Friday Morning Reading: Dean Takahashi on Xbox 360 Red Rings

I recently got the RRoD on a console that was replaced for the RRoD it recieved six months after I bought it.

I replaced my launch-Xbox last fall, after it Red-ringed severall times. The machine did work, but I just didn't want it to red-ring on me, when playing Mass Effect and Assassins Creed, which were about to be released. 

I bought a 360 in '06.  It still works plenty fine for me.

Though, to tell the truth, I kind of want it to Red Ring so I can replace it with a either a 60 gig version or the Elite.  Does that make me a bad person?

I went a year and half without any RRoD but then it struck... I lasted way longer than most I know.

i have had the red rings once since launch and since it came back it worked fine

Three year RROD-exclusive warranty is too puny me thinks. Five years encompassing all hardware failures I say. I just know mine's gonna crap out on me just after it has expired... My fourth 360 btw. It's been fine and dandy for over a year now.

I just go the 3 Red Rings this week for the THIRD TIME! Oh, and I was lucky enough to still have my  warranty going due to the much needed 3 year extension given to me. THIRD TIME...and my girlfriend left me too. What a week... :(

Not a bad article. Microsoft are supposed to have fixed up the various 360 issues but the whole RROD thing should've never happened and even today I'm still hearing stories of the three red lights. Personally I have been using preowned 360s and in under a year I've had 4 Xboxs, I'm a little worried about what will happen when my warranty runs out.

My 360 red ringed today... 

Oy vey.

I had the RRoD two weeks ago. I brought the xbox back into my bedroom and started preparing it for shipping. As a last ditch effort to reclaim the Mass Effect disk that was stuck inside, I plugged the console in.... and the RRoD disappeared. Guess I'm playing on some sort of ressurrected box now. A Jesus box, if you will.

it's weird, mine just red-ringed yesterday for the THIRD time now! This time, I'm asking them to give me a new console cause this one is clearly defective as they tried to fix it twice now and yet it's still happening. What do you think my chances are of them giving me a new one rather than trying to repair it yet again?

Doesn't worry me anymore since I got sick of troubles with my 360s and ditched the system altogether. I went through 4 360s in 18 months and not one of them red ringed. 1 was due to faulty cooling fans, and the other 3 were all disc drive problems (one scratched discs really bad, another refused to read discs at all, and the third was a growing combination of the two). My fourth and final one was on the fritz (and out of warranty) when I decided to sell it while it was still half working and grabbed a PS3 instead. I probably just had an very unlucky run, but 4 systems in a year and a half was a joke, so Microsoft lost me as a customer.

Mine red ringed

I have yet to experience a RROD on my 360, but I did have to send it in April-May of last year (one month after I bought it) because of disc drive issues.  I somehow managed to get my own console back instead of a refurbished unit, but I'm still wary.  I feel like my console could display the RROD the next time I turn it on, which is probably one reason why I haven't played any games on it extensively in months.

A great read. This was interesting to me, and  a good way to burn some time while at work!

My console got the red rings when the Nyko cooler decided to short out. I took that out and I've been problem free since.

Well ive had my 360 since last christmas and recently the ethernet port has become defective and will not detect any cable I enter into it. I've already bought a defective wireless adapter that Amazon (or Microsoft) wouldn't take back because I had opened it. So I can't send my console in since I don't have the receipt because it was a gift. So I can't play Xbox Live. So... Microsoft totally screwed me. And I'm really angry.

I bought my Xbox360 the July after launch and I've never had a problem.

Yea I just got my 360 back, for the second time, I mean they take good care of it by sending a new one but this has been the second time it has happend to me, they need to do something this is crazy, i've never had any problems like this one any other game consouls.

I had a problem with my optical drive, sent my 360 for repair under warranty.

As part of the repair they changed the motherboard in the console, unfortunately this new motherboard suffered RROD within 2 hours of play.

What annoyed me was not the very unfortunate way I got my RROD, but the fact MS were so f___ing inept in dealing with the problem.

I worry and everyone I know who has a 360. I already had one repaired under warranty but the time away from my console almost killed me. I got myself an Elite to prevent this but since then I've heard of Elited also breaking from close friends. I don't think the issue is resolved and I think it really hurts the platform. 

I just got the RROD two weeks ago on a system I bought in May of '06. Based on that and other people's responses, I'd say that RROD is still a big problem. I'm thankful that people like Chris Szarek have forced Microsoft to recognize the problem and extend their warranty. I have a feeling they would have kept ignoring the problem if enough people weren't vocal about it and I suspect that the internet has played a bigger role in rallying those complaints than with previous console problems.

I thought the article explained the intricacies of the issue pretty well, although I haven't read anything else to compare it with. I agree that Microsoft must change it's mentality of "release now, fix it later". However, I don't think the article gives enough credit to the things Microsoft has done well with the 360. If the video game industry has "never seen a consumer problem as bad as the (RROD)" then it's that much more impressive that millions of consumers are sticking with it. The author mentions games as part of that success, but I think Achievements, the uniformity of the Xbox Live experience and the XNA community deserve recognition as well.

I don't think we'll be able to gauge the full extent of the damage that RROD has caused Microsoft for some time. It's certainly been an expensive mistake, but $1.15 billion is still a lot less than the $3 billion Sony has lost just selling the PS3. Certainly, Microsoft could have a larger market share without the RROD, but the Wii would still be cheaper and would still appeal to a wider audience. The damage RROD has caused to consumers' confidence is hard to gauge and may not become clear until the next generation of consoles.

I've had two disc drive deaths and a ring of death.

Had 5 red rings under a timespan of 7 months.. I simply gave up on it, demanded my money back, which I got, eventually.. I later won a 360 elite, so I do have one now..
It was the premium model I had that died constantly