Percentage breakdown of Xbox 360 hardware problems
- February 27th, 2008
- Read 254 times
- 9 Comments
Here’s more details on the Xbox 360’s failure rate. Because few things are as fun as kicking a man (or a video game console) when he’s down.
SquareTrade, which is an independent warranty company, says that it tracked a sample of 57 Cores, 956 Premiums and 27 Elites, or 1,040 in all. Sixty percent of the 171 that had problems (so, 60 percent of 17 percent of the total) had the red ring of death. Of the remaining hardware problems, 18 percent were disc read errors; 13 percent were video card failures; 13 percent were hard drive freezes (!); 10 percent were power issues; and 7 percent were disc tray-related.
Remember how the original model of the PlayStation would overheat after only a few hours of use? You’d think Microsoft would have constructed a more durable system.
What’s even more amazing is that these numbers only represent systems tracked for six to ten months; hardware failure usually occurs after that time frame. In other words, these numbers could be on the low side.
For the record, I’ve only had one red ring of death, so maybe I’m a little on the lucky side, all things considered.
New Info on 360 Death Rate Study [IGN via Xbox-Scene]
I have 3 Xbox 360 machines, the one with the most usage went down last month with the 13% video card failure, but was not under warranty. Cost $110. bucks to get fixed, communications with the repair center are poor, but it came back in fine shape. The other 2 have less wear, but I am hoping to avoid this problem. The Xbox 720 should have much better coolers I hope.
So far:
First was a RRoD
Second was a RRoD
Third was Dirty Disc Errors
Fourth was video card related
Fifth… well, i just got my fifth, so far it seems okay, just like the others did :)
hold on a sec…talk about spinning numbers…
171 / 1040 = 16.442%…nice rounding skills.
Further 102 xbox’s out of 1040 suffered the RRoD…
But I love how you got a 60% failure rate for RRoD in there when in fact the numbers would say the problem dropped from 33% down to 9%.
I’ve never had a problem with my Xbox 360s. My first Xbox was one of the first released, and it still works fine to this day. My second Xbox is the Halo 3 version and I’ve never had any issues with that either. I think the main key to Xbox health is to be smart with how you set it up. I have my Xboxs in cool, well ventilated areas. I do not have them standing vertical (which would increase disc read errors). I have real surge protectors (not the $10 power strips) and I use UPS devices. Some of this may be overkill, but I do know one thing…. My Xboxs have never failed me. On the other hand, I have a friend who has gone through 5 Xboxs. He keeps them in his room which is always above room temperature. He keeps his Xbox vertical between his TV and his stereo with no ventillation…. and he blames Microsoft… I told him he’s a moron. Cause he is.
buy a ps3
I have gone through 3 xbox 360s since launch all with the RRoD. Of the people on my friends list 52% (12 of 23) all had failures and all of them were warranty RRoD. One of my friends has had multiple failure as have I. I definitely believe that the failure rate is much higher for medium and high usage owners. It is my opinion that the failure rate on the original console would be close to 100% if you assume a MTBF of less than 1000 hours in a 12 month period.
Don’t get me wrong, as an owner of a 360, PS3 and Wii I defintely think that XBOX and the Live service are the best out there. However, it is my opinion that MS rushed the 360 to production to gain marketshare and the consumers are the test subjects. The first consoles are BETA quality hardware at GOLD prices.
“You’d think Microsoft would have constructed a more durable system.”
I wouldn’t
I’ve had hardware failure two different times with two different xbox 360s, and I’m waiting for them to fix my second one or send me a third one. I hadn’t even used this last one for a couple of weeks. I turned it on, and a few minutes into my game, it froze. This happened a couple of times, and then the three lights appeared. The first 360 I had flashed the lights right out of the box. I take fairly good care of my system too. Besides, even if I didn’t take great care of it, I shouldn’t have to set up some kind of perfect game system fortress just so my console will work properly….just because they didn’t take care while developing it in the first place. I think it’s great that Microsoft will fix everything, but I’m getting sick and tired of having to send in my 360.
Funny picture of xbox with three red lights at Best Buy.
http://forums.xbox.com/20183151/ShowPost.aspx#20183151
Check it out.