:FYI:

So those of you who’ve installed an application on the Microsoft platform have no doubt run into issues from time to time when installing an MSI package (Microsoft System Installer).

I recently ran into a problem where an MSI package would just not start up correctly and nearly instantly tell me that it was interrupted and could not continue. In order to determine the culprit I had to try to install the package with logging enabled; [msiexec /l* x:\install.log /i "%PATH_TO_PACKAGE%"].

Once the log file was created I had to search through to locate the actual error that was causing my problem, which I did and found the following non-descript error code; (0×800cc810).

After a few minutes of digging I discovered that this is typically related to an MS IIS installation error of some sort. In order to fix it I just reinstalled the local IIS (through Control Panel > Add / Remove Programs).

Ran my MSI package again and POW!!! No Installation issues ran through without a hitch. (So to speak.)

Well for those of you (like me) who’ve been playing Halo Wars off and on for the past week and I don’t know about you but I get the feeling like it’s a dumbed down version of an RTS. It really makes me long for Starcraft 2 to see how that’s going to be unfortunately that won’t be on any console which makes me a sad panda indeed.

StarCraft 2 : Screenshot

[Oops now only fourteen more gamerscore to go, until I reach the 10,000 mark.]

How the hell did I get such a weird gamerscore? Luxor2 and that’s all I’m going to say about that… never ever play that game. EVER.

Have you ever tried to install an MSI package only to receive the following message:

Error 1718. File FileName was rejected by digital signature policy.

Yes, no… maybe?

Well if you have then you should know about this MS KB Article: 925336.

This problem occurs if the Windows Installer process has insufficient contiguous virtual memory to verify that the .msi package or the .msp package is correctly signed.

Lovely.

At least there is a hotfix download that you can get which will prevent you from having to talk with MS Support. Egh, [shudder].

For those “tinkerers” out there that like to play around with some “programming” using the Microsoft Development tools (Express or otherwise), you should look at the How Do I video series they have that covers a range of topics.

You can view the C# ones here.

It’s here.

So last night I fired up a little bit of Madden 09 goodness just prior to me hitting the lights out, (you do know that Madden is like warm-milk to some).

And suddenly started to understand the newer passing game. Though I still had issues with my pass defense I was doing alright against the run.

And most importantly I was finally starting to register some wins.

Oh and I snagged me some more achievements; Steal Their Thunder, Kick a FG for over 50 yards, 80% completion for a game and Shut out Rival in Franchise.

So that’s 50% of the 1,000 possible gamerscore possible.

Oh and what’s really awesome the Steal Their Thunder achievement… just requires you to press the B [RED] button while in a celebration zone.

Very, very, zen.

Now just have to work on that New York Jets rushing for 300 yards. [sigh]

When was the last time you played a game made/published by Square Enix? If you’re anything like me, it’s been quite a while… so much so you may have never played one forgetting even that Chrono Trigger was produced for SNES by Square Co., and that they merged with Enix around 2003.

Getting out of the way back when machine though, what I am interested in the upcoming Square Enix title Infinite Undiscovery which I believe is slated for an Xbox 360 only release in just a week or so.

Again though what I’d really love to see, is a re-make of Chrono Trigger for both Xbox 360 as well as the PS3.

What? That’s right I said it, it had to be said.

If you want some more low-down go catch the “official” IU website over here.

flashback: [ part i, ii, iii ]

For those keeping track of the ongoing saga that is the replacement of the Bunnies and myself Xbox 360 through the Best Buy Product Replacement Plan service.

Due to how Microsoft implemented their DRM as well as data transfer capabilities from an old console to a new one, since the only means for accomplishing this is through the data transfer kit which can only be had (via purchase) one of two ways. One, buying a new (or possibly used) 120GB hard drive or secondly with the purchase of a new Xbox 360 Elite console.

When you purchase a new Xbox 360 Elite console however, you receive the kit in the form of a voucher, which you must mail or fax in and wait.

So I did.

On Monday I faxed in the completed form sometime in the AM.

This past Saturday in the late afternoon I finally received the transfer kit, which consists of a CD/DVD rom and the cable which contains a USB connector on one end and a special connector for the hard drive on the other.

Late last night I made the connections and plugged in the drive, once run I followed a few prompts and then aproximately one and a half hours later, BAM!!!

All data transferred, game saves, pix, downloaded content including movies. (Which I’ve been told it doesn’t do.)

I fell asleep during the transfer and when I woke up this morning I turned on my console with the old drive still attached and looked at it’s contents. Nothing, all data erased.

Detached the old drive, attached the new drive and pow, all data showed up just fine.

All in all the transfer process was simple and there’s very little to remember but that the drive you want to transfer from is attached to the console the new drive to the other end of the DT cable and some wait time.

The overall replacement process for the 360 was thirty plus days which included the Best Buy PRP processing time.

Glad to have our console back up and running and lots of extra space to work with.

Good times.

[flashback: Part I, Part II]

So this past weekend (Saturday) to be exact during another grand day of 99+ degree weather around 2pm in the afternoon I received in the mail a letter from Best Buy Services regarding my PRP.

It was a simple one page letter with a Best Buy gift card attached, the letter had a few paragraphs and a section with the amount $399.99.

Zen baby!

So later that afternoon I braved the one hundred and two degree weather to head on out to a local Best Buy to get my replacement 360.

Before departing I had noticed on the Best Buy website that there were still available at a few of their stores the Xbox360 Elite Holiday Bundle, which they discontinued (sometime during the summer) so it’s now the same price as the normal Xbox 360 Elite ($449.99). However included in the bundle is a copy of Marvel: Ultimate Alliance as well as Forza: Motorsport 2.

On my way to Best Buy I ran into some horrible construction work (doh!) so it took a bit longer than I had anticipated but you know, I still made it (eventually).

When I got to Best Buy I walked towards the video game section in the back and grabbed a new wireless controller (pink) for the Bunny as well as a pink and a black rechargeable battery pack for each new controller. (The Xbox 360 Elite comes with a wireless black controller, but it only comes with two Energizer batteries.)

I asked a “sales associate” if they had any more of the Xbox 360 bundles as shown on their website since I didn’t’ see any in the case. “Actually I think I just saw two this morning, let me check.” The “manager” type wearing the white shirt told me as he went to grab a rolling staircase to climb.

. o O ( WTF!? )

I then looked up on the top of the massive shelving and noticed that all the boxes up there were Xbox consoles… where a treasure trove of Xbox Elites sat, one stacked atop the other. There were a few of the others but it seemed Best Buy was well stocked on Xbox 360 Elites.

After about twenty seconds on top (don’t laugh) the white shirted Best Buy warrior located what I was looking (again no laughing).

As we were walking towards the counter he asked me about the Best Buy PRP plans and if I was interested, I actually cut him off and told him that’s why I was there today and that you’re damn right I’m getting a new one.

At the counter the girl rang me up, I handed her the gift card I had received earlier after which I owed approximately another $200. (+$50 for Elite console, +$50 for Wireless Controller, +$80 for Best Buy PRP, $11 for Wireless Rechargeable Battery Pack (pink) and $15 for Wireless Rechargeable Battery Pack (black).)

After I paid up she bagged my items, then I was outie five thousand.

When I returned home I hooked up the new ‘Box.

First unpacked all the included items:

I plugged in the power cord (A Major!–j/k), plugged in the HDMI cable, set the console down on the packaging box (since I don’t have a media center stand) and then powered up.

After deleting some of the included demos from the new box and configuring the network settings I powered down and detached the included hard drive (which contains one hundred and twenty gigabytes of space and is also black incidentally). I then attached my old twelve GB drive (from my previous console) and then powered back up. I had also inserted my sixty four MB memory stick that contains all of our profiles into one of the front ports as well.

The issue now was that my user profile has to be logged into Xbox Live for any other user to use previously purchased content.

But wait there is a license transfer option that you can use one per twelve months which you can find here. Essentially since all of your purchased content is tied to your console, and not the hard drive if you get a new console your content can’t be accessed offline. This process however gives you the opportunity to transfer from an old console to a new one and not have to deal with those pains, which is especially nice when you have multiple users in a single household and don’t want any mischief possibly taking place regarding your Xbox Live account.

For more detail the Xbox 360 Content License Restoration FAQ can be found here.

There is just one catch.

You must now re-download all of your previously downloaded content for this to work.

=-|]

This would be no big deal if I didn’t have over two GBs of Rock Band downloads as well as another GB of miscellaneous content, and lest we forget that if you are logged into a controller when in Rock Band it’s going to expect your are playing, even if you aren’t so just logging into Xbox Live with your primary account for another user is not a solution.

Booooooo!!! Cat calls….. Booooooo!!!

Perhaps I’ll get to that at some point. [sigh]

[rewind] You might be wondering why I put my old drive on my new system and detached the brand shiny, new, sexy, sleek 120GB drive. Well, because the Elite Console does not come with a transfer kit.

What’s a transfer kit?

The Xbox360 Hard Drive Transfer Kit is a cable which enables users to move data from one hard drive to another. This cable can only be purchased separately or with a 120GB drive upgrade (which runs approximately $180).

Why don’t I just put my new drive back on and re-download all my purchased content and not worry about transferring my previous data?

Because of my saved games, yes saved games all of my saved games would be lost. And Homey don’t play that.

Fortunately Microsoft does currently allow for a free DTK however you must send away for it.

You can find the form here, you will need to know two things prior to submitting the form (which can also be faxed). One, the serial number of your previous console and two the serial number of your new console.

I sent mine in this morning via fax, we’ll soon see how long that takes.

This might all be a moot point if I had a 512MB memory card with which to transfer each of my saves over to what essentially amounts to one chunk at a time or if I was so inclined to attempt it with my 64MB card.

The problem with this scenario is that I’d have to attach my old hard drive, move saves to the memory unit, then detach the old hard drive attach the new hard drive, move the files from the memory unit to the new hard drive then rinse and repeat.

Needless to say that’s just way too much time and effort for me so I’m pretty sure I’ll be waiting for the transfer kit to show up.

On the brighter side of things…

I did spend some time this weekend with the copy of Madden 09 Collectors Edition that I had pre-ordered and look forward to spending more time with it soon. In a word it’s “redicutarded” how good this football game is.

[SideNote: One of the achievements in Madden 09 is titled Steal Their Thunder and has T.O.'s mug as the picture. :rofl:  ]

But back to our “story”.

In the future I won’t have to deal with the same situation I had this time but I now know the following:

• Best Buy PRP: Despite what they tell you don’t buy a hard drive to send back, just keep yours and don’t sweat it or buy another console and transfer right then.
• Best Buy PRP: Don’t ship your return to them any faster then they are going to pay for, it doesn’t make your gift card get to you any faster.
• Best Buy PRP: They have fifteen days (business style) to get your card out to you. [And they'll probably take that long.]
• Best Buy PRP: They’re website will list your status as “PAID” when they issue your gift card, just an fyi.
• Best Buy PRP: It’s worth it.
• Xbox360: They fail a lot. Microsoft’s repair and warranty service is sub-par, get a 3rd party service contract.
• Xbox360: The Elite version is the cat’s meow.
• Xbox360: The license/DRM scheme Microsoft employs in certain circumstances is not user friendly (though no DRM ever is, it’s not designed to be… hence “management”).
• Sony: My television does not appear to support 1080p through HDMI, only through its component connections. [weak]

So I guess overall the experience was a good one, except for being without a console from the 24th of July to the 16th of August. I’ll definitely purchase future PRPs for consoles and such when I purchase them through Best Buy.

Also I’ll keep you all updated on the data transfer situation, since technically I’m not really back up and running like I was previously.

Take care and one love.

- zay

So for those of you you might remember I finally initiated the process to get my Xbox360 replaced on July 23rd of this year. It’s been nearly three weeks and I haven’t heard word one on a status and the Best Buy replacement website doesn’t show anything outside of “working”.

So I finally decided to call and found out the following.

1. They don’t have record of receiving the unit yet.
2. I will be issued a gift card for the original purchase price of $399.99.
3. They have up to fifteen days to issue gift cards for replacement plans.
4. They can go have someone check the warehouse and call me back but it will take three to five business days and that will not make it get in the system any faster.
5. I should just call back this Friday and check on status again.
6. =-|]

So basically no one knows anything, and I have to wait until Friday to see where things are.

The saga continues…