While I never ended up with a red ring of death, my three year old Xbox became an overheating two-red-light mess last weekend. For the last year it sounded like a 747 getting ready for takeoff, so it wasn’t a surprise when it finally died, and its unfortunate demise seemed like a great reason to grab the new, quiet Xbox 360 Slim
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- The hard drive from the old, fat Xbox, hidden in it’s hard drive fortress.
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- The Xbox hard drive out of its shell.
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- The old Xbox hard drive in it’s new, cooler, home.
Tools Needed
- T6 and T10 Torx screwdriver
- Flathead screwdriver
Take apart the old hard drive case:
Why Microsoft decided to bury a 2.5” SATA drive inside of 4 inches of solid plastic I’ll never know, but they did, and you have to get it off before you can put it in your new Xbox slim. The plastic carriers are not even remotely compatible. There are three T7 screws on the bottom of the case that need to be removed. Once off, pry around the edges of the case to loosen it, then pull it apart from one side. If you have no further use for this case, then just give it a good yank and it will crack open.
Remove the old hard drive:
The 2.5” SATA drive is held in place by 4 T10 screws, and is connected by a standard SATA connector. Remove the screws and pull the drive out.
Open the Xbox slim 4GB and drop the hard drive in:
On the bottom of the Xbox slim is a removable plate. Push the tab in and pull it off. At the bottom of this port is a SATA connector. Line the hard drive up with the SATA tabs (make sure you have it facing the right direction, one connector is smaller than the other), then push it in until it clicks. Put the cover back on the Xbox slim, and you’re done!
This is completely worth it if you have an old, dead Xbox with a hard drive in it. The aftermarket Microsoft hard drives are the same drives, just with a plastic case around them so they slide in and out of the port easily.
Update October 20th, 2010: If you’re wondering about online co-op and firefight modes in Halo Reach, dropping an older style drive into a new Xbox slim will allow you to play those modes. For whatever reason, Reach doesn’t recognize the on-board flash memory as a legitimate hard drive, and I wouldn’t be surprised if future games have this same issue.
Notice: Use of undefined constant after - assumed 'after' in /home1/wwhadcom/public_html/scientiaest/wp-content/themes/scientia_blog/single.php on line 13I never told you how to do this, and if you do it wrong, it’s your own fault.
66 Responses to “Replacing the Hard Drive in an Xbox 360 Slim”
Hey thanks for the helpful information. i have one question though. With the 4gb xbox slim, one is not able to play online coop on the new halo reach. There i an error message that says that “you dont have the correct hd on yur xbox” So, do u know if this 20gb original xbox hd mod will be compatible to make playing reach in online coop and firefight modes work? Please email me back a reply. Thanks
i think this voids the warrenty..
it does
It probably does but how would they ever know? Done properly it does zero damage to the Xbox and is as simple as plugging two SATA ports together.
I don’t have Halo Reach myself, but it should work with a 20GB HD installed in the Xbox. From what I understand, it does not recognize flash drives (like the 4GB in the new slim) as being a real hard drive.
Also, it will void the warranty of the old hard drive (obviously, you had to pull it out of the case), but to my knowledge, not of the new Xbox.
i did this mod to my xbox 360 slim and used a 20 gb hd and can not even load halo reach or halo 3 it just sits at the start screan forever but will load everything else so do it at your own risk i think its bs that ms trys to screw us on every little thing
My questions is can’t you just connect the hard drive to your PC and copy the configuration from an old XBOX 360 hard drive and add it to a new 500gb hard drive and it should be compatible right?
Nope. To my understanding the console does a hardware check, and the drive would have to be specifically formatted for the Xbox. There are tools to do it with, but you’d be stuck to a drive that has come in an Xbox already (8, 20, 80, 250) from a manufacturer that MS uses.
I opened the bay door for the slim and looked down inside, the connectors are MALE and so are the hard drive so how does one SLIP in the old hard drive ????
I’ll try and get a better picture, but the Xbox 360 has a standard SATA drive in it. If it doesn’t look like it will go in, flip the drive, and the connectors will line up.
This worked like a charm! Thanks man – huge help. I’d sent my XBox in for repair, but it came back a 250 GB HDD light, so I scrambled and only had an old hard drive and this post. Huge help. Just gotta figure out what Microsoft did with my Hard Drive.
Hey guys /women for you people that cant use halo reach because of putting the old hard drive into the new one you can just use the click on the the memory unit the one that is already in the slim and it should work
Ok just did this and checked to see if any problems would come up with Reach and Black ops and not a thing, plays just like normal.
A million thumbs up! This worked great and took me about 5 minutes.
Thanks. This worked great. I bought yoostar 2 and it wouldn’t work without a hard drive. Had an extra one this saved me lots of money. Nice!
i just have a question on the xbox 360 4 gb does at have a hard drive in it or not cuz iam getting a no signal and i can see the pic on it so can u help me thanks
Five minutes and this was done. Use some packing foam to brace the HD in the slot or buy a case for your HD off ebay $5. Works great especially for getting reach to work in coop mode. Plus you do’nt have to retrieve your GT. You tube has some good videos for this too.
I still don’t fully understand, do your save files stay on the hard drive? For instance, if I was playing xbox live on Call of Duty would I still have all my progress?
I am upgrading because my xbox 360 elite just got the red ring for the second time and I decided to get a slim. I am trying to get my old save files onto the slim.
Thanks
Yes, your hard drive will have everything on it that was on your old console, save games, settings, and gamer tag. If you have to save a file in a new game, you’ll have the option to save it to the 4GB of memory in the console, or to your old hard drive.
Thanks!
Totally worked. There is a 4th screw under the reflective Microsoft sticker on the harddrive. I did not notice till I ripped off the cover. No big deal either way, though.
Worked like a charm. Freaking awesome. Now I am playing Halo Reach Firefight without having to spend $$ on a hardrive i didnt really want.
um are u sure hardrives bought from a random store is the same as the one in the xbox?
So any idea whether or not this voids the warranty on the new Xbox?
Obviously it would on the 20 gig hard drive, which I couldn’t care less about, but I really am not too keen on voiding the warranty on my brand new 360.
I can’t speak for Microsoft, but I don’t think they could void your warranty for this. Also, you could remove it if it had to be sent in for repairs.
Okay so after putting the old hd in my new xbox how hard iz it gonna be to remove it if I need to send it in for repair
To remove it you just pop the cover off of the Xbox and pull the hard drive out. You might need tweezers to grab it if your fingers don’t fit, but it’s a standard SATA connection at the bottom.
So, I definitely laughed hysterically at the disclaimer part. XD haha. before i do this, does it play original xbox games too?
Original Xbox games? I don’t think any 360 does that.
Joe, yes the 360s are able to play original xbox games. I have done it. Most do but I hear that some games do not.
cheers for this helpful info ill recommend your wordpress blog to my class mates as we have been looking for this since i can remember.
DUDE!!!! thank you so much for posting this! I dropped my slim this morning and when I turned it back on it wouldn’t recognize the hard drive and said it couldn’t find my profiles! After reading this i saw that it is possible to remove the hd! Turns out that the hd just came loose! Thank you so much!
I was giddy when I was able to make this work. Now I have a new slim and all my old saves and games. Save yourself the money and do this!
No it does NOT void the Slim’s warranty…if you go on xbox.com/support it will show you a list of GAMES that are backwards compatible, the console has nothing to do with it…you are required to have a HDD installed to play the GAMES that are backwards compatible…Source: I work for XBOX!!!
ive done this but every time i search a game on reach and i find one it keeps on saying failed to load creating new vote we do it a couple more times then it still dosent work it kicks me out of the game mine is a 20gb does anyone have any suggestions if u do plz help ill apreciate it thanks to all
Yeah and I forgot who said it, but other games will not download and work with the 4gb. Fallout 3 (DLCs), halo, and a lot of other games with downloadable content. And if you’re using a generic it does not include the emulator for old xbox games. You can still play them on the new 360, but you cannot install them on the 4 gb because it is emulatorless.
I installed my old hard drive into this slot without any problem. After I had done this, I went to play a game and I selected my newly installed drive, but the game still will not register that I have saved game files on the drive. Can anyone help? I’m kind of stuck and not sure what to do.
I did this with my new slim console and my old pro’s 20gb HD. For some reason when playing Black Ops multiplayer, about 50% of the time it freezes at the loading screen prior to the match, the load bar usually fully loads but the pinwheel pops up and it stays on that screen. This never happened with my old white xbox console. I’ve only had this Slim for 3 days now, do you think it’s something wrong with this console?
Does anybody know if this will work with a 120gb elite hard drive?
Yes, it will work with any hard drive that was in the previous (fat) Xboxes.
Thanks.
I tried this but when I play reach its slow a freezez also I got one red ring from it but it seems to work with others games but halo games.
Can some one help me with this probelm?
Lets just pretend I may have an old 20 gb drive from an xbox360 that was, lets put it this way, firmware upgraded.
Will I risk getting banned if I use that particular hypothetical HDD in my new and very real xbox 360 slim?
Thanks guys.
so i changed my old harddrive to a new slim reach edition that my bro gave me but now it wont read discs..it reconigezes the hard drivre and i reformatted it but it wont read discs why???
ok so i did all of this without knowing becuase i was pissed that i didnt have the t-screw drivers for it so i took a knife pried it open then took needle nose pliers for the other ones but when i put the drive in the xbox whice i have the 120 or what ever it is it freezes
help?
scratch that i let it go after it froze then it started went past the xbox litle intro but it sad there for 10 seconds then gave me the e63 or the hard drive one and it still wont work :
Put in old hard drive but doesnt recognise it as there. Does this mean the hard drive is faulty or the xbox?
BTW, it’s a T6 torx screwdriver you need. Not a T7.
Works perfectly! I only lost 5 € for buying the T10 tool.
Thanks man, saves me 100€
you’re the man!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! it worked like a charm so i don’t have to buy a new hard drive. Battlefield 3 here we come!!!!!!!!
i have done this and it works but there is a problem. when i plug my Turtle beach headset in it stops working. does anyone know why this is?
Thanks man your the best! so simple but your the only one on the net that figured it out
Opened up the homies old 20gb hard drive put into the my new xbox 4gb slim model……. Plugged it in correctly, but doesn’t show up on the memory menu….. Should I have deleted everything off it first before trying to plug into new slim model????
Ok so can any one help me i just got a 120 gig hoping to use it and the guys at gamestop said that microsoft might send out a worm to see the people using a off hartdrive but my theory is its still a microsoft hard drive so why should they care. i know your xbox is fine but im worried about xbox live band. ????
Neither the T6 nor the T7 I tried really fit these screws well, but at least after reading this I knew that they were SUPPOSED to work, so I went straight to the brute force method and tore that fucker apart instead of trying to go buy a new screwdriver/bit. Surprisingly enough, the HDD itself seems to have survived unscathed and is now happily downloading the demo for fruit ninja. Thanks for the post!
i did this but with my 60 gb hdd and when i downloaded some xbox originals games it wont play them i transferd the licenses and downloaded them again can any one help me please
I did this with an old 20 gig HD I had lying around. Probably just a difference in time or place of manufacture, but the case was held together by 4 T5 screws rather than 3 T7.
What’s the highest size HD that the slim version will recognize?
thanks
I’m contemplating getting either an old 60 or 120gb hard drive tomorrow, but I’m worried that it’ll either not work, or screw something up. I read somewhere that newer xboxes were having problems with it. I just bought mine a week ago, so I’m worried that some firmware upgrade or something will prevent this. Anyone who recently bought an xbox and have successfully done this?
I have been getting an error as well, It will do the XBOX title screen, then give me an error screen. The hard drive is a 120gb from a 360 elite… any suggestions?
nevermind I found out that my hard drive it self is damaged and thus cannot be connected to jack all.
There is a transfer cable you can buy.
I have a question, does Halo: Reach theater mode work on this?
@ Lordplato: Since the drive is coming out of another 360 and is already formatted and whatnot, everything that works on a 360 that came with a hard drive should also work with this.
hello i just bought the new xbox 4gb model and i have also bought a 250gb external hard drive which looks like the old style one as well as a 320gb internal made for the slim xbox i was wondering how easy it is to replace the orginal storage and will the xbox accept it?
if u do this can u still play original xbox games