X3 IR Review

Written by Brakken
April 2006 Introduction

Xecuter has finally delivered their long awaited Infrared add-on for their very successful Xecuter 3 CE™ line of XBOX™ modification chips. Using this device along with the X3™ or any 3rd party modchips that support it you can turn your XBOX on and off with either a stock XBOX Remote Control or any remote control that supports RCA™ signals. Furthermore, if developers hop on board you could see applications which you could control via remote and I’m hoping XBMC will be one of them.

Features

Blue status led

Compatible with any modchip

Enable/Disable Modchip upon boot.

Easy to use programming software

Learning functionality allows virtually any remote control to be used

User programmable buttons for all functions, such as which button turns on the Xbox or turns it off

Safety Off™ makes sure you press the 'OFF' button 3 times before turning off the Xbox to prevent unintended Xbox shutdown

Turn ON and OFF the XBOX with the XBOX DVD remote control, and any RCA DVD compatible remote (and there are hundreds of these)

Perfect-Press™ - The length of emulated press of front panel 'Power' button can be finely tuned to work with any modchips' needs (i.e. - long press is 100msec - mod on, short press is 10msec - mod off)

Contents

X3 IR™ PCB Module
X3 IR Programmer
Infrared Receiver
Installation Wires
Double Sided Foam Tape

Installation

Before installing the X3 IR you’ll have to already have a modified XBOX setup that supports the module. So far the only two modchips I have seen advertised to support the X3 IR are Xecuter’s X3 CE and SmartXX’s v3 modchips. My personal setup is a v1.6 XBOX modified with a Xecuter 3 CE, Xecuter Control Panel™ and Xecuter LCD™.

Like most of Xecuter’s products you aren’t privileged to receive your goods with an instruction manual. So I set off to find one on the Internet. After searching Xecuter’s website with no luck I hit up the search engines and found a generic manual. After reading over the manuals I couldn’t figure out what the three pre-stripped wires were for. The generic manual left out any reference to these three wires. Finally, thanks to Mikerosoft’s review I obtained diagrams of where these wires needed to go.

All three wires need to be soldered directly onto the power cable running from the XBOX’s power assembly to the motherboard. They need to be soldered like this because the rest of the solder points on the motherboard aren’t powered on (well, until you power the XBOX via its power/reset assembly) when the XBOX is turned off. This way the X3 IR has constant power flowing to it so it can pickup your signal to turn it on.

Stripping the three wires I needed to solder could be approached two ways. I could use a razor blade to cut around them and down the middle or I could just use the soldering iron to melt away the plastic. I decided on the latter. Sure, it looks a little uglier, but I’ll be covering the bare wire with electric tape anyway so what the heck.

Once I had the wires soldered into their respective locations I set that wire assembly aside and picked up the IR receiver. If I wouldn’t have had a Xecuter Control Panel I would have had to either dremmel out a small hole for it or place it between two vents underneath the XBOX. Since I have one life was a bit easier. Xecuter had pre-planned for their infrared modification and left a small red piece of transparent plastic for it right behind the blue LED on the left side of their Control Panel. I simply removed the two micro Philips head screws holding it in place and secured it in place with some double sided foam tape.

Next I took off the left side game controller assembly and fit the infrared receiver’s wire through the empty space and also fit the programmers wire in there too. I replaced the controller assembly and then snapped the Control Panel back into place. After that I plugged all three wires (the power, infrared and controller assembly) into the X3 IR PCB and stuck it next to the controller assembly using some more double sided foam tape.

The last thing I had to do was plug the power wire from the X3 IR PCB into Xecuter’s power/reset button interface, then put the XBOX back together and mount the ugly programmer onto the front of my XBOX. The installation wasn’t that difficult. I’d say once you’ve done it for your first time the entire process would take around 7 minutes to complete.

Usage

After obtaining X3 IR Game Manager (v2.0) I tried to run it and got an error. I was missing a visual basic runtime file. Since I’m running Windows XP with SP2 I figured it would have all of the necessary files to run VB programs, but I was wrong. So I hit up the search engines again and after going through a few sites that actually wanted money for the file I found it.

The webpage I found the programming software on said to unplug the XBOX when I run it, but the program itself gives you two options: one to use the XBOX’s power or one to use the power running from the cable you hook it up to your computer with. Well, to be safe I took the websites advice and unplugged the XBOX.

I mentioned a cable didn’t I? Well, for some reason (mostly money I’m assuming) your need to program the X3 IR with a serial cable. Heck, most PC’s you buy now don’t even come with a serial port! So I knew I had a cable someplace. After digging through my pile of boxes in the basement I found one and plugged it into my computer and then into the X3 IR. I tried to read the settings from the X3 IR and got an error. Ah, the old days of having to reboot before you plug something in – I totally forgot about that!

After rebooting my computer it still didn’t work. So I rebooted again and went into the BIOS to see that the serial port was disabled (by default). I had a good laugh as the technology is so old they figured why not even turn it on. Anyway, I rebooted again and this time was able to connect to the X3 IR and read it’s configuration settings.

The program itself is pretty basic. When you load it up you’re presented with a “Main Settings” window which has the hex codes which will control the device. Once I read them they were pre-set at default settings for Microsoft’s official Remote Control. Here is a brief explanation of the program.

Main Settings - Allow Power On - You can tell the X3 IR to let you power on the XBOX. I’d say leave this setting on.

Power Button Push Delay, Mod On / Mod Off - These settings are the milliseconds you will need to hold down the button you assign for powering on and off your XBOX console. This is pretty handy incase you accidentally hit the wrong button as it gives you a bit of time to press the right one.

Next you have three input boxes where you can insert the necessary remote control codes to turn your console on with the modchip either enabled or disabled and to turn your XBOX off.


The last two settings on the main menu are to “Read Settings” and “Write Settings” which will of course let you read your current settings or write the changes you’ve made to the X3 IR.

Now we’ve got some submenus. The first is the “Tools” menu which will let you check which version of the X3 IR you have, turn on “Learn Mode”, “Show List of Codes”, “Clear Values” and “Load Default Values”. The show list of codes will give you a list of codes for Microsoft’s remote control so you can change the buttons to your liking and the clear values and load default values should be self explanatory.

The interesting feature in this submenu is the “Learn Mode”. Basically, you turn this mode “On” and then point your RCA compatible remote control at your XBOX and press a button a few times. You’ll want to press the button three of four times as it’s a bitch glitchy and sometimes won’t display the correct code. Once you’ve got it displaying the same code you’re good to go and can place it in the main menu.

The last menu is to set the X3 IR to receive power from the XBOX (which I didn’t test due to the webpage I downloaded the program telling me not to do this), set it to be powered via the serial cable and select which COM port your serial cable is using.

Conclusion

After testing the X3 IR with a few universal remote controls around the house I was successfully able to program it and turn the XBOX on and off at my leisure. So, do you really need to get this thing? At this point in time I’d say it’s more of a novelty if you own a chip that supports it. Of course it could be handy to turn your XBOX off/on from across the room – combine that with a wireless XBOX controller and you wouldn’t even have to go close to your system. Some people I’ve talked to say it’s too little too late, but that is up to the developers. If the XBMC guys decide to implement support for it then you’d have a great setup.

I personally dig the device because it’s just another addition to my all mighty blue XBOX. Plus, like I said above if you have a wireless XBOX controller (which I do) I won’t have to get near the XBOX to turn it on. If you’re low on cash I might wait a bit to see if developers add support for it in their applications, but if you already have a decked out XBOX you should pick the X3 IR so you can have it all.

Positives Reasonable Price Only 3 Wires to Solder Works with most Remote Controls Great Addition for X3 CE Owners

Negatives Lack of Proper Documentation Lack of Developer Support Ugly and Outdated Serial Interface Lack of Features

Links

Team Xecuter's Website


-=[ X3 IR Review Discussion Thread ]=-

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