is the USB MU allocation (USBMU0: )

If you put an empty shoe box in a drawer, the space in the drawer is taken up from day one. Regardless of the content of the shoe box, the drawer's space is limited to the maximum size of the shoe box.

 

[Scrufdog]

Ok. So the Xbox360 directory I sed is merely there so that the Xbox has something to start with, then it uses up the extra allocated free space as needed. I thought that when formatted it allocated the 32GB with the data files inside the Xbox360 directory, but it actually allocates it inside the container of a hidden file system (similiar to his linux was stored on the original Xbox). Then FSD3 opens the container allowing access to the free space. Do I got it?

 

[Martin C]

no, not at all.

Get someone on IRC/Teamviewer/Chat to explain this to you.

You're overcomplicating this.

 

[Scrufdog]

Lemme try this one more time before you give up.

I think my hangups on figuring this out are as follows...

1. You stated FSD3 and NXE cant see Fatx, but they see... 'something'. Where is Fatx used if NXE cant see it?

2. You stated that the 32GB is allocated inside the Xbox360 folder, but FSD3 sees 32GB free, and I can write data outside of the folder. If Xbox360/ is the container how come I can write outside of it... that's the big hangup.
I understand your analogy. That's how the some *nix filesystems work, allocate say 2GB for OS usage. Windows sees one file thats 2GB large but once inside the *nix shell, *nix can open that file and there is the directory structure, including used and free space.

Or is it like this...

Basically, the Xbox takes 32GB of physical blocks and takes ownership of it, so that nothing else can use it (windows, *nix) then writes the hidden Xbox360 directory and the data files inside. Then as the data grows (game saves, profile/avatar creation, dash updates), it simply increases the data file size in the Xbox360 folder, ultimately until is uses up its 32GB. By doing that there wouldnt be an obvious file system container, but simply, reserved blocks on the hard drive/flash drive for it to use. If thats the case then how come I can place a Content folder outside of the hidden data files and Games see it no problem. Is that the Xbox going to that reserverd space and reading the data files and anything else it sees, since it figures only an Xbox could have put it there?

If I'm still way off, I'll try to do more research tonight and take some notes.

 

[Martin C]

1. You stated FSD3 and NXE cant see Fatx, but they see... 'something'. Where is Fatx used if NXE cant see it?

FATx is used for internal SATA only. However, as stated it's also visible via the HDD Transfer utility in NXE when used with the USB HDD Transfer cable.

2. You stated that the 32GB is allocated inside the Xbox360 folder, but FSD3 sees 32GB free, and I can write data outside of the folder. If Xbox360/ is the container how come I can write outside of it... that's the big hangup.

Right.

When you connect your USB HDD to the console, it mounts as USBx: (where x is the USB enumeration for you FAT32 Partition).

Your FAT32 partition can ALSO have an amount of space used for Memory Unit purposes. The console puts an empty container onto your FAT32 Partition, so you're now 32GB less. This container comes in the form of an xbox360 hidden folder and a number of data files. Ignore this.

The Memory Unit is addressable via NXE/FSD as USBMUx: (again, where x is the USB enumeration for your FAT32 Partition).

NXE/FSD/Party Buffalo all recognise this container and can open it up to view the contents. Of course it's empty when first created, but inside is the exact same format as any other IntHDD/MU - you have /Content, /Cache, etc.

So whilst your USBMUx: may show as 32GB free, the overall space on USBx: will not reduce based on the content you put in USBMUx: as the space was pre-allocated on creation.

 

[Scrufdog]

Ok. I think I got it. The Xbox only recognizes FatX if it's over a sata connection, and doesnt see it over usb, unless a transfer cable comes into play.

So getting back to the original question of sorts. If I use Fatxplorer to expand the Content partition, will it allow me to store more than 32GB of useable DLC? I assume from what I know now, what it calls the Content partition is actually the reserved space.

 

[jsinger47]

It's a damn shame there is no internal MU port to tap right into, like the Trinity.

Does J1D1 not work?

 

[Scrufdog]

Does J1D1 not work?

It's just an unused USB port, not a leftover MU port.

 

[Martin C]

Ok. I think I got it. The Xbox only recognizes FatX if it's over a sata connection, and doesnt see it over usb, unless a transfer cable comes into play.

So getting back to the original question of sorts. If I use Fatxplorer to expand the Content partition, will it allow me to store more than 32GB of useable DLC? I assume from what I know now, what it calls the Content partition is actually the reserved space.

The only device which can create MU allocated space is the console. FATXplorer/Party Buffalo etc can only read/write to it.