Xbox 360 Power Supply Blamed for Arkansas House Fire 89
Beryllium writes "In Arkansas, an XBox 360's power supply (or power cord, the story is a bit ambiguous) apparently
caused a fire with over $10,000 in damages. The fire chief says that it was probably due to the power supply unit being crammed into a space that had poor air circulation. The previously-documented heat issues with 360s led me to buy 'Andy', an affordable IKEA wireframe stand for my gaming system — with drawers! Since I've also got the power supply inside one of the unit's drawers, it should have more than adequate airflow to dissipate heat. I wonder what other airflow-improving ideas Slashdotters have come up with for their consoles?"
Are you sure...? (Score:2, Insightful)
Doesn't that mean the fire was caused by an idiot who didn't realize that a power brick weighing 5 pounds with a fan on it kinda needs to have airflow? Not only that but it was probably a old-school one that wasn't registered and didn't get the replacement cables.
There's a lot of "should" in that... I'm sure the people who owned the home that had fire damage had a lot of "should" insurance too.
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Insightful)
And honestly, how many people read contracts before signing them? Come on, I mean all of the contract. Alright, still some dissenters, how about this... how many understand all the terms? There we go. That's what I thought.
And how many of us have been burned by a cup of coffee when it didn't say "Served Hot"? And how many of you have had a firework blow up in your hand and take a finger off? That's right. All of us. Obviously this is a manufacturer problem in all of these cases. The salesperson should be required to tell us every warning.
Unlikely (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Insightful)
How did this PSU get UL approval again? (Score:3, Insightful)
What happened to the sorts of tests where devices were deliberately abused to make sure they failed in a way that didn't involve burning down the owner's home?
Failing that, why is MS not building the heat equivalent of a circuit breaker into these PSUs? The possibility of corrupting the hard drive or whatever due to a non-graceful shutdown has to be less than the bad publicity caused by burning down customers' houses.
Re:How did this PSU get UL approval again? (Score:3, Insightful)