"Linux" may have been a bad word in Xbox Live, but that shouldn't stop Linux fans from running the OS on their Xbox 360 platforms. New experimental patches have been released to allow people using Linux on their Microsoft console to upgrade to a newer kernel. More details in the full article.

The team of tmbinc, Cpasjuste, stonersmurf and the rest of free60.org, who've been furiously at work porting Linux to Microsoft's Xbox 360 have just made two big releases getting us closer to the dream of having a full-blown Linux distro on our 360.

First, the Free60.org team released X.org drivers for the Xbox 360 hardware called xenosfb. X.org is the implementation of X Window System, the software used by Linux to render graphical user interfaces. This means that once distros incorporate these drivers into themselves, you can run these distros with better graphical compatibility, including higher resolution support.

And the second release is what I just talked about. Cpasjuste has released a Gentoo LiveCD (Full version - 608 MB) with these new drivers built into it. This means that you will be able to run the LiveCD with the GUI and with a lot more compatibility. The livecd uses the xenosfb drivers, plus it includes a powerpc toolchain so that you can compile and build applications on the 360 itself, without having to cross-compile applications on your PC and then transferring them to the 360. The Gentoo LiveCD contains the Gnome Desktop Environment.

Firstly, here's what the Free60.org team had to say about their new drivers:

X.org driver and a new LiveCD No April Fools' Day joke. We have released a preliminary X.org driver and Cpasjuste has built a new LiveCD which makes use of it. Unfortunately, support for Samsung drives and sound drivers are still missing.

The full article awaits after the jump!

In the short time between the first usable exploit for Xbox 360 consoles and today, we've already seen a lot of great achievements by people like tmbinc, Cpasjuste, and others. A few hours ago, a new shader exploit using the King Kong game was announced which will allow people to load XeLL and subsequently, any Linux distro without needing a serial connection with a PC.

This patch will modify the King Kong ISO to include a modified shader which will trigger the exploit. Once triggered, the exploit code will automatically eject the King Kong DVD. Just insert Cpasjuste's modified version of the Gentoo minimal LiveCD. Wait for a few seconds and it should boot right into a minimal Gentoo environment. While its only command line mode for now, you should expect a user-friendly distro like Ubuntu to be released after the necessary patches are applied.

In short, these are the things you will need:

• An Xbox 360 with an older kernel (4532 or 4548). Anything above that will not be affected by the exploit.
• A hacked DVDROM drive in the Xbox 360 so that burnt discs can be run.
• An ISO of the game King Kong (dumped by yourself hopefully, we don't encourage the use of warez)
• An ISO of the Gentoo minimal LiveCD (gentoo-xenon-minimal-2006.1.iso)
• The patcher to patch the King Kong ISO.

All in all, these things will make sure that you have a usable Linux environment on your Xbox 360. Finally, I'd personally like to thank everyone involved in this effort to make it what it is today (Felix "tmbinc" Domke, Cpasjuste, stonersmurf, xorloser and the whole free60.org team), we love you!

Anyways, here's the links for the relevant stuff. If something is considered illegal, it won't be hosted on our servers. Same goes with stuff which is in the grey area concerning its legality. As for the Gentoo ISO, we feel that we should link directly to sourceforge since the ISO will be updated quite frequently.

Download Link: King Kong Shader exploit for XeLL
Download Link: Gentoo Linux Xenon minimal LiveCD (Sourceforge Link. Click on gentoo-xenon-minimal-2006.1.iso on that page to download)
Link: King Kong Shader Exploit for the XELL Loader readme
Link: Gentoo Linux Xenon minimal-2006.1 readme

It seems that the recent Hypervisor hack, and the subsequently released Linux Loader are so good to the point that you can already load Linux distros on your 360. This is because of the great work by Felix Domke who wrote a bunch of drivers for Xbox360 hardware so that Linux could recognize it. And, as early as now, we've been hearing murmurs from the hacking community already.

Stonersmurf, a well respected hacker from xboxhacker.net, recently posted on IRC that he got Ubuntu Linux going on his 360. When asked about hardware compatibility, he pointed out that all hardware except for 3D and sound is working. Then, we hear that Cpasjuste has also successfully booted Ubuntu on his 360. Not only that, he was kind enough to provide instructions for anyone curious and brave enough to try it.

This development means that users could be looking at full fledged Linux distros working on their 360 in the near time. The only thing currently holding back everyone is the fact that you need a 360 with an older kernel version (4532 or 4548) which is a rarity. Until someone can either find a way to downgrade to an older kernel, or find a vulnerability in the new version, you would either have to wait for the new kernel to get hacked or buy an Xbox360 with an older kernel off sites like eBay.

Apart from that though, I can't wait to see where this goes. Comparing this to PS3 Linux (which has been openly supported by Sony), the only difference you have now is that sound drivers haven't been ported yet. If you don't count that, Xbox360 Linux is actually better than PS3 Linux since it's running at a much higher privelege (Hypervisor level), meaning people could fiddle around with stuff and hope to find bugs in the Xbox kernel.

You can head on over to Cpasjuste's tutorial for Ubuntu on Xbox 360 for more info.