Xbox 360 Case Modding

Jano · 25 Jul 2011 at 14:31

I have an ancient, 5 year old Xbox 360, that has (touch wood) never blown up, spontaneously combusted, conked out, died, or done anything else untowards, except sound like a jumbo jet taking off.

I have recently considered trading it in for a newer 250gb one, but I really can't bring myself to do it, and it seems a pointless waste of money. I have therefore decided an alternate option of buying a new case mod, changing the looks a bit, and while I'm at it, give the insides a damn good clean and maybe change the fans inside and hopefully reduce the noise down to a more respectable level.

So I guess my questions are, how easy would it be to do the above, and does anyone know of where I would be able to get some decently designed case mods for an old 360?

True_Scotsman · 25 Jul 2011 at 14:36

What about the Lian-Li XB-01B xbox case (cant link to it).

Jano · 25 Jul 2011 at 16:02

Expensive, unavailable, and not really what I'd be looking for unfortunately

Zid_ · 25 Jul 2011 at 16:46

This endeavour will be expensive regardless.

I'd turn away now, if I were you.

edGfaCTor · 25 Jul 2011 at 17:52

Don't touch it

when you tend to do simple things like clean it out or change stuff it then goes and fails it's also not worth investing money in it.

just keep your old one use it while saving up the current 360 price will drop. there has already this year been lot of places doing deals with 250gb model for £150 so if you can wait to near xmas i bet there will be bundle deals.

Emphacy · 25 Jul 2011 at 17:55

I'm in the same boat mate! 5 year old XBOX 360 which still works, as quiet as it is, yes my PC is much louder on a grand scheme of things I'm still gonna mod it.

I just don't have the machinery, to do so, so I'm thinking of housing it in small PC case. I'm yet to look for the smallest I can though.
Let me know how you get on with yours...

Jano · 25 Jul 2011 at 20:03

The cost of a replacement isn't an issue, the only issue I could see if it did go wrong, is getting the stuff on the HD onto the new Xbox, if it did go kaput, and I'm pretty confident I could fix it if it did.

A quiet, more unique looking 360 however, is rather tempting.

edGfaCTor · 25 Jul 2011 at 20:12

Jano said:
The cost of a replacement isn't an issue, the only issue I could see if it did go wrong, is getting the stuff on the HD onto the new Xbox, if it did go kaput, and I'm pretty confident I could fix it if it did.

A quiet, more unique looking 360 however, is rather tempting.

well you can use usb pen drives now so buy a say 8gb one there under £10 and transfer all your bits to it.

sean · 25 Jul 2011 at 22:34

Jano said:
A quiet, more unique looking 360 however, is rather tempting.

My standard technique to quieten an old xbox is to first sand the heatsink mating surfaces down to a near-mirror finish (you'll be shocked how rough they are on these older machines) then apply decent thermal paste and do the x-clamp bolt replacement for good measure. This should buy you significant noise reduction but I took my personal machine further by cutting the rear fan grills. It looks ugly but reduces turbulence and kills a lot of the low frequency drone/whoosh noise. The internal fan shroud can also be extended by an inch or two over the GPU and hopefully buy a slight increase in cooling efficiency.

Cosmectically since you'll have the case off why not pick up a spray can of vinyl dye and recolour the machine however you like? It's unlike spraypaint in that it doesn't create a scratchable paint layer but actually soaks into and recolours the plastic. I've done one of mine black and the finish is remarkable. It looks like the xbox was black all along

Hope that helps

Emphacy · 26 Jul 2011 at 23:18

Took my 360 apart no more than an hour ago, I'm getting the panels ready to be painted with some black vinyl dye, just looking for some now. I'm also going to replace the two rear fans with some 60mm Fractals.

The front green LED's are getting replaced with some orange LED's and I'm going to pre-cut an adhesive logo to go on the side of the machine.

sean said:
Cosmectically since you'll have the case off why not pick up a spray can of vinyl dye and recolour the machine however you like? It's unlike spraypaint in that it doesn't create a scratchable paint layer but actually soaks into and recolours the plastic.

What is the best way to apply vinyl dye? I'm guessing you just spray it on a few coats about a foot away from the surface? Thanks.

Zid_ · 27 Jul 2011 at 12:02

It's a Jasper. Definitely consider x-clamp mod as suggested. May as well do it now rather than later.

edGfaCTor · 27 Jul 2011 at 14:34

I have only seen one place that does the vinyl dye in uk it's around £20 for large can but I think the smaller can should be fine.

clean the casing of course
very fine coats so you can hardly see it on there you will need 3-4.
time for each coat will be between 10-15min then hour for final one.
remember you dont go left and right you only go one way.
a foot min distance is about right

key is not to rush.

D18241 · 31 Jul 2011 at 16:06

Was thinking about playing about with my luanch xbox also...like it but makes to much noise so i tend not to play it. Was goona strip it down give a clean out and possibly replace the fans with some quiter ones and add a fan elsewhere to give more air flow