Red Ring Of Death Explained?

That's a pretty long explanation I just normally use the word junk.

I would be less accepting of junk in my house and gripe to people about it if Sony had not already conditioned me that junk hardware is worth the trouble of owning if the software is good enough.

I knew the failure rate of the Xbox 360 was above average, but I don't think it's as high as 30% though, eventhough I have 2 friends that have bought one, both having it fail on them. Such a great system, flawed by hardware inconsistencies, it's a shame. (not being sarcastic)Exeed_Orbit

I guess some people got a good one. :D

LOL... in other words, its crap!

ive had my ps3 longer than my 360 and i had 2 send for 2 coffins.

My 360 has is broke from the RROD right now also,but its like a weird kinda RROD.Like it come and goes,so if im playing and then turn it off it gets the red lights sometimes and then i just turn it off for a few hours and it works fine again.And then sometimes it goes away for like a whole month,like as of right now i have not had the red lights in about a month.

I cant send it in for repairs becuz i broke my warrenty and im not spending my money on another one,besides it still works fine now and we should be hearing about a new xbox console in 09.

My 360 has is broke from the RROD right now also,but its like a weird kinda RROD.Like it come and goes,so if im playing and then turn it off it gets the red lights sometimes and then i just turn it off for a few hours and it works fine again.And then sometimes it goes away for like a whole month,like as of right now i have not had the red lights in about a month.

I cant send it in for repairs becuz i broke my warrenty and im not spending my money on another one,besides it still works fine now and we should be hearing about a new xbox console in 09.

MrPostman4Chi

LMAO. my freind had his first RROD the very first second he switched it on LOL. he disconnected everything and tried again and it worked fine afterwards. He was leaking sweat while i was leaking tears of laughter .

You know what's funny, if they launched with their 2006 line-up, had enough time to perfect the hardware and had Halo 3 out in 2007 it would have still been able to beat out the Playstation 3.

They probably could have got Toshiba to supply them with HD-DVD drives, had the hard drive standard and launched with Gears of War, a more complete Perfect Dark Zero and Blue Dragon/Dead or Alive 4 in Japan giving it a boost right off the bat.

It would have also given the original Xbox a chance to finish it's life in a respectable time frame.

Well, no point in dwelling on what could have been. They need to focus on making sure this problem never happens again.

How come my launch system hasn't crapped out on me, or even a single freeze? Am I just lucky? :P

[QUOTE="MrPostman4Chi"]

My 360 has is broke from the RROD right now also,but its like a weird kinda RROD.Like it come and goes,so if im playing and then turn it off it gets the red lights sometimes and then i just turn it off for a few hours and it works fine again.And then sometimes it goes away for like a whole month,like as of right now i have not had the red lights in about a month.

I cant send it in for repairs becuz i broke my warrenty and im not spending my money on another one,besides it still works fine now and we should be hearing about a new xbox console in 09.

mclovin401

LMAO. my freind had his first RROD the very first second he switched it on LOL. he disconnected everything and tried again and it worked fine afterwards. He was leaking sweat while i was leaking tears of laughter .

Same thing happened to me when I first turned my 360 on. Of course the problem was the fact that the cable wasn't plugged into the back of the 360 all the way. I still got the RROD about 15 months later, but ever since I got it fixed in February 2007, it has worked flawlessly.

Well, no point in dwelling on what could have been. They need to focus on making sure this problem never happens again.

I dont think they will fix the problem. i DEF know most of the first gen consoles were decent. i think theres 6 or 7 million consoles what were sold with major defects, not completely sure though. I do know this though, the ups near my house admits to getting around 20 xboxs a DAY!!!

A week before Microsoft and Bungie split up, Jake Metcalf was the first one to report it. Today, he interviewed an unnamed Microsoft insider who revealed the secret behind the famous Xbox 360 Red Ring Of Death.

The unnamed insider confirmed that Xbox 360 failure rate is around 30% and explained that Xbox 360 "Life expectancy is all over the map because the design has very little margin for most of the important parameters. That means it's not a fault tolerant design. So a good unit may last a couple of years, while a bad unit can fail in hours."

The "source" then went into self-bashing mode: "MS was so focused on beating Sony this cycle that the 360 was rushed to market when all indications were that it had serious flaws. The design qual testing was insufficient and incomplete when the product was released to production. The manufacturing test equipment had major gaps in test coverage and wasn't reliable or repeatable. Manufacturing processes at eall levels of suppliers were immature and not in control. Initial end to end yields were in the mid 30%. Low yields always indicate serious design and manufacturing defects. Management chose to continue to ship anyways, and keep the lines running while trying to solve problems and bring the yields up. Whenever something failed and there was a question about whether the test result was false, they would remove that test, retest and ship, or see if the unit would boot a game and run briefly and then ship. 360 is too complex of a machine to get away with that."

He also explained the hardware reasons behind RROD :
"RROD is caused by anything that fails in the "digital backbone" on the mother board. Also known as acore digital error. CPU, GPU, memory, etc. Bad parts, incompatible parts (timing problems) bad manufacturing process (like solder joints), misapplied heat sinks or thermal interface material, missing parts, broken parts, parts of the wrong value, missed test coverage. Any one or more, on any chip, or many other discrete components, would cause this. And many of the failures were obviously infant mortality, where they work when they leave the factory and fail early in use. The main design flaw was the excessive heat on the GPU warping the mother board around it. This would stress the solder joints on the GPU and any bad joints would then fail in early life."http://www.megagames.com/news/html/console/microsoftinsiderexplainsrrod.shtml for those who are curious.Exeed_Orbit

Most of the problems seem to stem from heat in the console. after the extended warranty is up, anybody that builds pc's could open the x360 up and fix the problem themselves for around $5-10. Once my warranty is up, i'll just replace the Heatsinks and re-do the thermal paste.7thSIN

Fix it 3 years into the consoles life? Why even bother, there will be an XBox 720 out by then.

That's what happens when you don't do thorough testing on the hardware. I'm sure M$ won't make this same mistake in their next system. Still, I'm sure M$ is doing full testing now and by the time the upgrade system with the new cooler GPU cheap comes out in Sept 08, all those issues should be fixed. Hopefully my system will last until the end of the year. blackace

Hopefully, hopefully, hopefully. All these announcements of "fixes" do is placate 360 owners. They aren't going to make any significant fixes. The big deal Falcon chip didn't help anything. I wouldn't hold out hope, just keep your warranty info handy.

You know what's funny, if they launched with their 2006 line-up, had enough time to perfect the hardware and had Halo 3 out in 2007 it would have still been able to beat out the Playstation 3.

They probably could have got Toshiba to supply them with HD-DVD drives, had the hard drive standard and launched with Gears of War, a more complete Perfect Dark Zero and Blue Dragon/Dead or Alive 4 in Japan giving it a boost right off the bat.

It would have also given the original Xbox a chance to finish it's life in a respectable time frame.

Well, no point in dwelling on what could have been. They need to focus on making sure this problem never happens again.

BreakingPoint8

Lawl. If they didn't launch when they did, they wouldn't have had a hope in hell of competing. That's why they rushed it out, which is pretty much the entire point of this thread.

The Xbox brand was a stinker after the first console ended with Gamecube numbers, the year they had between launches gave them time to establish the Xbox name by being the first shiny new HD console on the block. A lot of people bought 360's as placeholders until the PS3 came along, then decided they really liked it. The PS3's weak launch lineup didn't help.

[QUOTE="BreakingPoint8"]

You know what's funny, if they launched with their 2006 line-up, had enough time to perfect the hardware and had Halo 3 out in 2007 it would have still been able to beat out the Playstation 3.

They probably could have got Toshiba to supply them with HD-DVD drives, had the hard drive standard and launched with Gears of War, a more complete Perfect Dark Zero and Blue Dragon/Dead or Alive 4 in Japan giving it a boost right off the bat.

It would have also given the original Xbox a chance to finish it's life in a respectable time frame.

Well, no point in dwelling on what could have been. They need to focus on making sure this problem never happens again.

excelR83

Lawl. If they didn't launch when they did, they wouldn't have had a hope in hell of competing. That's why they rushed it out, which is pretty much the entire point of this thread.

The Xbox brand was a stinker after the first console ended with Gamecube numbers, the year they had between launches gave them time to establish the Xbox name by being the first shiny new HD console on the block. A lot of people bought 360's as placeholders until the PS3 came along, then decided they really liked it. The PS3's weak launch lineup didn't help.

VERY KNOWLEDGABLE.........completely agree

The biggest problem was the solder holding the graphics chips on the motherboard. It just was not strong enough. It kept melting. So the new mobo's have got stronger solder and the mobo gets replaced when you send it for repair.lazerluke

The biggest problem was the solder holding the graphics chips on the motherboard. It just was not strong enough. It kept melting. So the new mobo's have got stronger solder and the mobo gets replaced when you send it for repair.lazerluke

Lawl. If they didn't launch when they did, they wouldn't have had a hope in hell of competing. That's why they rushed it out, which is pretty much the entire point of this thread.

The Xbox brand was a stinker after the first console ended with Gamecube numbers, the year they had between launches gave them time to establish the Xbox name by being the first shiny new HD console on the block. A lot of people bought 360's as placeholders until the PS3 came along, then decided they really liked it. The PS3's weak launch lineup didn't help.

excelR83

This is most certainly made up... 30% failure means that of the 9,000,000 consoles sold... 3,000,000 of them have died from a RROD... that is such a lie... that's 1 in 3... that is borderline fraud which is illegal and I doubt that the richest and most powerful corporation on Earth would be doing illegal under the table things to make money when it already has more money than god...

I knew the failure rate of the Xbox 360 was above average, but I don't think it's as high as 30% though, eventhough I have 2 friends that have bought one, both having it fail on them. Such a great system, flawed by hardware inconsistencies, it's a shame. (not being sarcastic)Exeed_Orbit

Preatty much every Xbox 360 owner I know (7+ people) have gotten atleast one broken unit. One guy is on his 5th console...

[QUOTE="excelR83"][QUOTE="BreakingPoint8"]

You know what's funny, if they launched with their 2006 line-up, had enough time to perfect the hardware and had Halo 3 out in 2007 it would have still been able to beat out the Playstation 3.

They probably could have got Toshiba to supply them with HD-DVD drives, had the hard drive standard and launched with Gears of War, a more complete Perfect Dark Zero and Blue Dragon/Dead or Alive 4 in Japan giving it a boost right off the bat.

It would have also given the original Xbox a chance to finish it's life in a respectable time frame.

Well, no point in dwelling on what could have been. They need to focus on making sure this problem never happens again.

mclovin401

Lawl. If they didn't launch when they did, they wouldn't have had a hope in hell of competing. That's why they rushed it out, which is pretty much the entire point of this thread.

The Xbox brand was a stinker after the first console ended with Gamecube numbers, the year they had between launches gave them time to establish the Xbox name by being the first shiny new HD console on the block. A lot of people bought 360's as placeholders until the PS3 came along, then decided they really liked it. The PS3's weak launch lineup didn't help.

VERY KNOWLEDGABLE.........completely agree

I was one of those who bought a 360 and left sony.Once I saw gears at E3 I didn't care 4 PS. Also it has been shown that the Ps3 is not very far ahead in Hardware in fact the only diffrence is that because of the 7900 gpu the ps3 can load a little more. But for most games the 360 has better color.

This is most certainly made up... 30% failure means that of the 9,000,000 consoles sold... 3,000,000 of them have died from a RROD... that is such a lie... that's 1 in 3... that is borderline fraud which is illegal and I doubt that the richest and most powerful corporation on Earth would be doing illegal under the table things to make money when it already has more money than god...

Squeets

Good thing they covered it with a 3 year warrantyHeil68

[QUOTE="Heil68"]Good thing they covered it with a 3 year warrantymusicalmac

This is most certainly made up... 30% failure means that of the 9,000,000 consoles sold... 3,000,000 of them have died from a RROD... that is such a lie... that's 1 in 3... that is borderline fraud which is illegal and I doubt that the richest and most powerful corporation on Earth would be doing illegal under the table things to make money when it already has more money than god...

Squeets

that's 30% at launch. So the numbers (hopefully) aren't quite as bad as this predicts. However, theres are probably close to 20 million systems sold. That means about 6 million defective units. To me, this is unacceptable as a consumer.

I agree that they have lots of money, but Bill Gates is known for his russian egg collection and his huge amounts of charitable donations. I don't agree that this is close to fraud. The system does what it's supposed to do. It just doesn't do it very long before breaking down.

The 3 years warranty will run out right around the time that the new console is released. It was basically them putting a bandaid on the product until they get the next one ready for release. Then they stop repairs and all these dead consoles push gamers to purchase the newest version (probably with horrible BC) because they'll have to dole out at least half the price anyway to get their old system repaired/replaced. It's sleezy. It's horrible. It's underhanded. It's shady. It doesn't break any laws.

It's in no way illegal, but it is incredibly disrespectful to the public and in most cases the backlash more than erases any gains made.

one reason why i hate my 360.

but i love it.:oops:

but i hate it.:x

[QUOTE="Squeets"]

This is most certainly made up... 30% failure means that of the 9,000,000 consoles sold... 3,000,000 of them have died from a RROD... that is such a lie... that's 1 in 3... that is borderline fraud which is illegal and I doubt that the richest and most powerful corporation on Earth would be doing illegal under the table things to make money when it already has more money than god...

effthat

that's 30% at launch. So the numbers (hopefully) aren't quite as bad as this predicts. However, theres are probably close to 20 million systems sold. That means about 6 million defective units. To me, this is unacceptable as a consumer.

I agree that they have lots of money, but Bill Gates is known for his russian egg collection and his huge amounts of charitable donations. I don't agree that this is close to fraud. The system does what it's supposed to do. It just doesn't do it very long before breaking down.

The 3 years warranty will run out right around the time that the new console is released. It was basically them putting a bandaid on the product until they get the next one ready for release. Then they stop repairs and all these dead consoles push gamers to purchase the newest version (probably with horrible BC) because they'll have to dole out at least half the price anyway to get their old system repaired/replaced. It's sleezy. It's horrible. It's underhanded. It's shady. It doesn't break any laws.

It's in no way illegal, but it is incredibly disrespectful to the public and in most cases the backlash more than erases any gains made.

In the United States of America... selling something that is supposed to do something and it doesn't work is a crime called Fraud and it is illegal here...

rrod=trying to beat sony, cheap, profit over consumer happiness

[QUOTE="effthat"][QUOTE="Squeets"]

This is most certainly made up... 30% failure means that of the 9,000,000 consoles sold... 3,000,000 of them have died from a RROD... that is such a lie... that's 1 in 3... that is borderline fraud which is illegal and I doubt that the richest and most powerful corporation on Earth would be doing illegal under the table things to make money when it already has more money than god...

Squeets

that's 30% at launch. So the numbers (hopefully) aren't quite as bad as this predicts. However, theres are probably close to 20 million systems sold. That means about 6 million defective units. To me, this is unacceptable as a consumer.

I agree that they have lots of money, but Bill Gates is known for his russian egg collection and his huge amounts of charitable donations. I don't agree that this is close to fraud. The system does what it's supposed to do. It just doesn't do it very long before breaking down.

The 3 years warranty will run out right around the time that the new console is released. It was basically them putting a bandaid on the product until they get the next one ready for release. Then they stop repairs and all these dead consoles push gamers to purchase the newest version (probably with horrible BC) because they'll have to dole out at least half the price anyway to get their old system repaired/replaced. It's sleezy. It's horrible. It's underhanded. It's shady. It doesn't break any laws.

It's in no way illegal, but it is incredibly disrespectful to the public and in most cases the backlash more than erases any gains made.

In the United States of America... selling something that is supposed to do something and it doesn't work is a crime called Fraud and it is illegal here...

I live in the USA. I'm voting age. I've taken biz law. There isn't any fraud here.

They are selling a system that runs software designed for the system. In the event that there is a manufacturing defect, they will make sure that the unit works up until a specified time at which the unit is expected to not be in it's original working order. It's what they claim to sell and it's all they claim to sell.

The American public have the right to buy horribly designed products whenever they'd like. They can also buy defective products if they'd like. It isn't the producers job to create a system that will last until the next ice age and they don't claim to do so. They claim that their system will function how it was designed to function. Play 360 games, put a siphon on your checking account for online, and eventually wear out.

A warranty is designed to cover manufacturing defects. It's designed to end when the intended use of the product causes failure. Microsoft has accepted that manufacturing defects will be seen up to three years after initial usage. It's an open admission that their product is poorly designed and manufactured poorly and these poor practices can be the direct cause of failure up to 3 years after purchase.

They have no reason to support the system any longer than this because they will have a new system and the last thing they want is to support their old tech wen they want to sell their new tech.

Long story short. There is no fraud.

one reason why i hate my 360.

but i love it.:oops:

but i hate it.:x

mr_w25

lol atleast when you're 360 is gone to get fixed you can look at the awesome game cases, marvel at the beauty of the case :o

[QUOTE="MrPostman4Chi"]

My 360 has is broke from the RROD right now also,but its like a weird kinda RROD.Like it come and goes,so if im playing and then turn it off it gets the red lights sometimes and then i just turn it off for a few hours and it works fine again.And then sometimes it goes away for like a whole month,like as of right now i have not had the red lights in about a month.

I cant send it in for repairs becuz i broke my warrenty and im not spending my money on another one,besides it still works fine now and we should be hearing about a new xbox console in 09.

mclovin401

LMAO. my freind had his first RROD the very first second he switched it on LOL. he disconnected everything and tried again and it worked fine afterwards. He was leaking sweat while i was leaking tears of laughter .

i've had a disc read error on my first one (no RROD) and exchanged it at best buy for a new one. no problems. i guess its just a lottery.

[QUOTE="mr_w25"]

one reason why i hate my 360.

but i love it.:oops:

but i hate it.:x

Swift_Boss_A

lol atleast when you're 360 is gone to get fixed you can look at the awesome game cases, marvel at the beauty of the case :o

yea plus i have a ps3 too play also :D