Microsoft Insider Details Xbox 360 Red Ring Problems

kylemonger writes "A blogger at the Seattle PI has interviewed a Microsoft insider about the Xbox 360 project. The insider purports to have the background story on the 'red ring of death' (RROD) failures and why they are so common. 'RROD is caused by anything that fails in the "digital backbone" on the mother board. Also known as a core 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. There are also other significantly high failure rates in other areas, like the DVD.'"

Sometimes I hope Microsoft AI conquers the world

[Anonymous Coward]

Because you just know it's going to fail.

To catch a ring.

[Anonymous Coward]

At least their diagnostics were comprehensive enough to catch all those failure modes.

Re:Preventative measures?

[Swampash]

What sort of things would cause those different parts to fail?

The sun coming up, basically.

It's called 360 because...

[Anonymous Coward]

it's called 360 because of the trip it takes
from microsoft, to you, back to microsoft, to you again

http://bash.org/?806949 [bash.org]

Re:Preventative measures?

[Chrutil]

I have had my 360 since a few months after the lauch and I have never had any RROD problems with it either.
Then again, I'm having good luck with Vista so I guess I'm inversely jinxed.

Re:Preventative measures?

[RuBLed]

...in the basement?? preposterous!!

Re:Q: My HDD died MS wants $100 to replace...

[Wuhao]

Have you tried playing it?

Re:Preventative measures?

[Mr. Roadkill]

I have had my 360 since a few months after the lauch and I have never had any RROD problems with it either.
Then again, I'm having good luck with Vista so I guess I'm inversely jinxed.

There's a Mr Satan on Line 2, Mr Chrutil. Something about coming over to collect payment.

Most probably cause of a red ring of death...

[Anonymous Coward]

...is a vindaloo.

Re:Calling Shenanigans...

[dustmite]

Just FYI, you mean "leak", a leek is a vegetable - sorry, I don't normally troll spelling/grammar, but it was mildly amusing reading your post and thinking of the vegetable each time :)

OB Venture Brothers tie-in?

[Aereus]

This reminds me of the episode of Venture Brothers where they go to the space station and it has a single red light labeled "Trouble" that blinks when any problem occurs... :)

Re:In hindsight (current Xbox owners)

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. A 1000 times yes. This is the second time my xbox failed (on it's way to Texas so sayeth UPS), the 1st time I shipped it away. I'm kind of going through a low grade withdrawl. I stupidly created an unreadable gamertag since I never thought I'd be playing with people who don't know me. Over the year I had my xbox it changed how I entertained myself. I didn't go out drinking as much, going to movies as much, and I watch A LOT less TV. The xbox had nearly killed TV for me entirely, which in the midst of a writers strike is fucking painful. But I had been at the point where I'd play the occasional RPG, but mostly I had a regular game or series of games with people I'd met on xbox live. It's social and relaxed, got it's share of pithy comments (why bother sticking with games filled with asshats when you got people who aren't asshats to play with), but also competative. It's a complete entertainment experience. One I clearly partook of too often, given my symptomatic reaction. But just Gears of War, I've played that for about 500 hours for $60 bucks. Even if you include the price of the console, that's just dominating value. I've considered buying a second "spare" xbox to use in case of repair. And this might be the addiction talking, but with just one Gears of War game a year, it makes a certain twisted economic sense. Then since I was the only guy who had a 360, cause I was the only one of my friends who had an HD tv, my place was something of the cool place to hang out. Now, I'm jittery, posting AC on a laptop, as I sit in the dark. Alone.

Your question boils down to was my life before "400 dollars better" than it is now. Yeah. Easily. Thank god for superbowls and superbowl parties.

Re:It's called 360 because...

[ozmanjusri]

I thought it got the name because 360 F is the melting point of 63/37 solder.

Re:The Xbox 360 Is Fundamentally Defective

[shannara256]

Xbox 360s have been dying for two years now...

Netcraft confirms.

Ringu?

[Chas]

So you see the ring and your XBox dies...

There's a movie in there somewhere...

Re:Sometimes I hope Microsoft AI conquers the worl

[edwardpickman]

You'll know when it happens, all your electronic devices will turn to blue screens.

Re:We don't all have this issue

[NuclearKangaroo]

My condolences.

my...

[cosmocain]

...coffee machine's got the same problem. almost every day there's a ring of red light flashing and it stops working, but then i refill the water and the RRoD disappears. Maybe you should try this with the Xboxes as well - i'm almost sure that the RRoD will disappear INSTANTLY!

Re:Did I miss the part where this was different?

[Gandalf_Greyhame]

"Fast, cheap, reliable, pick any two" when you go to buy any videogame system.

You mean "Fast, cheap, reliable, Microsoft*, pick any two"

* Microsoft counts as two

Re:Preventative measures?

[Anonymous Coward]

>> Dude, my SNES has PENNIES rattling around in it and it still plays.
WOW!! First piggy bank case mod! Weren't you supposed to choose an iMac, though?

Re:Sometimes I hope Microsoft AI conquers the worl

[sortius_nod]

Now I know where that term comes from... it's not crashing computers, it's M$'s ulterior motive - to take over the world!

"it's Pinky, Pinky and the brain brain brain brain brain brain brain brain brain brain brain brain"

Re:Which is why it is funny...

[laejoh]

Ah, towels, isn't there anything they can't do!

Ok, true, you have to remember where your towel is...

Re:To catch a ring.

[Fred_A]

If the number of costumers having to repair their machines is in the millions,

Obviously the machine was tailored to their market !

Who needs context?

[stormguard2099]

if you want to take a gamble and enjoy working on electronics it's a good option though.

After hearing this I know I'm sold on the xbox 360!

Re:Which is why it is funny... XBOX mensuration!!

[Anonymous Coward]

... that a common "fix" for RROD 360's is to wrap them in a towel. This causes the bad ROHS solder balls to expand and make better connections.

This problem should be known as "XBOX menstruation" with the fix being "tampaxing":

Person1: "Damn my XBOX is now showing the red ring and is refusing to work properly".
Person2: "Have you tried tampaxing?"
Person1: "Eh?"
Person2: "Your XBOX is suffering from XBOX menstration. Tampaxing deals with the flow issues"
Person1: "Thanks, your right tampaxing has fixed the issue!".

Re:Xbox infant mortality?

[Ryokos_boytoy]

Many manufacturers think it's cheaper to just ship it and deal with the failures later.

And oh boy, does that sound like MS logic.