The Orange [?] Ring of Dea.... Worry?

[Lance]

What with all those warnings, and with a bunch of I-Told-You-Sos eagerly awaiting articulation, I had to wonder a bit last night when I suddenly saw the little orange lights going on and off in a circle on my new X-box 360 while playing Soul Calibur IV. I immediately turned it off, then pulled the power plug out of the console socket. After waiting for 30 seconds, I plugged it back in and pressed the power switch. Darkness. Silence.

hmmmmmmm

unplugged and replugged the power cord and the AV cable.

pressed power switch. same result.

Got out VU meter to check if power supply was delivering electrons. WTF? eigHT contacts? Got no voltage with any combination of them.

hmmmm

Looked at other end of power supply. sheesh. The input cord from the line was no longer attached. sheeeeeeeesh.
Plugged it back into the power supply. Pressed power button

Green lights come on and run in a circle. Disc drive makes its usual wacky noises. TV screen says HI, welcome to X-box. Play game?


Duh. What a dummy I can be. Thank you, Universe for things being okay. Uh.. next time, if you can spare me the attention, could you make me think of the first thing first instead of last, please?

[RedScar]

Shame, I love to hear about the Xbrick 360 :P
I kid I kid
Glad to hear you aren't stuck without games.

[Lance]

Thanks for the thought.
If it did go, I still have three other game consoles, but I would have to wait awhile to continue making progress on the new games I have on this one.

[andy]

I got a fright a couple of months ago when I got something similar on my xbox. Somebody had moved it and had managed to pull the video/audio cable out of the back of it. Plugged it back in after I saw it was poking out a bit, a good while later, and all was fine.

I've had mine since the Christmas it came out though and there hasn't been any problem with it at all. Which is nice.

[Darkdrium777]

I TOLD YOU S....

Oh wait. nvm.

[AG-wolf]

Wait, Kigo hasn't posted here yet? *looks around*

;p lol

Do you know what motherboard revision you have? Falcon/Opus and Jasper have a much lower chance for the RRoD, but the three of them still have the potential to fail due to the E74 error; although they fixed the cooling on the main CPU/GPU chips (which was the issue with the 3 red lights), the E74 is caused by all that hot air being blown across the HANA scaler chip, which overheats then sh*ts the bed and boom E74. Keep it in mind, maybe stand the machine vertical... it's of course a hit-or-miss problem until the Valhalla board is released, but I wouldn't play for more than a few consecutive hours at a time.

(for the record, to all the other 360 nay-sayers out there, my PS3 runs ten times hotter than the air my 360 is belching out, and the heat-sink fins are warped... I expect it to die far sooner than my 360 :P )

[Darkdrium777]

Valhalla. xD
Microsoft has a dark sense of humour :lol

60GB do run hot though (FrostE's 40 was omg so cool), but mine doesn't warp... Where do you keep your system(s) AG-Wolf? Mine's out in the open, next to the computer tower. Right now with the weather the fan kicks into fourth gear a lot (ie very loud) but it doesn't have any problem staying on for the whole day...

[NightArh]

Here is my workstation :beer It is the best way to cool the system :p
http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/2599/pic048.th.gif (http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/2599/pic048.gif)

[lunar]

Yeah Lance don`t go teasing us with XBox snuff stories and then spoil the ending. :(

Really I`m glad it all worked out for you. I would love to have a 360 to play PGR - love that game when I get a chance to have a go :rock

[GreenPhazon]

A death of a console is a painful thing, especially one you still play regularly (My GameCube had to be replaced the other week)

Glad you were spared the grief this time.

[KIGO1987]

Get a bloody PS3 with Wipeout HD on it Lance, instead of buying these lumps of shiityness consoles. Your a mod on a wipeout forum, time to get either Pure, Pulse or HD at least.

[Lance]

Do you know what motherboard revision you have?

... Keep it in mind, maybe stand the machine vertical...

No, I don't; I just haven't looked; how would I check that? It's a new one that I just bought less than 3 weeks ago at GameStop. Huge number of hours on it already because I play at least 10 to 15 hours per day. And don't sleep much.

Standing the machine vertical might be good, but in my house, it would just be asking, nay, commanding, that it get knocked over. I'd best leave it horizontal. I usually point a fan so the outflow hits both me and the 360.

I may have somewhat better odds of missing overheat because it's an 'Arcade' model with no harddrive, but with a half-gig internal memory card. Whether that's a heat advantage I don't know.

..................

KIGO, during all these years that I've been on the forum, up to last year, I couldn't even pay my property taxes, was always behind on paying electricity, water, and telephone bills and ate as cheaply as possible. So there was a bit of a delay on purchasing stuff. Now that my situation is better, I wanted something to play on the HDTV instead of on a tiny screen, even though I like the portables. I also needed a new DVD player. And the PS3 costs more, has too many updates that I don't want the time and trouble of keeping up with, and costs double what my 360 cost. And has only one game on it that I want to play.

[Hemicrania]

I don't need water/food/electricity. My house/body is powered by the dark side. :rock

[AG-wolf]

No, I don't; I just haven't looked; how would I check that?
http://beta.ivancover.com/wiki/index.php/Xbox_360_Revisions

It's a new one that I just bought less than 3 weeks ago at GameStop. Huge number of hours on it already because I play at least 10 to 15 hours per day. And don't sleep much. Chances are, it's the newest revision, thus you probably have nothing to worry about. WHat's your xbl gamertag?


Standing the machine vertical might be good, but in my house, it would just be asking, nay, commanding, that it get knocked over. I'd best leave it horizontal. I usually point a fan so the outflow hits both me and the 360. dogs or children? dogs = it's an acceptable risk, children means beatings ensue lol But at this point, if you (presumably) have one of the newest revisions, I wouldn't really worry about it.


I may have somewhat better odds of missing overheat because it's an 'Arcade' model with no harddrive, but with a half-gig internal memory card. Whether that's a heat advantage I don't know. I don't think it's really a heat-related issue... a buddy of mine has a first generation launch model with a hard drive and hasn't had any issues to this day.
On the topic, if you can spring for it, snag a hard drive... the ability to download demos and stuff is great, because you can at least try out anything you might have been interested in. Plus, a LOT of awesome XBL Arcade games are wicked cheap, but the 512meg on-board memory isn't enough to store stuff beyond saves :/ The best thing to do is just get an empty hard drive sled from ebay or something, then buy a 120gb Western Digital WD1200BEVS from newegg or someplace for dirt cheap and mod it to be recognized on the 360 (blatantly illegal, against WOZ TOS, etc etc etc, but far less expensive- I can help elsewhere if you want)


Money issues Aldi.

[Darkdrium777]

Saving money? If you want the HDD without voiding your system warranty, you're not going to :D :D (Or at least not much, enough to buy yourself two sandwiches at a Diner xD) Xbox 360arcade (http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-360-Arcade/dp/B0029MAXS6/ref=sr_tr_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1248894143&sr=8-1) + 120GB (http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-360-120GB-Hard-Drive/dp/B000OYKQBU/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1248894094&sr=8-2) + 1 year Xbox Live (http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-360-Live-Month-Gold-Bonus/dp/B000B9RI00) ≈ 400$; **** mathematics...

Oh snap!

[AG-wolf]

doing the modded hard drive doesn't void the system warranty at all actually, because you never once open the machine itself. And there's no need to pay for XBL Gold if you're not gonna play people online. YOu can get a free silver account and you can do everything else except watch netlfix, listen to last.fm without advertisements, and play online. I haven o reason to get Gold what-so-ever, myself, because I don't care about last.fm, I dont have a netflix account in the first place and don't watch movies anyway, and I don't have any desire to play against people online. Given the explanation Lance provided about $$, it doesn't seem like not having gold is really a problem ;)

edit: btw, my 120gb hard drive was apx 50-60 bucks in the end, after doing the mod myself. essentially JUST the cost of the drive itself... and prices may even be lower now

[Darkdrium777]

Yeah, but you are able to do those mods. In truth, I am not, and I don't know about Lance... If he can't do it he has no choice but to pay the ****ing absurd price Microsoft sets because they're the only ones allowed to make accessories for their system. :/
As you said, you can find a 120GB HDD for 50$ (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136072), and it works on the PS3 no mods needed... But on Xbox 360 you have to mod it, and then you are perfectly certain it doesn't void the warranty if you are using an unauthorized accessory? (That seems surprising, considering it's Microsoft we're talking about)

Oh, look what I found on that Newegg page:

It works with the 360 too
Reviewed By: MrAltoid19 on 5/8/2007
Rating + 5
Tech Level: high - Ownership: 1 week to 1 month
This user purchased this item from Newegg

Pros: Works flawlessly with the 360 too!!!
And its less then Half the price of the "official" 120gb Hard Drive.
Cons: Not as easy to install on the 360 as it was on the PS3. It requires some firmware modding to get working on the 360.
Other Thoughts: DO NOT GET THIS FOR 360 UNLESS YOU HAVE A HIGH TECHNICAL UNDERSTANDING. It's not an easy mod and you might waste your money if you don't know what your doing.
Certainly seems encouraging. :|

[Lance]

I don't really have interest in being online, and am not even on XBL Silver. This is one of the reasons I bought the Arcade model to begin with. Simpler is better for my preferences. You should see how simple the engineering of my car designs is. I love simplicity. And I'm interested in having casual fun rather than being beaten by people less than a third of my age in online competitions. :g My priorities have changed as I've thought more about life and my goals more thoroughly. Even though I'm on the same line of development as I was when I was younger, I am not the same person I was then. I'm less competitive, more complex, and see more and more the delights of simpler living and simpler machines, despite, or because of, my love of engineering and technology.

Eric, Aldi is farther away than Dollar General and Save-A-Lot. :) Though not as far away as GameStop and Target, both of which I walk to. No car.
And thanks for the link; I'll check it out later.

[KIGO1987]

KIGO, during all these years that I've been on the forum, up to last year, I couldn't even pay my property taxes, was always behind on paying electricity, water, and telephone bills and ate as cheaply as possible. So there was a bit of a delay on purchasing stuff. Now that my situation is better, I wanted something to play on the HDTV instead of on a tiny screen, even though I like the portables. I also needed a new DVD player. And the PS3 costs more, has too many updates that I don't want the time and trouble of keeping up with, and costs double what my 360 cost. And has only one game on it that I want to play.

That xbox (i rather call it by its alternate name) you got will prob cost more in due time, like after the manufacture warranty has expired, in stupid repair costs and postage and handling, another Microsoft backstabbing money making technique.

I went broke in buying the PS3 in the first place, $800 AUD plus the additional accessories, but now two years on, it is the best investment, not only it is a great console for games, but is the safest place to stash my music collection and videos as ive now had to get the HDD replaced for the 10th time on my Vista laptop under its one year manufactures warranty. Ive lost count how much stuff i losed, the only place safe for my music and the rest of my computer data is on flash drives, the Western Digital HDD i got, and the PS3. If you got data on any MS based OS, most likely it'll corrupt itself before you know it. Twas is the way MS design its products.

Btw Lance, i dont have a HDTV or a adequate internet connection, all i have is my sweet 60GB PS3 which is happily working quite well these days. If i had some cash on me then i would get a Full HD tellie, im still actually yet to see Wipeout in full HD rendering yet, ive only ever played the game in SD. Also net upgrade will be coming hopefully sooner rather than later.

But once again, i have absolutely no regret buying my PS3 console, also it looks slicker in design than that ugly creation skynet made, oh i mean MS created.

[Lance]

KIGO, your experiences and your personality are very different from mine; you can't expect that I will make my decisions about what is right for me on your experiences-desires-tastes instead of my own. What is wrong for you can be right for me, and the converse is also true. Why are some people so eager to tell me that I've made a bad choice for myself when they don't live my life and can't know what is best for me?

I hate Microsoft's John D. Rockefeller monopolistic unscrupulous competition-hating business practices, but I haven't thus far suffered any tech failures due to their products, which have rendered me good service.

If I eventually regret having done something, I will deal with it if disaster happens, but I will not spend my time worrying that it's going to happen; I will enjoy what works while it works.

[KIGO1987]

I tell some of my best mates that they are idiot for purchasing the a 360. All in good faith. Within that same year of saying it, there has been a problem with there console that they have purchased. Interesting thing is every console has had a different problem. Overheating, RROD, error codes, constant freezing, the list goes on Lance.

I hate MS expecially now days as the reliability ive had with this bloody laptop i forked out 2k for last year, keeps on conking out on me, hasnt particularly made me a happy person. It seems the norm for these days for MS to release shiit rather than working products, a company as huge as MS, surely and defiantly needs to be way more regulated by governments, so if they release constantly poor preforming products, MS gets fined and then they would get there act in together.

BTW im not a bias person, Sony isnt too perfect also, the Lanch PS2 i bought had a lazer that died on me. But on a spectrum of performance, reliability and satisfaction Sony and MS are far far far apart.

[NightArh]

It is continuos holywar between xbox360 and ps3 owners. It is nonsense to debate here about this. Everyone has its own tastes ant this is personal think. I am on the "white" side and prefer Sony and gonna to buy it in few days (again ****in inflation) :rock

BTW new models of XBox are pretty good and have no any problems. My co-worker bought it half year ago and it works perfectly

[Lance]

KIGO, I say this to you one last time: Your experience is not my experience. Stop telling, by direct statement or implication, your friends or me that they or I are idiots for doing what you wouldn't do. It's insulting, useless, and irritating. And you and I and all of us are biased by our experience, but we do not have the identical experiences. Get over the venting of your anger and think about something else. You will not have your own grievances corrected by attempting to stop Microsoft sales to other people. You need more direct interaction between MS and you. I am thoroughly tired of hearing about your seemingly endless capacity for non-productive hatred of a company. And your uselessly repetitive recounting of the same occurrences. Please cease this activity.

[KIGO1987]

Holywar is the best way to describe it.

Whats the major difference with the new 360s? Do they run on Win7 now? XD


I am on the "white" side and prefer Sony and gonna to buy it in few days (again ****in inflation) :rock

Smart man.

[NightArh]

New consoles have no old problems and work not worse than ps3.

btw win7 is very good system I can say as system engineer (and this is really nice surprise for me from MS) :)

[Lance]

Last night, I checked out the link that AG-Wolf posted and looked at a couple of forums, too. My Xbox 360 was made this year on May 8, and has a 512 MB internal flash [?] memory unit, and the 150 watt power supply, so it's a late model Jasper board built with 65 nanometer fabrication for both CPU and GPU [and more chip integration with fewer parts and fewer needed connections] rather than the 90 nano chips like the ones in early production RRoD prone machines. So running at the same frequency as always but with much less power-need for the chips, the new boards run cooler. It must be time for us to let go of preconceptions that are based on the old reality instead of the new one. The 90 nano processors haven't even been used since 2007 if the data sources were correct.

[andy]

It looks like a have the xenon (first one) and I've never had a problem with it.

[Lance]

Excellent. Even if the failure rate were 30 percent on those older machines as D777 stated, that would still mean that there was a 70 percent success rate, and with MS still fixing the prob, even now, for free within a week under extended warranty, that was not a bad risk to take. My risk would seem to be a lot less.

[Rapier Racer]

I've got a black box from each company, what does that make me? :p

I heard MS are stopping the RRoD extended warranty this year?



btw win7 is very good system I can say as system engineer (and this is really nice surprise for me from MS) :)

I'm tempted to buy Windows 7, given what I've read so far and also the ridiculously cheap price. NightArh can you shed any light on how well it would perform with a gig of RAM? My PCs has way more than the advertised specs in all other areas but I think my RAM is lacking...

[Lance]

Yet again, for about the fourth time, KIGO has knowingly taken this thread offtopic. This time it lasted for nine posts before I got here. The sequence of offtopic posts has been deleted.

[Darkdrium777]

Yeah, there is no more RRoD problem, but there's still E-74 running around... I don't know how many and what causes it though I heard it came with software updates D:
Anyways that's something you cannot plan for (Unlike the RRoD where you can buy a new Xbox-360), so hopefully many hours of gaming without problems (That's what matters.)

[Mu5]

E74 has nothing to do with software updates lol - Its caused by overheating ;)

[Darkdrium777]

Oh, so it's the same as RRoD except with a new name. Fun. :?

[Mu5]

No. In the event of RRod, you can do nothing but send it in for repair

In the event of E74, you have a chance of fixing it yourself without having to send it back :)

[Darkdrium777]

Okay, that's weird lol :lol
Heatbox 360 xD

Hopefully for you your consoles won't be part of that family. :)

[Mu5]

Yeah ive had a RRoD - Sent it away for free, and got a brand new one returned with updated chipset in a week :D

I was well happy! :D :+

[Lance]

My neighbor got that same great service more than a year ago, and no problem since. He seems to have had one of the old machines, with a 'Xenon' board. It has a 203 watt power supply, instead of one of the later 175s or the new 150s.

[Vartazian]

Kigo, Doesnt the Tray in a 360 Greatly Increase the risk of Disk Damage then that of a Wii or a PS3? (I owning all 3 consoles havent had a problem with any of them. But Ive heard from some store owners that since the 360 has a tray it has a much larger chance of damaging CD's...

You know anything about this?

[Motorsagmannen]

i did read somewher of a guy demanding money back from MS after his 360 constantly scraped the discs untill they were no longer readable.
apparently this was a problem for some of the early 360.
however. nobody i know has had THIS kind of problem though. but could be something to look out for.

[Lance]

If having a tray for the DVDs is a problem, somebody should tell all those people with regular DVD players; they've got the same tray.

[Vartazian]

I just heard it was something with like the tray and how the 360 read disks or something, Maybe im just crazy.

[Hemicrania]

E74 has to do with either the audio/video cable is broken or when the Xbox 360 hardware scaler chip is ****ed. So its not completly homemadefixable.

Then there is the complete video failure. Its sometimes preceded by other graphical glitches such as a crazy saturation of green and/or red colors.

problems :
- blank or staticky video output with a proper functioning audio output and no flashing red lights on the console

sollution : dont really know if MS fixed this jet....

A m8 of mine had rrod and E74, he has send his elite-box back like 6 times. (he also had the discscratch problem). He didnt have to pay for the repair, he did have to pay for mailing the damn thing. Did get a game the 6th time, Battlefield 2 HELL YEAH!!! :?

I do miss the good old days of the super nintendo.... Junno...when you bought a console and it just...like....WORKS ALL THE TIME COUS YOU PAID A SHITLOAD OF MONEY!!! stupid PS3 backup utility almost gave me a heartattack! :bomb

[IH8YOU]

Scrapes on the outer edge of the disc are usually inflicted by the tray.

Scraps on the inner read area usually are inflicted by the laser itself trying to achieve focus. When the sled assembly goes bad, it also gets an amount of slop in the travel - and can collide with the disc too.

But to buy a unit and have this problem - is nuts. First evidence of disc damage inflicted by anything, I'm tearing it apart and fixing it. Especially with blu-ray, uber sensitive to scratches.

[Darkdrium777]

blu-Ray is actually more resistant to scratches thanks to that special coating they put on.
Two years on and none of my PS3 games or blu-Ray movies (Bar Stargate Continuum) have scratches. DVDs and CDs on the other hand... Though these last two are still quite resistant if you take proper care.

But yeah that 360 scratching issue sucks. Sometimes it even breaks the disc completely and you have to buy another. :/ Don't know if it's fixed, I head they changed the DVD player in recent models...

[Lance]

Since the motherboard and power supply are different units in current production versions, I wouldn't be surprised if the DVD drive has been changed too. There may be nothing at all left of the original except the outer shell.

[Aeroracer]

Everyone has an opinion...heres mine:nod:nod:nod

This is my experience of xbox360 (reliability and performance) vs ps3 vs vista ms and whatever
xbox360

I got xbox 360

My brother bought it years ago when it was first released it has never broken down or failed in any way it has been bashed about it has gone to france like 20 times in a suitcase.It even got used as a door stop on my bedroom during summer.But it still works perfectly


I love playing xbox because I like xbox live and the achievment points. I love the user interface it is easy to talk to friends and it's good to go online and chat to your friends while you all play the same games or when we all are doing different things such as i watch a film another plays music another is playing a game. ect

Graphics wise and game wise its the same quality as PS3

what i dont like about xbox is the controller but only when i play Mortal kombat as the d-pad is crap apart from that it's fine. I like the mini keypad you stick onto it as i love to send messages really quick.
my brother gave me his xbox in the end cos he never saw it cos it was in france mostly when i work.:nod:nod:nod:nod

PS3My brother bought a PS3 a year ago no one really plays it cos it didnt have anything to offer which was better than xbox. I prefered xbox online and achievment points.
The 3 games we have we never really bothered with.He downloaded wipeout cos he played that when he was a kid.I had a go liked it and found out that wipeout HD existed so i downloaded it a few weeks ago so im hooked now.
I like the joypad on ps3 better but the keypad that come with it is crap
The user interface is a bit tricky but perhaps i am not used to it yet.Online experience is empty and lonely.perhaps im used to xbox..who knows
Graphics and games are just as good as xbox but i miss achievments.
Ps3 is starting to grow on me..maybe i will like it as much as xbox.:nod:nod

Vista
Looks good but is broken and riddled with faults. I hope new system is better.
The price of operating systems is way too expensive as they don work properly. I paid £200 for mine as the pc was a home built one.

Wii

Havnt got an oppinion on wii as i havnt got one and unlike other people i dont like to talk out of my a**e without first trying it myself.

This my personal opinion.

[Rapier Racer]

Graphics wise and game wise its the same quality as PS3

Offering an opinion without starting a fanboy war, I don't quite agree with you on that. What looks like Killzone 2 on the 360? There might be something I missed I'm not into my 360 so much.

[mdhay]

A Big, Fat Nothing.:D;):lol

Not trying to start a flame war either, but there's nothing on it AFAIK.

[Mu5]

Killzone 2..... meh (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QyYaPWasos&feature=related) :D

[Darkdrium777]

LittleBig Planet or Xbox 360 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwu0gExNVuw)?

xD

Oh yeah: CONNECT FOR FREE!*




*most services reserved for Xbox Live Gold accounts which are 50$ a year

[Mu5]

Im amazed you cant tell - its a 360 add :D

I must remember - DNFTT :D

[Darkdrium777]

DNFTTwat..

[Lance]

Gee, I thought this thread was about hardware. The reliability/unreliability thereof. Something objective. Something non-fanboi.