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By Emma Martin In the latest issue of
the Official XBox Magazine (Oct. 2007), they've written up a significant report
on the hardware failures that have stymied XBox fans everywhere ever since the
release of the XBox 360 in 2005. The worst hardware failure is indicated by
three red rings of light surrounding the power button and so it is has come to
be known as the Red Ring of Death among XBox 360 owners.
Due to the overwhelming
number of owners who have had to return their XBox 360s to Microsoft for repair
or replacement, wait times for getting the Xbox back can frequently extend into
months. The magazine reports on some fans who have waited two months to get
their console back only to find another hardware failure crop up after another
couple of weeks of serious video game play. As a result of all the issues,
Microsoft finally released a statement about the three red lights and its
related hardware failure in June, promising to fix all XBox 360s that die as a
result of the failure for free and extending their warranty out to three years.
Of course, with so many
XBox 360 problems, you just might wonder why on earth anyone would buy a 360 in
the first place instead of switching to another console. The question's fair
enough, but the answer is obvious. It's the games! There are so many great games
that are exclusive to the XBox 360, starting with the latest and long
anticipated release of Halo 3. If you want to play Halo 3, you need an XBox 360.
If you want to play another excellent game, Bioshock, on a console, the XBox 360
is the one you need. Sure, you can play Bioshock on the PC -- after you upgrade
it massively or buy a brand new computer. But that strikes me as nuttier than
just dealing with the Microsoft hardware issues because Bioshock plays best on
the console anyway.
There are some
solutions to the XBox 360 problems besides waiting around for Microsoft to send
a repaired console back to you. One solution is to take it to a private computer
repair shop, one who specializes in repairing videogame consoles. You'll need to
pay for having them fix it, but the turn-around time is likely to be a few days
instead of weeks or months. If you're handy, however, the best solution is to
simply crack open the box yourself and do the repairs that are needed. You will
void your warranty if you do this, but if you follow instructions and aren't a
total klutz, then there is no reason you can't have your XBox 360 working again
in an hour or two.
Need to get back to
playing Halo 3? You can get the guide to
fixing the XBox
360 red lights problem yourself in a couple of hours. |
