- What does this mean for you and what can you do about it?
Firstly, and most obviously, you cannot connect to Xbox Live on this console any more. This means no more game updates (aka title updates), XBLA games, marketplace content, netflix/sky player and so on. There is no way around this, all online capabilities are now disabled PERMANENTLY.

In all likelihood, your gamertag has NOT BEEN BANNED. When your gamertag gets banned, Microsoft sends you an email detailing why, if you have not recieved this email then your profile should be ok, to a certain extent.

Hard Drive installs are now disabled on the banned console. This means any disk-based games you have will no longer play off of the hard drive. If you attempt to play a game, it will tell you that it was installed on a different 360 and needs to be deleted/installed again. When you delete the game and attempt to install it, you are given a message telling you that it is not supported. There is no way to fix this, that functionality is simply gone from the banned 360.

The hard drive itself is left untouched - you can place it in another 360, even an unbanned one, and it will still work just fine. You do NOT need to reformat it to regain any kind of functionality. Any installed games will need to be reinstalled for the console you want to play them on. This is normal behaviour and happens when swapping HDDs on unbanned/legit 360's.

Windows Media Centre functionality is disabled. It is still possible to stream video/music content via the video library.

Your Gamertag may be corrupted. This does not mean your gamertag has been banned, you can recover it using any live-capable 360, however ANY ACHIVEMENTS YOU HAVE EARNED SINCE BEING BANNED WILL BE LOST. Your gamertag will be corrupted EVERY SINGLE TIME it is used on a banned console. This means you cannot use your banned console to play backups offline just to get achievements - it wont work, the second you put your profile back on a good 360, it will be corrupted and all progress lost. There is no way around this.

The same applies to game saves - if you access a game save on a banned 360, it too will be corrupted when accessed on a legit/unbanned 360! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! There is no way around this, either.

Your XBLA games and DLC will still be valid, however to play them on a different 360 you will need to be signed into Xbox Live. This is normal behaviour on unbanned/legit 360's as well. They may be corrupted and have to be re-downloaded if you attempt to access them on a banned 360. You can transfer all of your downloaded content to a new 360 here: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] however note that you can only do it once every 12 months.

So, in summary:
Your Banned 360:
* Cannot go on Xbox Live
* Cannot install games to the HDD
* Cannot use Windows Media Centre extender
* Cannot be used to get achievements from backups without corrupting your profile

You cannot do anything about this, short of buying a new 360.

There may be more functionality disabled than mentioned here, things are still being discovered.

- So what caused my ban?
There are MANY theories as to what is causing so many consoles to get banned this time, however as of yet there is nothing concrete, just a lot of circumstantial evidence and speculation. Please do not add to this, a full investigation is under-way.

c4eva, the main guy behind iXtreme, had this to say:
<+c4eva> fw itself not detectable
<+c4eva> suspect they are going hard on warez releases and incorrect use of abgx!

He also added the following:
<+c4eva> just to let you know that im looking into the current ban wave. I am currently running several brand new xboxs on live! These xboxs are in various configs. All are running ixtreme 1.61
<+c4eva> One is running original discs, another is running on xbl (no discs) , another is running a backup from my region!
<+c4eva> until tests are completed, no eta on liteon fw!