I picked up a Xbox Debug Kit machine recently, I didn't know these things existed or what they were but despite Christmas, I dug into my savings for something you don't normally see in public. My wife will get a smaller box of chocolates this year. 
Now I have one, I'm going to try and write "Hello World" for it as a challenge.
What is the Xbox Debug Kit?
It was used by Developers to test their games in development and connects to the Xbox Development Kit, installed on a PC for file transfer and other operations. This particular machine was built in 2003.
It comes in a funky clear green case which was then seen later in the Halo Xbox original special edition. I don't why they didn't use this case from the beginning as it looks quite funky (all part of that alien look).
I believe it comes with 128mb RAM (whereas the consumer unit has 64mb) for the extra debugging functionality.
The top of the case has a different logo colour style in black plastic
Underneath there are some different stickers - note "Opening Breaches Contract". I have not seen the contract and I bet it didn't include selling the console to the public too!
Made in Mexico - I normally think that electronics are made in the East.
Setting up XDK on a PC - this was hard as the software does not run on Windows 7 64bit. So I had to setup a Virtual Machine to run Windows XP which took a while.
Here the options to connect to your Xbox through Xbox Neighbourhood - you can reboot it remotely (ooo I love the warm and cold modes!), take screenshots and access the file system.
Here is a pic of the dashboard taken using XDK - the machine boots straight here, sadly there was no code left for me on this machine from whoever owned it before
Here are some the machine settings - you can create fake Xbox live accounts for testing, change region settings among many other possibilities.
This image was one of the only things I could extract from the drive which was probably wiped. It looks like a picture from Army Men, so perhaps this machine was used for testing that game.
Next Challenges!
I did find it surprising it only has a 8gb HD drive which is not a lot of room for storing games - a full DVD title will be 4.7gb? I would have expected more room for developers on it.
It does not run retail games but there is a software bios file you can add which I will install next.
Then my next big challenge is to setup Visual Studio and write "Hello World" which is about as far as my programming skills go!
Now I have one, I'm going to try and write "Hello World" for it as a challenge.
What is the Xbox Debug Kit?
It was used by Developers to test their games in development and connects to the Xbox Development Kit, installed on a PC for file transfer and other operations. This particular machine was built in 2003.
It comes in a funky clear green case which was then seen later in the Halo Xbox original special edition. I don't why they didn't use this case from the beginning as it looks quite funky (all part of that alien look).
I believe it comes with 128mb RAM (whereas the consumer unit has 64mb) for the extra debugging functionality.
The top of the case has a different logo colour style in black plastic
Underneath there are some different stickers - note "Opening Breaches Contract". I have not seen the contract and I bet it didn't include selling the console to the public too!
Made in Mexico - I normally think that electronics are made in the East.
Setting up XDK on a PC - this was hard as the software does not run on Windows 7 64bit. So I had to setup a Virtual Machine to run Windows XP which took a while.
Here the options to connect to your Xbox through Xbox Neighbourhood - you can reboot it remotely (ooo I love the warm and cold modes!), take screenshots and access the file system.
Here is a pic of the dashboard taken using XDK - the machine boots straight here, sadly there was no code left for me on this machine from whoever owned it before
Here are some the machine settings - you can create fake Xbox live accounts for testing, change region settings among many other possibilities.
This image was one of the only things I could extract from the drive which was probably wiped. It looks like a picture from Army Men, so perhaps this machine was used for testing that game.
Next Challenges!
I did find it surprising it only has a 8gb HD drive which is not a lot of room for storing games - a full DVD title will be 4.7gb? I would have expected more room for developers on it.
It does not run retail games but there is a software bios file you can add which I will install next.
Then my next big challenge is to setup Visual Studio and write "Hello World" which is about as far as my programming skills go!
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