XBox won't connect to Live
 

Ok, tried to do the Evox install and HD upgrade myself. Big mistake. I won't go into that mess again, but I did attempt to explain what I had done in a few recent posts on this forum. Thanks to the people who replied.

Anyway, after putting my XBox in what I thought to be a FUBAR state, I managed to restore the original C: and E: drives to the original HD. One big problem: XBox Live is still listed on my dash, but it will not allow me to connect. I am running through a Linksys router (which worked fine until I decided to be an idiot and open my XBox).

My gamertag is gone. Not there anymore. Missing. My only options are New Account and Account Recovery. When I test the network settings, I see the following:

Cables connected
IP Settings configured
DNS Resolved
Xbox Live not found.

I called Microsoft and played dumb, which at this point isn't too hard for me. They attempted to blame it on the router, but I know that's not the issue. In their words, they are "escalating" my situation and will get back to me.

I want to somehow be able to recover my gamertag and get back online. Can someone help me out?

I had the same problem but I cannot pin point what exactly I did to fix it... Try to recover your account first and let me know if that works. It may be that simple. I would not worry, I don't believe you are banned although I am sure you may be thinking that.

Thanks for the reply. Account recovery doesn't get me anywhere. I shouldn't be missing any files because I backed up the C: and E: drives prior to installing anything. If you happen to think of what it was that you did to correct your situation, please let me know.

Microsoft has yet to get back to me, but I'm not holding my breath.

I did the exact same thing. Re-did my C drive, and lost all xbl info. I upgraded the dash, then did account recovery. When you recover, you have to put in the exact information, capitalization matters.

Quall:

Thanks for the reply. When you say that you updated the dash, how do you go about doing this? When I try to do account recovery, I get a message stating, "Could not connect to Xbox Live. Do you want to troubleshoot your connection?"

When I click on yes, it does what I have described above: It tells me the cables are connected, the IP settings are configured, DNS resolved, but (with a red "x" next to it) Xbox Live not found.

If you have any advice, I'd appreciate it.

I figured out what I did wrong the first time (I think), but I don't want to attempt to install a new HD until I have ALL of my original settings backed up.

Somewhat relating to all of this, are you familiar with what settings from the original C: drive control Xbox live and gamertag info?

Thanks again.

Well, what i meant by updating is that i updated from the original xbox dash, without the xbl option. And i re-did my E partition (xbl info wouldn't copy) as well. If you have not messed with E, then your account should still be ther unless u deleted it.

You will get that message if you have been banned as well. Im not sure this is the case, but if you logged on without locking an upgraded drive or had your chip on, then unfortunately this is the case...

My suggest is to hook up your xbox directly to your cable modem. That will insure your roputer is not messing with it in any way. If you do that, also make sure everything is set to auto-find (like the ip and stuff).

Quall:

Thanks again for the reply.

Just spent 48 minutes on the phone with Microsoft. They claimed to have never seen this problem before.

The tech had me connect the xbox directly to the cable modem and I got the same result as what happened with the router.

I've gone back and checked my original backup of the original xbox HD. Everything seems to be the same. Problem is, I do not possess the requisite level of knowledge to understand where the xbox live settings are located.

How is it possible to update the original xbox dash without the xbox live option? The xbox live info was already on the HD when I first loaded evox. That's what I made the original backup from.

Once you re-did the E: partition, were you able to reinstall and reconnect with xbox live? I have not touched the original backup of my E: partition (except to access it to transfer files from my PC to the Xbox when I had to redo the original HD).

I know I am asking a lot and I appreciate any assistance that has been provided to me so far, but if you possibly explain what you've done in greater detail, maybe I would be able to duplicate what you've done and get back online.

Thanks.

hmm, was your xbox bought used?

Next, are the xbl connection settings set to auto?

I got the xbox when it first came out, and backed up every dash i've had since. Xbox live didn't come around untill about a year after the xbox's release. If you didn't have an xbox live dashboard, whenever you'd hit "go live" in a game, it would update your dash to enable xbox live. Which is what i did when i redid my C drive. Then i redid the E drive because i was having some problems.

Anyways, when i re-did E, i was able to connect and recover my account with no problems. I think i may have deleted all the other xbl related saves off E when i did so.

Thanks once again for your reply.

I got my Xbox the day it came out. My xbl settings are set to auto.

I hadn't had any experience with backing up anything on the Xbox until I finally had a modchip installed (about 2 weeks ago). I was an xbl beta tester so I have had the xbl stuff on my xbox for some time.

When I reinstalled the backups of my original HD, it reinstalled all of the xbl stuff (I'm assuming), but my gamertag and ability to connect were gone. If I'm backing up to the original HD using my orignal backup, how do I do that install without the components of xbl?

Are there xbl files on both C: and E: that can be safely deleted from my original backup prior to placing them back on the original HD? Otherwise I have no means to redo any of the partitions because my backup contains xbl.

Assuming that I had a backup that did not have xbl, are you saying that I would be able to place a retail xbl game (without chip on), in the xbox, go live, and then recover my account information?

Again, sorry for all of the questions, but I feel as though I'm getting closer to a resolution of the issue and you've been extremely helpful.

If you have any further information relating to the most recent set of questions, I'm all ears...

Here's a shot in the dark bro, it may or may not work but it seems that you would be willing to try anything at this point. Find out your MAC address on your computer then go into the dashboard when it does it network setting test ie. DNS REsolved blah blah blah go into the settings option the go to advanced and then enter DHCP as the name and then enter your MAC under that. Back out and then try to reconnect. Let me know if this works...

Tango:

Tried what you suggested, but it was a no go. Like you said, I'm willing to try about anything to get this thing back up and running properly.

Well, if you hot "go live" in a retail game, it will attemp to connect to xbox live. If the dashboard is not a live enabled dash, it will update it for you.

I believe your live account is on E, but i don't think it can be copied to another hdd. If it can, then I guess it just failed for me. You problem is pretty wierd. Is there anything you could have done to get banned? Like maybe you had your chip on after you updated to an xbl 2.0 dashboard (where it logs onto xbl when you turn your xbox on. It can be disabled though).

Im not sure what it could be. Go into the memory (dashboard) and delete everything that has to do with xbox live, like account info, auto updater. That may help.

Quall:

As far as I know, I haven't been banned. I assume that when I spoke to the well-informed people at Microsoft about the problem, they would have told me that my account was banned once I gave them my gamtertag info. In fact, they told me I was paid up through Nov. 2004.

After reading your last reply, what might have happened was the automatic update thing with xbl. Does this feature take over even if you've booted into evox? It wouldn't seem that that would happen.

I will attempt to delete the xbl entries from the HD memory. If you or anyone else reading this series of posts can help me solve this problem, I would be extremely grateful.

It only logs on once you start the dash. So it wouldn't do anything unless u hit the "ms dash" button in evox and loaded the msdash 2.0.

Quall:

Thanks for all of the assistance. I decided, after attempting many different things and having none of them work, to keep my modded xbox, trade in an unmodded PS2 that I had at my office, and get a brand new xbox.

All I should have to do is go through the account recovery. I guess 2 xboxes are better than one.

Thanks again.