Xbox 360:Creating Game Backups
Circumventing DRM mechanisms and/or creating backup copies of games and media for personal use is a right granted only in some countries. It is your sole responsibility to stay up to date with the law in your respective country. The information provided within this wiki is solely educational and its editors take no responsibility for the use or misuse of this information. |
As Xbox 360s age, their lasers begin to degrade with use. Because of this, it is smart to keep a backup of your game library to be played digitally. Game backups can also be useful for emulators, such as Xenia.
On an unmodified console, you have the option to rip games to the hard drive, playable off of the hard drive by inserting the disc for a license check. On a RGH/JTAG, you can make a complete rip of the disc, which is playable without having the disc inserted. Alternatively, you can install games to hard drive with an unmodified console, move them to a USB device, put them on an RGH/JTAG, and play them that way.
A video demonstration of how to rip game backups can be found on Modded Warfare's channel.
This process also applies to original Xbox games and DVDs.
Ripping with Stock Dashboard
Using the stock dashboard's installation feature does make a complete backup of a disc (including padding) inside a Game on Demand-like container with the downside of it being the largest size and requiring the original disc to play on an unmodified console. It is also unsupported with a few games.
- With the desired disc in the console, navigate to the game disc icon and press X to open the game's details.
- Press the Install button.
- Select the storage device you want to install the game to.
- Once the installation is completed, press A to continue.
On a modded console, you can use the NXE2GOD application to convert officially installed games into Games on Demand. This isn't too necessary, as official disc installations will still play without the disc on a modded console anyway. However, it will allow you to copy and move the game using the storage settings on the official dashboard when converted to GOD. It also means they will no longer be signed to the console they were originally installed with, so they can be easily transferred between modded systems.
Ripping with Aurora
Disc to GOD
Aurora's disc to GOD script is similar to installing the game with the Microsoft dashboard, but it is signed as a digital GOD instead of a console signed disc installation.
- While in Aurora, press the Back button on the controller.
- Select
Scripts
. - If the Disc to GOD installer is not already installed, open the Aurora Repo Browser. If it is already installed, skip to step 6.
- Go to
Utility Scripts
. - Select
Aurora Disc to GOD installer v1 by Phoenix
to download the script. Once it has been downloaded, press the B button twice to go back to your installed scripts. - Open the Disc to GOD installer script.
- After launching the script, it will prompt you where the game should be backed up to. If you want the game to also show up in the Microsoft dashboard, it can be placed in the
Content\0000000000000000
on either the internal HDD or USB storage. - Once a folder has been selected, it will show a prompt asking if you want to create content directories.
- If the game is being installed the
Content\0000000000000000
folder, you will need to create the content folders so the game is visible in the Microsoft dashboard. - If you are installing the game to its own folder outside the Content directory, then this setting is optional.
- If the game is being installed the
- After the disc is done installing, Aurora will prompt you to scan for new content. You can select
Yes
so the game will be visible after installation.
Manual File Extraction from Disc
- While in Aurora, press the Back button on the controller.
- Select
Dvd
. This is the current disc in the DVD drive. - Select all of the folders and files on the DVD. After selecting everything, navigate to the left and select the copy button.
- Press the right bumper and navigate to the storage device you would like to install the game to. Then select the folder you want to install the game to.
- Make sure you are in a folder dedicated for the game itself. An example file path would be
Hdd1:\Games\Halo 3
- Make sure you are in a folder dedicated for the game itself. An example file path would be
- Navigate to the left and select the paste button. Once the game's files are finished copying, you can press the back button again to return to the dashboard.
- Keep in mind that your dashboard must be set to scan the containing folder if you want it to show up in a category listing.
Ripping with FSD
- Navigate to Utilities > DVD Extract.
- Select Change, browse to where you want to save the disc contents, and press Y. The program will create a folder with the name specified inside of the selected folder.
- If you want to change the title of the ripped content, click the second Change button.
- Select Start Copy and the disc will be ripped to that location. When the process is finished, the Cancel button will disappear and you will need to press B to go back.
- Keep in mind that your dashboard must be set to scan the containing folder if you want it to show up in a category listing.
- Navigate to the file manager and to the folder you want to rip files to. Note that it will *not* create a directory, so it's recommended to make a folder for the game and enter it.
- Press Y and scroll down to the second to bottom option, CopyDVD. Press A on it and it will open the disc tray.
- Place the DVD in the disc tray, close it, and press Confirm. The disc will be ripped to that location.
- In XeXmenu, the game's folder has to be in a folder called
Games
,Applications
, orEmulators
in order for XeXmenu to show it in the discovery menu.
- In XeXmenu, the game's folder has to be in a folder called