Microsoft owns up to Xbox 360 failures

This week, Microsoft admitted that the large failure rates for Xbox 360 consoles was indeed an issue and then said they would extend the warranty period for any and all consumers that have experienced hardware failure with their console.

Recent reports showed that as many as 30% of 360 consoles experienced the infamous "three red lights of death" and Microsoft is now taking full responsibility for the issues.

Those that have experienced the red lights will have their warranty extended to three years from the date of purchase and if you have ever paid for out-of-warranty repairs, then you will be reimbursed, including shipping charges.

According to analysts, the move will set Microsoft back over $1 billion dollars USD for the second quarter of their fiscal year.

"This problem has caused frustration for some of our customers and for that, we sincerely apologize," Microsoft's entertainment chief Robbie Bach said. "We value our community tremendously and look at this as an investment in our customer base."

So far, the move has been applauded and I agree that is a very good step in the right direction.

"That's a good move for them and it's an important step to take. It's nice to see a company owning up to issues and taking responsibility for them although at this cost it's certainly painful, even for Microsoft," JupiterResearch analyst Michael Gartenberg said.

Source:
BetaNews

Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 5 Jul 2007 14:30

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77 comments

ZippyDSM

ZOMG the truth!

5.7.2007 14:33 #1

mikeh0303

possibly the first nice thing Microsoft has ever done, now I want them to admit how bad Vista really is!

5.7.2007 14:44 #2

thegrunt

Originally posted by mikeh0303:possibly the first nice thing Microsoft has ever done, now I want them to admit how bad Vista really is!
Now this crap again,even when it has nothing to do with Vista someone still has to say something...

5.7.2007 14:46 #3

DrKePhRiM

That makes me worry alot less about my warranty If I ever get the rings of death. Thanks MS!

5.7.2007 14:46 #4

samshizze

How the hell did they manage almost 1/3 of their units crapping out? Thats pretty pathetic.

5.7.2007 14:52 #5

ZippyDSM

Originally posted by samshizze:How the hell did they manage almost 1/3 of their units crapping out? Thats pretty pathetic.the design spec is to high for low quality factories to do right,so MS wound up with with a high number of failing units,at this is the stew of rumors I belive.

5.7.2007 14:58 #6

DoomLight

DAMN straight they better extend this warranty. i was about to pay the 25 dollars for another. but thank god. i didn't. no need for me to get the elite now. i'll wait for the new chip set systems to come out.

its just too bad it couldn't be built better. i liken the 360 to GM card. they break like crazy always needing to be warrantied.

after all the controversy its about time they admitted the failure rate was a little super high.

the next question is. does this extention cover launch systems? cause in theory. the launch systems just got another year and change added to the base warranty.

5.7.2007 15:09 #7

thegrunt

It covers ALL 360's :D

5.7.2007 15:20 #8

caliph

yeah the warranty covers systems since launch day. So if your system in November 2005, then warranty is gonna expire november 2008 for u.

5.7.2007 15:20 #9

ZippyDSM

Originally posted by caliph:yeah the warranty covers systems since launch day. So if your system in November 2005, then warranty is gonna expire november 2008 for u.also if you have your system replaced that system gets a new warranty dose it not?

FIGHT THE M.A.F.I.A.A.

5.7.2007 15:27 #10

john_jaxs

Great move, Sony would never admit fault like this.

Vote Ron Paul 2008, A True Patriot, A True Conservative, And A True American.

5.7.2007 15:52 #11

hughjars

Credit to them, everybody gets a 3yr warranty. Good one.

That's also a very nice 'raising of the bar' and hopefully all the other CE companies will have to live up to this standard too.
Why not?

I can honestly see no serious reason why they all shouldn't be backing their products for at least 3yrs
(or even more....why should an expensive piece of a/v kit be expected to go pop after just 3 yrs anyways?)

I always thought the American 30 or 90 days was appallingly small, we at least in the UK usually get at least 1yr and 2 or 3 is not unknown.....although the 'extended warranty' business is IMO little more than an organised and grossly over-priced racket.

Anyhoo,
credit to them too for publicly admitting this instead of just quietly doing it, it's just a pity it took a while to happen but this is a nice example of a massive company responding to consumer pressure & demonstrating some decent customer care.

5.7.2007 16:00 #12

mikeh0303

Quote:Originally posted by mikeh0303:possibly the first nice thing Microsoft has ever done, now I want them to admit how bad Vista really is!
Now this crap again,even when it has nothing to do with Vista someone still has to say something...vista has been the biggest pain for me so i just had to add it

5.7.2007 16:29 #13

JorDogg

Originally posted by john_jaxs:Great move, Sony would never admit fault like this.of course they wouldnt, their systems dont crap out like M$

5.7.2007 16:33 #14

ZippyDSM

Quote:Originally posted by john_jaxs:Great move, Sony would never admit fault like this.of course they wouldnt, their systems dont crap out like M$
---------------------------------------------
the DREs of the old PS2s and bad lens in the slim line says you are wrong,while not a huge scale in comparison it was a lot of systems non the less.

5.7.2007 16:37 #15

JorDogg

Quote:[quote]Originally posted by john_jaxs:Great move, Sony would never admit fault like this.of course they wouldnt, their systems dont crap out like M$
---------------------------------------------
the DREs of the old PS2s and bad lens in the slim line says you are wrong,while not a huge scale in comparison it was a lot of systems non the less.[/quote]>>

all systems will have faults, but not to the point of 30% of their consols, thats just crazy! if sony ever did that im sure they would admit fault...... haha maybe!

5.7.2007 16:39 #16

Andrew691

Bit late but good to see them finally admit they messed up. Even better that they re actually reimbursing the money people have had to pay to get their system fixed.
But the fact is that it shouldnt really have got this bad in the first place, after the first batch started dieing maybe they should have completely redesigned the system then and maybe they would keep a little bit of credibility.
I would actually like to see what the PS2 failure % was, to compare the two. 4-6% failure is standard when it comes to things like this 30% is insanely high, PS3's failure rate is less than 2%.

"Windows is a 32-bit extension to a 16-bit graphical shell for an 8-bit operating system originally coded for a 4-bit microprocessor by a 2-bit company that can't stand 1 bit of competition."

5.7.2007 17:01 #17

Sickley

wonder if this has anything to do with a recent problem with some (i dont remember which) racing game that was repotedly shattering on the inside the of system for many consumers

everyone who owns a 360 knows that the optical drives are utter crap!

5.7.2007 17:18 #18

error5

Originally posted by Sickley:wonder if this has anything to do with a recent problem with some (i dont remember which) racing game that was repotedly shattering on the inside the of system for many consumers

everyone who owns a 360 knows that the optical drives are utter crap!Forza 2 Bricking Xbox 360s?

http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/801/801486p1.html

Microsoft denies these allegations:

http://forzamotorsport.net/news/pitpassreports/pitpass52.htm

I myself have experienced the graphics glitches mentioned in the original thread in the Forza2 boards - so much so that I cannot advance beyond a certain race in career mode. I've stopped playing the game altogether. Other games run glitch-free.

5.7.2007 17:46 #19

borhan9

Quote:Recent reports showed that as many as 30% of 360 consoles experienced the infamous "three red lights of death" and Microsoft is now taking full responsibility for the issues.About time they took responsibility for it. It's good to see they are making the adjustments for the consumers,

5.7.2007 17:50 #20

bobino

my ps3 is currently out of commission for absolutely no reason..just stopped workin and i barely use it

5.7.2007 18:02 #21

Iguana775

That's great and all but are they going to actually fix the problems or just repair them when they break? It's one thing to say you messed up but how are they going to make it so they 360 doesnt break anymore?

5.7.2007 18:16 #22

spydah

Its about damn time. This is the first step at getting better. Lets all walk MS down the road of shame for selling us such crappy hardware and waiting damn near 3 years to own what they made. "sarcasm"

5.7.2007 20:06 #23

jimmer

1 billion dollers..

thats like pocket change for microsoft

5.7.2007 21:20 #24

faqman98

Quote:the design spec is to high for low quality factories to do right,so MS wound up with with a high number of failing units,at this is the stew of rumors I belive.
that is why you only outsource brand name sportsware [cough]nike[cough] to slavery and not hight end electronics

5.7.2007 22:24 #25

Joshewah

Originally posted by DoomLight: i'll wait for the new chip set systems to come out.
Has there been any word on when those 65nm processors will be implemented?

5.7.2007 23:43 #26

Riotard

Originally posted by DrKePhRiM:That makes me worry alot less about my warranty If I ever get the rings of death. Thanks MS!Dude read it carefully,the extended warrenty is for ppl how have had the ring of death not for th eppl who managed not to get it in their first year. I'm still uber nervous playing mine,(mine was a launch one) but it seems to do well when friends coem over and we play GoW for the whole night. This is now ppl mention this ring of death i remember the first thing that happend when i turned my 360 on, was a i got 3 red flashing things. I managed to sort the problem out because the cable in the back wasn't connected properly lol. Strange huh?

6.7.2007 01:57 #27

NexGen76

LOL...Good to see they admitted but who is surprise they admitted that there was a problem hell Microsoft try to hide this a few month back by making there warranty's a full year.Microsoft didn't do that for the hell of it they knew the 360 had major issue's then dodge alot of reports about these issue's.You guy can buy that crap all you want but they admitted because of the pressure & they couldn't hide it anymore.On top of that they are losing money to which is a major set back for them.

http://videogames.yahoo.com/news-521686

6.7.2007 03:14 #28

hughjars

Originally posted by Joshewah:Has there been any word on when those 65nm processors will be implemented? - They are expected this fall/autumn.

With the cooler running 65nm CPU & GPU and those much more effective heat-sinks I can't help thinking that there's plenty of room for a decent little clock-speed tweak in the coming mk2 version.

That's a nice set of cards they're holding, they can match (or better) any reduction Sony might make, they have the newer 65nm technology coming first and they have now set a much improved standard for the warranty.
Interesting.

The PS3 is supposed to be getting a $100 price drop soon but I don't see it as being anything like enough.
Too little too late?

.....and the PS3 is also now gathering stories of games being canned for it, that's the kind of thing that is 'kiss of death' stuff for a console.
Sony can release as many in-house exclusives as they like but it's all looking more than a bit suspect to me.

6.7.2007 03:25 #29

NexGen76

Originally posted by hughjars:The PS3 is supposed to be getting a $100 price drop soon but I don't see it as being anything like enough.
Too little too late?480 dollars 360 elite or 500 PS3 you tell me which is by far the better buy if this is true it will Boost sales PS3 sales most people are looking for at least 100 dollars off nothing less.

6.7.2007 03:50 #30

ZippyDSM

Quote:Originally posted by hughjars:The PS3 is supposed to be getting a $100 price drop soon but I don't see it as being anything like enough.
Too little too late?480 dollars 360 elite or 500 PS3 you tell me which is by far the better buy if this is true it will Boost sales PS3 sales most people are looking for at least 100 dollars off nothing less.the price games with the elite is rather silly, they could jsut be waiting for sony to drop thier price then have then round thieres down
core:199
Premium: 299
Elite: 399

6.7.2007 04:36 #31

spydah

The reports on that I seen and was told by the Local games stores were i am and is the price cut will be in the range of $400 - $500. So i say maybe $450 to call it safe. They will never go lower then that at this point in the game. But I will welcome that cut.

6.7.2007 04:44 #32

ZippyDSM

Originally posted by spydah:The reports on that I seen and was told by the Local games stores were i am and is the price cut will be in the range of $400 - $500. So i say maybe $450 to call it safe. They will never go lower then that at this point in the game. But I will welcome that cut.450 would be nice,the ps3 needs a smaller price to sale without it only geeks and fanboys will be interested in it.

Sony clearly fck up the PS3 if they launched it at 450,it would have made up for so much.....

6.7.2007 04:57 #33

killalot

What about all those people that have taken the back off and put better fans in with the hope of keeping the buggy cooler after all the reports they have read about the shite�s over heating and there warranty as expired will Microsoft see that as you modding you Xbox ? Will they repair these if they fail?

6.7.2007 06:23 #34

SProdigy

Yeah, adding a longer warranty is needed and I do hope others follow suit. I had a DVD Home Theatre all-in-one setup that cost $300 die after 4 months, only to find out the warranty was 90 days. I created my own warranty by buying a new one and returning the defective one in the new box, under the store's return policy. However, so many consumer electronics advertise the serial number more now than ever, making it more difficult for the consumer to not get screwed over as the end result.

6.7.2007 06:24 #35

hughjars

Does anyone seriously think that any price move made by Sony will not be instantly matched by Microsoft making the same (or even slightly greater) move with the XBox 360?

In the UK we already have reports of the present premium coming down on the Game retailers site from around �280 to �220 - and that was news from a couple of weeks ago supposedly in anticipation of a Euro version of the 'Elite' coming,
ie long before any Sony move (the PS3 in the UK costs around �400 now).

I seriously doubt a �50/$100 reduction (which they are now denying btw) will make any real difference whatsoever.

Not only would I expect any Sony move to be matched but when the 65nm mk2 version of the XBox 360 launches in a couple of months I'd expect another little price goody there too, just to emphasis the cost advantages.

6.7.2007 06:43 #36

emugamer

It's got to be higher than a 30% return rate. They don't factor in the modding community in their numbers. People with modded firmware, cases and fans etc. cannot return theirs. Some people may have had to buy a new system because their original modded onew died. So in their new one, they installed custom cooling. Who knows how many people ended up doing this.

I'm making my choice next Spring. MS should have their act together. But I'm not just buying their console. I have to make a choice between the PS3 and 360, and quality of the hardware is just one of the factors I'm considering seriously.

The Sony PS2 return rate is also definitely higher, maybe not as high as 30%, but I would guess above 5%. Especially since that console was modded to death, and it was cheap enough to replace.

6.7.2007 08:11 #37

hughjars

Originally posted by emugamer:It's got to be higher than a 30% return rate. - Well, we can all play guessing games but that doesn't necessarily make it so.

But at the heart of this it hasn't "got" to be anything except what it is
(and I doubt anyone will be rushing forward with a specific number......certainly one of the other big console producers - 'you-know-who' - just denied all their disc read error problems and never reacted to consumer pressure like this)

I don't think anyone has provided a reputable figure
(IIRC the original 30% claim came from "a former EB Games employee"......not exactly what you'd call scientific or proof of anything).

6.7.2007 11:41 #38

emugamer

Well, I guess I agree that we probably won't know what it actually is, since most likely nobody will come forward with an official study. But admitting to and accepting 30% gives me the idea that MS knows it's close to that, and denying it would cause outrage among the gaming community. The EB games employee may have actually taken inventory of his/her store returns. When that number was released to the media, MS may have known it to be higher, yet stopped anybody else from taking actual inventory and announcing their return rate by owning up to it.

My point is that whatever the true number is (obtained from actual statistics that may never be made public by MS), it has got to be higher than that, because modded bricks are not factored into the equation.

6.7.2007 12:20 #39

NexGen76

499 price tag & 5 free Blu-ray movies make it a even more better deal now i will buy my second PS3 next weekend.

6.7.2007 14:19 #40

DXR88

Microsoft released there consol in a rush effort these is to be expected by such. But one must also realize that microsoft Never indevored into hardware. as such there Software is there namesake

6.7.2007 14:44 #41

fgamer

I think Microsoft just payed too much attention to how they can make the 360 much more slimmer and sleek, because as we all know the first Xbox was known as being a big bulky heavy box. They should've paid more attention to better cooling solutions in the system besides how much technology we can squeeze in a nice little slim sleek case (some of that high technology runs HOT). Notice the PS3 is pretty big and heavy because it's got adequate cooling with a HUGE heatsink. All in all this is great news for us Xbox 360 owners...finally the nay sayers who said this was a minor problem that only affected people who abused their systems ETC. can shut up!

6.7.2007 15:26 #42

scorpNZ

The best bet when buying any product from new is make it slave through out the warranty period as hardware failure is luck of the draw tho ms should've had a minimum 3 year warranty from the out set,quite frankly any product that would be expected to last a good while,i.e tv's,consoles,washing machines etc should have a decent warranty to reflect that companies confidence in that product and none of us should have to purchase any xtra warranty just because the manufacturer only gives a pathetic 1 year rtb

6.7.2007 15:43 #43

eLeCTR0n

I wonder when it'll own up to Windows failures.

6.7.2007 15:50 #44

fitzm

I want my $50 back for the 3 yr warranty I bought from Best Buy.

6.7.2007 15:52 #45

thegrunt

Originally posted by fitzm:I want my $50 back for the 3 yr warranty I bought from Best Buy.
You can get youre money back for a warranty as long as it has not expired yet,do you have a reciet???

6.7.2007 16:18 #46

fitzm

Prorated only right? I can't see them giving me the whole thing back, no?

6.7.2007 16:31 #47

ChiknLitl

Quote:Originally posted by DrKePhRiM:That makes me worry alot less about my warranty If I ever get the rings of death. Thanks MS!Dude read it carefully,the extended warrenty is for ppl how have had the ring of death not for th eppl who managed not to get it in their first year. I'm still uber nervous playing mine,(mine was a launch one) but it seems to do well when friends coem over and we play GoW for the whole night. This is now ppl mention this ring of death i remember the first thing that happend when i turned my 360 on, was a i got 3 red flashing things. I managed to sort the problem out because the cable in the back wasn't connected properly lol. Strange huh?This warranty covers new and previous owners for three years from the date of purchase, specifically in the event of general hardware failures indicated by the rings of death.

6.7.2007 17:57 #48

emugamer

Originally posted by DXR88:But one must also realize that microsoft Never indevored into hardware. as such there Software is there namesakeTheir software has just as many holes.

6.7.2007 18:07 #49

thegrunt

Originally posted by fitzm:Prorated only right? I can't see them giving me the whole thing back, no?
Not to sure but its worth a shot to try

6.7.2007 18:09 #50

DXR88

SO euro you saying my Triple core Cpus got wholes in it. think about it you can fix a rushed software product with paches but you cant do so with hardware Xbox360 is failing becuase of the hardware flaws Not the software ones the still release patches for the dash bord however.

6.7.2007 18:12 #51

fonzbear

i bought my 360 used-am i fucked if anything goes wrong with it?

6.7.2007 18:52 #52

thegrunt

No as long as they didnt register the console you should be fine

6.7.2007 19:02 #53

plazma247

hehe, it sounds to me that have tried meet the consumer half way, but is that far ENOUGH!

If they have agreed its a deisgn fault that only affects a small number of users is wrong, i can see that 30% rate increasing with time.

How is people are having like 3 - 4 faulty one in a row, wheres the odds in that.

In the UK they have extended the warwanty to THREE YEARS, but is anyone prepaired to keep on phoning microsoft of replacements for the next 3 years?

Instead of just offering a longer warwanty period for something that has such a high probability of going wrong, wouldnt it just make better sense to only offer 1 YEAR WARWANTY but instead fixing them ALL PROPERLY instead of just carry on swapping them out for the next two consecuative years.

Or is it something that microsoft knows that the rest of us dont, if its cheeper for them to offer 3 year warwanty instead of just a overall recall and re-fit all of them.

30% over 3 years is the same numbers as 90% in one year, which strangely doesn add up to 100%. A recall would require 100%, its close to but still more cost effective than a recall by 10%

If current public opinion has anything to do with it; 3 years warwanty isnt going to cut it people; just want boxes that work instead of having the ability to get it swapped over and over again.

Watch this space... if you ask me they still cant have a proper fix for it and maybe they cant, hence why its easier to to keep on swapping them out, last thing you want to do at this stage is to have to re-design the thing agin.

If i was mr Sony at this point i think i would be falling off my chair laughing, alas im not but he must currently be a very happy man.

7.7.2007 02:11 #54

pmshah

I am not a gamer but an engineer by profession. The first thing we learn is you DESIGN the quality into the product. If you do it right any decent manufacturing process will turn out quality product. You end up with a hell of a lot less disgruntled customers & save yourself a lot of heart burn.

What is happening with xBox is worse than Windows Vista. In an OS you are dealing with a jillion different combinations of motherboard, chisets, cpu, memory & addon cards. One reason why Apple have been so good with Macs & their OS is the entire hardware is under their total control. They can ensure perfect compatibility. You will hardly ever see any addons for them.

Why should there be a single failure whatsoever? Was this another one of Balmer's brainstorms to cut costs by outsourcing to a not so "hot" vendor & allow xBox to run hot? One really wonders what their priorities really are.

Perhaps they should move their test labs to non air conditioned warehouses in Las Vegas in summer.

7.7.2007 06:21 #55

compu795

why is everyone so upset? i have been into computers since 1985 and every piece of software that microsoft comes out with has bugs in it. microsoft, as well as most other software developers, always send out their software without as much testing as is needed. they, meaning the developers, dont make any money unless the product is on the market. i am not defending microsoft or any other developer, its just a known fact that any new software is not and in reality cannot be tested for every scenario that may happen. the thing i have a problem with is when the developer does not stand by their product and have some kind of customer service. i bought a program called "locomania" a train simulator and it will not run and there is no customer support. the solution is to wait at least 6 to 8 months for the bugs to be fixed, then buy it.

7.7.2007 06:49 #56

hughjars

A 3 year warranty is never a bad thing.

It's just funny watching people try to spin this as if it was.

The really interesting thing will be watching to see if the rest even try to match this level of support for their products & their customers.

Some people already do operate nice long warranties (Seagate for instance or Mitsubishi).

This should be supported as something which should be the norm, not something to argue against.

7.7.2007 07:39 #57

plazma247

Originally posted by hughjars:A 3 year warranty is never a bad thing.

It's just funny watching people try to spin this as if it was.

The really interesting thing will be watching to see if the rest even try to match this level of support for their products & their customers.

Some people already do operate nice long warranties (Seagate for instance or Mitsubishi).

This should be supported as something which should be the norm, not something to argue against.The big diffirence there is the fact seagate can do this is because the drives just dont fail, ive fitted 100's of seagate for people its all i will work with. I dont think ive ever had a single bad drive since they swapped to the new bearing design 3 - 4 years ago.

So when you get a 1 in say 1000 failur rate its not a problem to do a 3 year warwanty.

so if an xbox owner who has had a box one year and has two swaps in that year, you would guestimate that at a possible 6 swaps over 3 years.

Thats going to cost them a fortune.

Plus i dont know about anyone else but i wouldnt expect the DVD ROM to last that long, not when its heavily used.

Which could mean they are going to end up swapping say 60% of units for sure between the ring of death and possibility of drive failur.

Dont get me wrong 3 year warwanty is a good thing, but maybe the plan is to keep everyone going with swaps until the lower Nm Cpus out properly and then just give them one that doesnt cook so much.

7.7.2007 08:04 #58

ChiknLitl

7.7.2007 08:47 #59

emugamer

Originally posted by pmshah:I am not a gamer but an engineer by profession. The first thing we learn is you DESIGN the quality into the product. If you do it right any decent manufacturing process will turn out quality product. You end up with a hell of a lot less disgruntled customers & save yourself a lot of heart burn.

Why should there be a single failure whatsoever? Was this another one of Balmer's brainstorms to cut costs by outsourcing to a not so "hot" vendor & allow xBox to run hot? One really wonders what their priorities really are.

Perhaps they should move their test labs to non air conditioned warehouses in Las Vegas in summer.Agreed. I happen to be a gamer and an Engineer by profession also. I can't imagine how something like the effects of heat on a processor can be overlooked. And for over 2 years. This console should have gone through rigorous testing. 24 to 48 hours of straight play. It should have been run into the ground, and then made better. And then repeat the process. In a non air conditioned room....in a triple digit weather environment...lol

7.7.2007 12:20 #60

plazma247

I think the 90 day warwanty thing is only in america mate, in the UK we get a minimum of 12 months under the sales of goods act ;-)

7.7.2007 13:33 #61

ZippyDSM

pmshah/emugamer

their have been some rumors about the lowering of lead to meet RoHS requirements and that being the cause of the failings MS was to cheap to build them by the regoin or something.

my best guess is the testing units where made using a better manufacturing process and when they went to a cheaper or lead free setup they screwed up big time,this is all guessing of coarse its hard tot ell what went wrong,they obviously tried to cover it up and managed to to do so for a year or 2..

7.7.2007 20:35 #62

ChiknLitl

Originally posted by plazma247:I think the 90 day warwanty thing is only in america mate, in the UK we get a minimum of 12 months under the sales of goods act ;-)Good point! I believe it is an American-only phenomenon.

8.7.2007 07:03 #63

ZippyDSM

Quote:Originally posted by plazma247:I think the 90 day warwanty thing is only in america mate, in the UK we get a minimum of 12 months under the sales of goods act ;-)Good point! I believe it is an American-only phenomenon.Heil to the corporate machine >>

8.7.2007 07:31 #64

pmshah

Originally posted by ZIppyDSM:pmshah/emugamer

their have been some rumors about the lowering of lead to meet RoHS requirements and that being the cause of the failings MS was to cheap to build them by the regoin or something.

my best guess is the testing units where made using a better manufacturing process and when they went to a cheaper or lead free setup they screwed up big time,this is all guessing of coarse its hard tot ell what went wrong,they obviously tried to cover it up and managed to to do so for a year or 2..RoHS requirements essentially require you to change the composition of the wave soldering bath. As a matter of fact this solder contains no lead & more of silver which is a better electrical as well as thermal conductor to drain the heat away from the components along the tracks & dissipate faster,

It seems the same wise guy who was involved with the Win-ME release is running this show. Half baked products & there are people who will lap it up.

BTW when the entire product - hardware & software is completely under your control one should expect stability & performance similar to a Mac.

8.7.2007 08:30 #65

ZippyDSM

Quote:Originally posted by ZIppyDSM:pmshah/emugamer

their have been some rumors about the lowering of lead to meet RoHS requirements and that being the cause of the failings MS was to cheap to build them by the regoin or something.

my best guess is the testing units where made using a better manufacturing process and when they went to a cheaper or lead free setup they screwed up big time,this is all guessing of coarse its hard tot ell what went wrong,they obviously tried to cover it up and managed to to do so for a year or 2..RoHS requirements essentially require you to change the composition of the wave soldering bath. As a matter of fact this solder contains no lead & more of silver which is a better electrical as well as thermal conductor to drain the heat away from the components along the tracks & dissipate faster,

It seems the same wise guy who was involved with the Win-ME release is running this show. Half baked products & there are people who will lap it up.

BTW when the entire product - hardware & software is completely under your control one should expect stability & performance similar to a
Mac.
silver is also incredibly brittle and at the right temp pops chips......

8.7.2007 08:45 #66

plazma247

Umm, may also be due to the how much tortion the heat sinks connected using, im sure some of us remember the P4 478 Chip, i used to take those board out of machines after a few months and they would be warped like a banana. Hence one of the deciding factors for chaning over to 775 where the heat sink uses a little less tortion and the surrounding mounts are closer to the chip to reduce boardwarp.

Additionally the 4 pot hole the cpu heatsink sits in; normally is fairly eavenly spaced between 4 of the boards mounting screws, this reduces the amount of board warp, allowing for equal ammounts of contraction and expansion in all 4 directions.

Some manufactures of heat sink suppliers supplied cast back plats for the heatsink to pull onto, thus sandwiching the board understress so it couldnt warp.

Does the 360 have these?

However the 360 has two of these 4 pot heat sink mounts next to each other, i cant think of the stress diffirences in epansion this would cause.

8.7.2007 13:19 #67

spydah

Quote:Originally posted by DXR88:But one must also realize that microsoft Never indevored into hardware. as such there Software is there namesakeTheir software has just as many holes.
Thats not true they have been making Gateway computes laptops and so forth for a while now. They just simply choose to ignore simply computer building rules. Especially since their goal was to make a super gaming media center which is suppose to be similar to a pc. A cooling unit is not rocket science but leave to M$ to fuznuck that up.

8.7.2007 21:05 #68

pmshah

Quote:silver is also incredibly brittle and at the right temp pops chips......This is the first time I am hearing that silver is BRITTLE. It might be around absolute zero temperature or some thing close to that but at the operating temperatures encountered in electronics it certainly is not. If you look up a metallurgy book you will find it to be Ductile in stead. We use fine silver foil made by hammering it between 2 layers of leather for adorning our sweetmeats.

I have grown up eating out of pure silver plates. I have seen all kinds of dents out of misuse but never seen one POP.

In any case I have been using RoHS compliant motherboards in exactly the environment I am ralking about on 24/7 basis. Outside temperature hovering around 42 - 42 celsius, indoor temperatures around 37-38 celsius & the cpu temperature reaching nearly 60 degrees celsius. I am talking about the Real Indian Summer. No air conditioning either.

I haven't had any breakdowns!

9.7.2007 00:20 #69

DXR88

You got a point there. Spydah

9.7.2007 10:09 #70

plazma247

Hey pmshah, check this out... ;-)

http://mae.pennnet.com/articles/article_...DS=maccaig&p=32

I wouldnt argue with zippy he knows whats hes talking about ;-) well most of the time... hehe only jokin zippy.

And buddy eating your dinner off a silver plate at room temprature and dropping it on the floor and looking for dents is not a very concisive approach to heat stress testing silver based solder joints, well thats just my 2 penith worth ;-)

9.7.2007 11:26 #71

brokensco

Zippy you really shouldn't claim my random musing are a rumor. its just based on small things I hear from the folks up in productions and my friends in test engineering.

I work for a small company that builds small mobile computers designed for rugged environments. Our products are designed to deal with a temperature range that might run from 120F down to 20F. Ex A large freezer warehouse located in say downtown Vegas. The product could Ideally function up to 140, but they have bigger problems if its that hot. It also is designed to work in very humid environments as well.

On or computers we use BGA Ball Grid Array to attach chips to the mainboards. We began moving everything over for RoHS compliance in late 2005, at the same time we ramped up production of non RoHS compliant products so would could put them on inventory before the RoHS cut off date and have a surplus to sell while we worked out the major kinks in our new designs. Products claimed as inventory could be sold if produced before the RoHS cut off date. We officially stopped using Lead 2 weeks before July 1st 2006. We had enough product to supply us for 2 quarters at our current projected sales.

We had planned to start producing RoHS compliant products for all customers by early 2007. Were still working on that. Right now we can only ship to our light use optimum environment customers. Customers who don't need the ruggedness just the portability and are in a stable environment. However our defect rate has tripled because the silver alloy solder we use can't deal with the boards flexing and the chips are popping of our boards. This problem is compounded by the fact we use BGA because you have to X-RAY the mount to see where the failure occurred. The issue isn't the heat. Its the mechanical flexing and sheering of the board because the buttons on our devices are mounted on the main board. Temperature fluctuations would only add to this problem.

So half our customers are on back order while we try to get the same durability out of lead free solders across all temperature ranges. So far were not having a lot of luck. So now were redesigning our boards to be thicker, but the it is still not working. Were just not getting the right performance out of non leaded solders. This isn't the fault of the solder, its the fault of the applications and the constraints we build our products within.

The thing zippy is talking about is this. I know plenty of people who have launch and near launch boxes that work fine to this day. I know a lot of people with boxes that would need to be RoHS compliant that are breaking.

Now in theory MS could produce RoHS compliant boxes for europe and leave us Americans in blissful lead heaven. It just too damn expensive for a company that has been focused on software to produce hardware with different designs for different reasons. Its just much easier for a company to make all products Compliant with with all standards needed for sale anywhere then differentiating them with the software and the packaging. The most difference is PAL vs NTSC.

My random musing related to the fact that uneven heating, uneven exspansion, and the mechanical flexing that it can cause can cause chips, capacitors, resistors on the board to pop off. Pop being used as a general term for a components solder joint failing. I'm not just talking about the cpus and the GPU. There are alot of chips on the board anyone of them could break and anyone of them could brick the console.

@Pashma
So was your pure silver plates 2 layers of silver connected by another soldering agent? If not then your attempt at being a smart ass failed rather miserably and frankly only made you seem stupid, despite your otherwise intelligent comments.

As for your computer, how much space is there in the case? I'm willing to bet there is considerably more than there is inside a 360.

Not to mention the fact that the temperature range is more important a factor than a high temperature.

Please note, I'm one of the lucky ones who hasn't had there 360 crash even during nice marathon sessions of gaming. I also don't mean this as an excuse, I am only looking for an explanation as to what the actual defect is.

Though if by some wild chance I am mildly close as to what could be happening I will have a bit of sympathy for MSG.

9.7.2007 13:05 #72

ZippyDSM

brokensco

welcome aboard ^^
if you look at the link plazma247 gave us,it shows its not a simple rumor, army aero space and others are worried about the lack of lead in solder joints.

From extra stuff I dug up I think RoHS is reaching to hard, they need to focus on grants and subisties to have non lead stuff researched and give money to thos that wont use it,for some tech gadgets its not needed but for the most part its needed by the industry got non consumer products at the least.

9.7.2007 13:11 #73

plazma247

Just found this:

http://www.precidip.com/data/files/pdf/p...chnology_en.pdf

Thinking about it maybe the answer is for them to use 5 - 10mm high tempratured plasic raisers for the cores and insulate the boards from the heat producing components.

Similary to the way a ziff socket works.

Additionally fit a dam heat sink restraing plate on the back of the board, less warp, less problems.

9.7.2007 14:36 #74

plazma247

Originally posted by plazma247:Just found this:

http://www.precidip.com/data/files/pdf/p...chnology_en.pdf

Thinking about it maybe the answer is for them to use 5 - 10mm high tempratured plasic raisers for the cores and insulate the boards from the heat producing components.

Similary to the way a ziff socket works.

Additionally fit a dam heat sink restraing plate on the back of the board, less warp, less problems.Addition

...

ive just seen something called the XCLAMP mod which is suppose to address the board stress issue.

http://rbjtech.bulldoghome.com/pages/rbj..._com/XClamp.htm

and

http://rbjtech.bulldoghome.com/pages/rbj...com/Xbox360.htm

--- Also see its possible to take out the chips.

http://www.logictoys.co.uk/components/co...e55a352e813.jpg

Heres a nasty figure :(

http://www.360-gamer.com/news.asp?id=1143

9.7.2007 15:17 #75

brokensco

Its not just lead, its the fact that we have moved to a process where the solder is the only thing holding a component on the board. The military doesn't like that because well, frankly its fairly fragile.

9.7.2007 16:15 #76

pmshah

Originally posted by brokensco:Its not just lead, its the fact that we have moved to a process where the solder is the only thing holding a component on the board. The military doesn't like that because well, frankly its fairly fragile.I somehow have a feeling that more than likely it is the solder pads on the PCB itself which may not be able to sustain the stress & are losing adhesion to the glass/epoxy substrate. When that happens hairline tracks will break resulting in equipment failure. One reason I still stick with standard dip packages & ensuring thermal stress relief in other passive components by properly forming the leads. Makes life easier for the repair technician also in the rare event of a failure. Of course I am not into high tech product designing like multilayer motherboards but can't really afford failures in field.

With high level of miniaturization in smd components the pad size also are drastically reduced compounding the problem.

9.7.2007 20:06 #77

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