Xbox Live Blocking - total protection?

[CCMCornell]

I've been trying to find out more about Xbox Live Blocking in the newer X2 bioses, but after searching this forum and the one at X-S, I'm still having trouble finding answers to all my questions.

When booting with the X2 bios, is it still possible to unintentionally connect to Xbox Live (and, thus, be banned)?

Does the blocking feature prevent connecting to XBL:

from the MS dashboard?

from an in-game XBL menu?

an autorun from a game's xboxupdate.xbe or something similar?

any other method?

TIA

 

[Big_Whoopin]

As far as I am aware it blocks XBL entirely. My theory on this is based on the fact that I have seen very little or no discussion on if it does or does not work in the time that I've been following the forums, that being since the release of the 5xxx X2CL series. The best bet is probably to check the changelogs of the 4xxx series X2 BIOSes and see what details are in there. If you can find what BIOS version implemented the XBL blocking you might find more by searching for that version number on the forums.

-Whoopin'

 

[CCMCornell]

Thanks for the reply.

So far, the lack of complaints and the apparent faith in its functionality increases my own, but I just wish I could easily find something that it explicitly stated that it blocked Live in those instances I mentioned. I've tried searching here and at X-S, but could only find vague references to it's capability in this manner. Plus, it's often difficult weeding through forum software's search results even when carefully choosing keywords.

But, I'll take your suggestion and look through the changelogs.

Thanks again.

 

[Big_Whoopin]

Only other thing I could suggest, and this is much more involved and I'm not entirely sure how to pull it off, would be to run a packet sniffer on your network. Kill the broadband connection (power off or disconnect the modem) and then attempt the XBL tasks in question. If the packet sniffer picks up any data being set out to the network from the Xbox then I would suspect something is not blocked. For the best results a control test should also be done where the same tasks are tried from the retail BIOS. That way you will have a good comparison between the two of just what data leaves the box.

-Whoopin'

 

[Catalyst]

Only other thing I could suggest, and this is much more involved and I'm not entirely sure how to pull it off, would be to run a packet sniffer on your network. Kill the broadband connection (power off or disconnect the modem) and then attempt the XBL tasks in question. If the packet sniffer picks up any data being set out to the network from the Xbox then I would suspect something is not blocked. For the best results a control test should also be done where the same tasks are tried from the retail BIOS. That way you will have a good comparison between the two of just what data leaves the box.

-Whoopin'

If you want to get that involved you can use Ethereal

http://www.ethereal.com/

It is a free packet sniffing software that runs on your PC and you can specify by port or IP for what traffic what to scan...

That way you can check to see what your xbox is sending when it boots. If your xbox and PC are on a switch (which they probably are) you PC will get all the broadcasts your Xbox sends. If you want to be more thorough you can either get a hub... which is cheap and what I recommend... you can see all traffic that your xbox sends....

Or you can hook your PC to your xbxo directly with a cross-over cable and see what the xbox sends but since your PC isn't going to acknowledge all the right ports you might not see all of the traffic you would on a hub.

Good Luck!

 

[Big_Whoopin]

The whole reason I know about packet sniffing was from troubleshooting a thin client problem at work. Using a hub and Ethereal is what was recommended by the manufacturer. IIRC you can set Ethereal to filter by IP addresses so that you are only seeing traffic from (and to?) your Xbox.

A switch will allow broadcasts through, but since switches are "smart" devices if the Xbox is communicating with a specific IP the Ethereal monitor won't get this data from a trace. The switch will only send out to the port that is the proper route to the destination IP. Hubs don't have the same logic. Anything sent in to a hub on one port will be echoed out on all the other ports. This is why a hub will provide more data to a sniffer application, but in a normal network environment switches will be more efficient.

So now that we've gone into such detail regarding packet sniffing and network setup, I'll stop and say it is probably more trouble than it is worth. Short of finding a statement from Xecuter, as I would take his response as a true answer to what the BIOS can and can't do, I would recommend the changelogs and reading up or posting in the X-S XBL forum. http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showforum=53 While posting here is putting the question in front of the eyes of X2 BIOS users, a question in the XBL forum will probably be in front of a more concentrated group.

-Whoopin'

 

[Catalyst]

The whole reason I know about packet sniffing was from troubleshooting a thin client problem at work. Using a hub and Ethereal is what was recommended by the manufacturer. IIRC you can set Ethereal to filter by IP addresses so that you are only seeing traffic from (and to?) your Xbox.

A switch will allow broadcasts through, but since switches are "smart" devices if the Xbox is communicating with a specific IP the Ethereal monitor won't get this data from a trace. The switch will only send out to the port that is the proper route to the destination IP. Hubs don't have the same logic. Anything sent in to a hub on one port will be echoed out on all the other ports. This is why a hub will provide more data to a sniffer application, but in a normal network environment switches will be more efficient.

Um... didn't I just say that?

 

[Big_Whoopin]

Um... didn't I just say that?

In less words, yeah. Since I had more I was following up with I expanded on your hub/switch info. For those that didn't know the difference and might be wondering why they act differently. Wasn't expecting to educate you. If you know about Ethereal chances are you know a thing or two about network hardware. Not always, but they're damn good odds.

Plus I was at work and avoiding it.

-Whoopin'