Qoob SX -Review-

Qoob SX Review
By Brakken, June 2005

(french translation)

It's time again for another heart pounding an breathe taking look at an awesome product brought to you by the one and only ISO-420 Reviews. We're going to get down and dirty with the Qoob Pro's littler brother the Qoob SX.

The SX is a downscaled version of its sibling which is targeted at the people out there who are looking for an economical solution to boot backups without the frills of the Pro.

Qoob SX Features

Direct boot of all media, without swapping!
Supports all regions PAL / USA / JAP
DVD Disc upgradeable
Network upgradeable
Bios selection/control supported
Supports all retail hardware (DOL-001, 002, 101 & Panasonic Q)
Fastboot of original discs
Compatible with other IPL replacements
Supports homebrew and open-source coding
Integrated media compatibility check
Streaming Audio Fix
Easy Installation, only 6 wires
Multicolor graphical user interface for easy operation
High secure - low power Actel FPGA
Including ESD-bag, installation wires and 3D Sticker

Contents of the Package

The SX came inside a sealed anti-static bag and included the chip, the installation wire assembly and of course the trademarked high quality Qoob sticker we have all come to admire.


Installation

Following the diagrams I soldered the SX wire assembly onto my DOL-001 Revision A GameCube motherboard. As you can see in the picture I did a dual install with another chip which is why there are so many wires, but this is not required if you're just installing the SX alone. Look at the second picture to see which wires you only have to install.

Usage

After booting the Cube I was greeted by the default BIOS. One must understand that the SX has two BIOS banks, but only one of them can be programmed. This was done to protect end users from bad flashes as you can always access the BIOS on bank 1 and reflash the chip.




So I put in an original disc and it booted fine! Nice no need to adjust my laser pot, but of course this might not be the case for everyone. Next I proceeded to flash the second BIOS bank with the latest Qoob SX v1.3a release. To do this I booted the Cube while holding LEFT on the D Pad + button B and then when prompted I sent the ELF file over the network using SoftDev's VRMDSEND utility. After going through a few onscreen prompts the BIOS was successfully updated.


I then rebooted the Cube and tried to boot a homebrew disc and it worked like a charm. After that I tested some backups for compatibility with audio streaming and they also worked just fine.

Movie: Booting Homebrew



The Qoob SX boots DOL files perfectly from ISO-9660 discs and will also let you stream the DOL files via network which means you can also stream game images to the Cube using third party loaders.

Once you have updated the BIOS you can now access the configuration menu by holding 'B' while booting to toggle through different options.

Conclusion

All in all because of the ease of installation, basic feature set and price I believe this is a great alternative to other backup booting solutions on the market, but if you have the extra cash to spend I would recommend purchasing a Qoob Pro instead.

Links

modthatcube.pxn-os.com
- Everything you need to know about the Qoob Chip

www.qoobchip.com
- Official Homepage for the Qoob line of modchips

-=[Qoob SX Review Discussion Thread]=-

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