The 360’s Epic Fail
By Lewis Denby
In a week where GamesCom has dominated the videogame headlines, with Sony announcing both a Playstation 3 price-cut and the long-speculated PS3 Slim, it’s a piece of Microsoft-related news that’s captured my attention the most.
No, not all Molyneux’s Fable III talk. As interesting as the game looks, it’s not what’s been on my mind for the past few days. Instead, it’s a feature in the current issue of Game Informer, suggesting that more than 50 per cent of Xbox 360 units on the market have at some point conked out on their owners.
Game Informer’s report, off the back of a survey of its readership, claimed that a massive 54.2 per cent of 360-owning respondants had suffered a console failure of some sort. This was in stark contrast to the Playstation 3’s 10.6 per cent failure rate, with the Nintendo Wii’s being under seven per cent.
For many, this isn’t exactly news. The 360 has been infamous for its ‘red ring of death’ problem since its launch, and while Microsoft claims the issue has been largely resolved, there are still heaps of consoles that are refusing to fire up. But it yet again raises the question of what we should realistically expect from the hardware we spend so much money on. Should our games machines be considered throwaway distractions with a short initial shelf life? Or are they commodities that we hope will serve us well across multiple generations of the videogame industry?
//No consolation?
It’s a safe bet that every enthusiastic games player will know at least a person or two whose 360 unit has suffered some kind of significant problem. That’s not in any doubt, but I find myself considering my own games machines, and how well they’re serving me.
I should probably touch a large plank of wood as soon as humanly possible, but my 360 continues to tick along just fine. Indeed, across all the consoles I’ve ever owned, not a single one has broken so resolutely that it’s stopped me from playing and enjoying its games. Perhaps I’m particularly lucky. Maybe I just take good care of my equipment. I’m certain that anyone who knows me would stray towards the former.
Yet it’s not always been plain sailing for my gaming units. Until the relatively recent past, I’ve been very much a PC gamer. Since the mid 90s, I’ve been playing extensively on the big beige box, and it was only with my purchasing of a Playstation 2 and a Gamecube that my console playing career seriously kicked off. And while I’ve never had much of an issue with my consoles, the innumerable computers I’ve owned over the years have been in and out of the repair shop countless times.
That’s for repairs alone. This isn’t even considering the regular upgrades, updates and general clean-ups I’m forced to subject my machine to, just to keep it capable of playing even relatively recent releases. Whether it’s viruses, hard drive failures, processor problems or video card inadequacy, having to give my PC some serious care and attention has become second nature, as it is for an enormous amount of PC fanatics.
The difference, of course, is that the advantage of consoles has always been their plug-in-and-play accessibility. And with the games industry diversifying, and the amount and type of gamers rapidly increasing and demarginalising, expecting a home console to just work doesn’t seem too unreasonable. Furthermore, the range of places providing quick and thorough service to troubled PC users is vast. In contrast, if your 360 breaks, sending it back is often the only route to take.
Yet I’m still struck by the 360-related uproar and how it contrasts to the ambivalence of PC gamers. Of course, all of us like to have a little moan sometimes. Why can’t the machine we just spent the best part of a thousand pounds on continue to work to a reasonable degree for more than a year or two? But we still expect these problems from our personal computers, while shaking our heads, tutting or even angrily ranting at a console manufacturer, half of whose machines are playing up.
This is just food for thought. I’m not claiming to offer any radically contrasting opinion on the matter, nor do I believe it is acceptable for a relatively expensive piece of equipment to break so quickly and so comprehensively. But perhaps we should be demanding a response not just from Microsoft and the Xbox 360 team, but from the producers of any other format on which we have the chance to play games. After all, these things aren’t cheap – and if gaming is to continue in its growth, actually playing the things is going to have to become ever more accessible, for an increasingly lengthy period of time.
I think PC gamers have every reason to be rather laid-back about malfunctions, while the 360’s critics are correct to call it out as a shoddy piece of equipment. It’s about how each device is understood by its audience.
PC gamers have lived with breakdowns and bugs forever, and the modern PC experience is smooth sailing for anyone who ever had to deal with DOS. PC gamers know that their hobby has always meant difficulty and expense, and it’s not worth getting up in arms when a component fails or some kind of system-killing software problem appears. It comes with the territory.
More importantly, a lot of PC problems have everything to do with the way PC gamers manage their systems. They are constantly screwing with settings, introducing new components, changing configurations, generating extra heat, and changing OSs. There are so many opportunities for a user to screw-up his machine that one can’t really hold Microsoft or Nvidia responsible for everything that goes wrong.
Finally, my PC has a much harder job than any console does. Even though I said my gaming rig was going to be gaming only, it’s had to be my work machine and my media center. It’s working 18 hour days every day, and a lot of it is hard work.
The 360 is made to specifications by Microsoft, and even in that controlled hardware / software environment, Microsoft cocked it up. Consoles also promise that, unlike the difficult PC, they are easy and reliable. Plug and play. The 360 hasn’t lived up to its part of the bargain.
Sure – I’d agree with everything there. I think the pick up and play thing is really key. That’s always been the main benefit of consoles over and above PCs, and the reason console games continue to vastly outsell PC ones – core titles at least.
Another point I decided not to raise here, as it’s completely speculative, but I’ve a feeling that, contrary to what a lot of people have suggested, the 54.2% failure rate might be skewed a little high. People who are pissed off are generally more likely to be vocal about this sort of thing. If I’d had no issues with my machine, I’d almost certainly not bother filling in a survey just to say so.
The suck box 360 has a horrible 54% defect rate
people thats right
the shit box 360 aka OVEN aka X360 has a 54% defect rate . It has no games , no wifi, no FREE ONLINE, no dedicated servers, no HDMI 1.3 support,no BLU RAY player . It is just a dogshit console
54% of the x360s purchased HAVE ALL DIED
typical Microsoft and its bastard shitty products
Ooh. Calm down.
I really don’t want this to turn into an attack on the 360. I like the 360, I really do. I also like the PS3, the Wii, various older consoles, various handheld consoles and my poor, aged PC. I think the failure rate is certainly something worth discussing – and the concept of whether or not we think we’d accept this sort of problem in products other than games consoles.
Exactly that seems high and is a poll of readers so yeah maybe some people lied, true though the 360 failure rate is high and a point of conversation. I’m on number 4 but still like it as a games machine as I do my PS3.
I’m going out on a limb here Larry but I’m assuming you are a Sony fan?
what if i am a SONY fan
that suck box 360 is dead after SLIM’s launch
u are a [person whose views on this matter I disagree with] who buys the suck box 360 with a staggering 54% defect rate
stop supporting the shit box 360 that charges people for its lame peer to peer servers for 50$ online, 100$ for wifi
not to mention the OVEN BOX has no HDMI 1`.3 support
[Comment snipped by editor -- no console war flamebating round these parts, folks. Love games; love each other. We're all hippies. :-)]
Failure rates like this are unacceptable.
Stop defending this.
I’ll admit that I’m a Sony fan, been long time a Sony fan long time. I love my Playstation 3. But, you cannot honestly expect someone to just drop their 360 and not replace it cause it RROD on them numerous times when they have probably invested in 10+ games, extra controllers, extra accessories. To just make the jump to the PS3, cause it has a lower defect rate.
You can list all the benefits the PS3 has over Xbox360 has, but as stated before, most will not just abandon their game collections and investments(whether that investment is into entertainment) into the console based on principals.
now i wouldnt say the 360 has no games i would say it has a lot more games than ps3 me i own ps3 and 360 and i have more games on 360 than ps3 and i find that i have more fun on the 360 than ps3 the ps3 is a very good console it has better hardwear but the xbox has a better community than ps3 but the ps3s community is getting better by the day and with the pirce cut it will grow even more but the 360 has a price cut and some stupid people will know about the rrod issue but they will just get one because they can but yer gone off the subject the 360 has better games i would say but it has better games 4 now
Any thoughts on 360 failure rate versus PC failure expectations? Would be really interested to hear a few more opinions on that.
I had 3 systems from last gen, PS2 Xbox then gamecube, to play all exclusive games. I traded my PS2 for PS3 when it released,then Wii later while lining up in the cold (not really know why… and rarely play now), I had borrowed my cousin Xbox360, to play Gear of war (disappointed), bluedragon, and BioShock.Not until i pause the game and leave it on and come back 30 min later. RROD, returned it never want to borrow and buy the systems again. I told myself Only if MS fixed RROD, and Free Wifi plus Free internet, regardless it is 600$ I still buy it! But 1 and half year later, less exclusive games and less reason for me to puchase the system, not because of the price because it is not a Good Machine and too many hidden fee. I don’t Like it! Not really understand why ppl keep supporting it, but I guess if you got a American car, you just keep on fix it and put money into it. same for Xbox360 users who already got all the games, and subscribed for online play, and all the “Gears” they spent 100 and 100 on after purchased the system. It is understandable.
360 is my main console nowadays, so don’t take what I say as a slight against it as a whole, but the failure rate for the system is a calamity for Microsoft that should never have happened. I’m on my original console, but I’ve had to have it repaired because of the RROD, and it’s not because it’s ever been mistreated. For a console, a system that has fixed specifications that does not alter on hardware aside storage size, this whole thing should never have happened as there are far less variables to cause trouble. I maintain that the 360 was a rushed out system that was improperly tested.
With PCs it is somewhat expected that at some point every couple of years you’re going to have something going wrong, somewhere. But that’s because, as Rob says above, there is plenty more to mess around with on a PC; lots of the time when a PC has broken on me I know I only have myself to blame. It’s obviously still frustrating, but not as frustrating as watching a machine that is designed to be easy to use, as a console is, implode on itself without any interference.
Perhaps the problem is in some way to do with the fact that consoles are becoming closer to being PCs in friendly looking boxes – only with these ones, we can’t alter the configurations and optimise them.
Why do so many of you guys get so defensive over other people having differing opinions than your own? Do any of you have a stake in the companies you decide to support, it’s not like you have anything, to personally gain or lose. If M$ didn’t have any competition would such a high failure rate be so acceptable? I like all three systems, but I have to admit I favor the PS3. I was supporting all 3 equally for awhile, but games I wanted on the Wii slowed, and then I was burned by M$’s machine twice so, I’ve been supporting 360 less and less (I guess in case it breaks again). Point being now the lions share of all my games and acc. are on PS3, which I personally believe is the most value packed of the bunch, and that shouldn’t offend anyone, but so many people seem to take such things personally, I don’t get it.
Larry is not at all elegant about what he says, but at the core, he has a point I often try to make to people. Companies that make consoles that fail all the time and still make money at it….will continue to make consoles (and other things) that fail all the time. They have no incentive to make a good piece of equipment because you still give them your money. In other words, you, the Microsoft customer, are getting fleeced. It’s that simple. There are all sorts of things Microsoft SHOULD have done to improve the 360 before they released it. But they released it anyway and you bought it anyway. When it started getting red rings, everybody kept supporting it instead of DEMANDING that MS do something instead of continue to take your money. This kind of blind consumerism, in the end, WILL hurt the gaming industry as a whole.
I worry that, because so many people are obviously satisfied with the concept of sending their consoles back to the manufacturer for repairs and continually getting screwed, that this sort of shoddiness will permeate the industry.
And regarding PC problems…how many of the problems with PCs that you mention can be directly linked back to MICROSOFT WINDOWS? Microsoft does not care in the least about quality. Period. It cares only about getting your money into their pockets, period. Yes, it’s true that companies are in business to make money and I know that. But other companies seem to take a MUCH greater interest in putting out a quality product at a fair price.
I agree that the Xbox 360…. there is something really flawed with it. I’ve had mine break 4 or 5 times (I lost track) and my PS3 once. I got so frustrated that I bought an Elite and so far I’ve been good to go. In all I have had a bad experience with the 360 but yet i still play it only because of exclusives and that I play COD 4 with my friends but I still think that PS3 is hands down better, that’s my opinion. I am a Sony Fan and i will say the 360 has good titles but not good software and hardware. If it wasn’t for its deep pockets it would have died a long time ago.
As a Neutral gamer who owns all consoles i cant agree with the xbox not having games. First of all my xbox does have Hdmi suport games look better on it than on my ps3 (rb2, Oblivion) and i have gone tru 3 ps3’s since its release date due to malfuntions. I only gone tru 2 xbox 360’s and they both still work completely (reg one and elite). Blue ray well if i watched movies id just use my bluray burner on my pc wich is capable of better quality than my ps3. I only buy ps3 exclusives and the ocasional rpg thy might trow out but comparing the ps3 to the ps2 and ps1 its extremely lacking in the rpg department thus has little use to me as a console. The 360 on the other hand has quite a few rpgs wich are being ported to the ps3 now. In end i think the ps3 slim looks flat and horrid i like my consoles to be centepieces when ps1 turn to psone it looked better ps2 to pstwo same
but ps3 man looks like a old 3do…
I find the failure rate on the 360 very troubling; many older consoles are robust enough to last through several hardware generations, whilst a working 360 in its current form may be a rare sight in the future.
A PC may require upgrading and slight maintenance but they don’t irreversibly fail like the 360 commonly does, suggesting that the 360’s hardware base was either rushed out too quickly or produced at a substandard quality.
Either way, consoles should be built to last, regardless of the fact they’re cheaper than PC’s.
Because consoles technology is not as advanced as PC’s in general, there’s no excuse for mass hardware failures.
The Xbox 360 is a total piece of Sh#%! I had to send mine off 4 time to be repaired since launch. 2 days after I got it back for the fourth time – I took it to my local games shop and traded it and all my games for a PS3 and have never looked back. The sad thing about the 360 is that good gamers invest so much time and money in it that you don’t want to admit to yourself that you have been ripped off, or bought into a shotty product. Who does? The sad fact is that consumers need to suck it up and get rid of these things. Seriously people – YOU can live without playing Gaylo 3 and Fable 2.
the only thing more pathetic than the failure rate, is M$ attempt to excuse it.
while it could be over exaggerated and im sure it is.
no matter what the percentage is every person i speak to is on at least there 3rd 360,im on my second in 8 months, if this one goes M$ can kiss my money goodbye.
thats why i hate M$ they produce a pile of waste than polish it up and paint it to look exceptable, and constantly make BS excuses.
remember that claim arron greenburg made saying the RROD has been solved and the jasper MBs eliminated RRODs?
well mines a jasper and it RROD on me, and the jasper introduced another error the E74 which is just as bad.
not that sonys much better, they still have not came out and apolagised about the MASSIVE YLOD breakout after the 2.6 FW update.
my ps3 suffered from it and i had to shell out 100 bucks to get it fixed because of their screwed up FW update.
they screw up and i pay for it.
hows that fair?
at least M$ admitted to their fault and have extended the warranty who wants to bet sony will do the same thing.
ill bet my left nut they wont.
imagine when you buy a piece of electric equipment like TV or Entertainment center, and they scare you to purchase separate insurance and guarantee you that it will fail at least once (Best buy anyone?) will you still buy it? the answer is YES!!!! really? are you kidding me? YES!!!!!!!!
Yes, I think it has a LOT to do with consoles becoming more PC-like. The introduction of hard drives is, of course, the main thing here – and the direct cause of the RROD problem, for example.
As a PC user, having your hard drive fail is a reasonably common occurrence. I’d wager it happens to at least 54.2% of PCs some time during their life. Of course, they’re not only used for games, which is why it’s perhaps more understandable.
For all the biatches that compare the failure of 360 to PC
PC is not reliable? My PC never ever stopped working for the 2 years I have it now and it plays most games on highest settings. There’s no RROD or shit like that.
Besides, the hardware is not made by Microsoft, the only thing from Microsoft on this baby is the OS. Let’s face it, Microsoft succeeds at failing only, and milking stupid biatches who defend a faulty hardware.
Get a gaming PC bitches.
Did you really have to call everyone a “bitch” repeatedly? You sound like one of ‘em “gangsta rappaz”.
How can we accurately assess the failure rate of the Xbox 360? Is there a particular time frame that this figure is constrained to? Does this only include machines that have been returned under warranty? Has Microsoft set a “lifetime of product”?
In the end, isn’t the failure rate of everything 100%? It’s one thing for the mechanical components to wear out over time, but to have fundamental flaws in soldering and die manufacturing isn’t an issue of “wear & tear”, it’s an issue of poor design and quality.
If you return your 360 to Microsoft and receive a refurbished one (which was someone else’s broken console) and it breaks again, do you count that as a “new system” failure? I would think that if your console fails, is repaired, and fails again, the failure rate should double. I know of people who’ve been through this cycle more than five times; does this quintuple the failure rate? It seems to me that one machine breaking down multiple times is worse than more individual machines breaking down once. It shows that they cannot fix the problem, only relieve it temporarily.
Surprise, surprise – An Englishman is a 360 fanboy.
Being solely a PC man, I can hardly expect to weigh in on this from a console perspective, but I’m certainly aware of the problem as I know friends who’ve had failures with both the 360 and the PS3. The most badly afflicted failure friend had a PS3, actually, which died several times. He must have been cursed or something.
I think it’s highly reasonable to suggest that this 54% statistic is seriously skewed. We know that in surveys like this (and indeed in any scenario when people are encouraged to contribute to any discussion or information gathering exercise) that the people who are happy just don’t tend to respond as often as those who aren’t. In fact, if someone could magically produce for us 100% true figures that didn’t have this problem, I’d wager that the real figure of 360 failures would be – at least – ten percent lower than it currently appears.
Nevertheless, even if the truth is that far fewer 360s fail than the statistics show, it’s still clear that by comparison to its rivals, the 360 has a major issue which Microsoft should have eliminated literally years ago. But I think the ongoing problem does stem from the fact that they don’t feel they are being forced to solve the issue once and for all – almost everyone, presumably, has had their 360 simply fixed instead of replaced with an alternative rival console, for unsurprising reasons. If 360s were toothbrushes this wouldn’t have gone on – but as they are a wide-ranging, major investment that the owners don’t want to go without, and so the break/repair cycle has inadvertantly allowed the issue to fester for all this time.
It is of course hugely significant that consoles are more like PCs than ever before – it’s an unfortunate inevitability that hardware goes wrong, but when it does you can often remove the offending component, replace it, and carry on. But with an integrated console, if something dies, it’s all died and whole replacement or repair is inevitable. Combine that with obviously shoddy manufacture and you have a major problem on your hands.
Don’t buy 360 it Will break I had 5 friends and all their 360 did break twice or more than that. Mine broke only one time so I am happy.
I don’t know if I agree here. From the sounds of the 360 debacle, it has absolutely no resemblance to my experiences with building PC’s over the years. Whenever I’ve had a PC failure, it’s always been a direct result of something I’ve done. No, not storing things in the wrong place or not enough ventilation…I’m talking removing .dll files randomly. Or playing around with code in windows. Any number of nefarious crap you can find online. Fragmenting etc…
But, that was also when I was younger. Now I run my PC, like my father does. Proper layers of security both software and hardware. Weekly defragmentation runs. Auto-updates for Windows, and notifications for FW/Driver updates for my gfx card and mobo.
The 360 can die from simply turning it on, it’s not a matter of downloading a virus, it’s not a matter of updating firmware, it’s simply, you turned it on…and it died.
funny thing is. is that poll had so many variables of being staged
1)its a reads poll which means people who cared enough sent in which in this case are suck up ps3 fans
2)game informer as we all know is a bi est magazine so they could have only pick the votes they want
and 3) most people who have a dying 360 or ps3 treat them horribly….i work at gamestop i see all these disgusting systems…but thats not my point….
ive had my 360 since launch and it worked fine then i bought an elite to upgrade and both are still kicking….as is many of my friends…
I agree with this one. I also think that the failure rate isn’t accurate. They should at least tell us how they assess these things especially since they did say that the did something about the RROD.
Like 54.2% in 3 years? I dunno. If they did do something about RROD then they should at least tell us how that went.
I think we just have to let this go because I goes like this:
majority of the People buy a 360 then it dies then they fix it again then it dies again. On and on.
The audience thinks in black and white esp. if they’re already in a hole. you bought at least(for some) 10+ games for the system already and of course there are exclusives and ex-playstation exclusives that are on the 360 not to mention accessories. Having to give up on a system after all that is kind of a waste. Of course this doesn’t apply that much to people who have all systems. Now it’s just commitment.
and lets face it. Microsoft got lucky. They got the console out before Sony, they were able to reel in the next-gen hungry zombies long before sony got their chance. The zombies not knowing of the impending disaster that will dawn on them.
If it were the other way around. Microsoft would have been in deeper trouble than Sony is at the moment.
my xbox got 1 red light and an E73 error (not covered under warrenty) 2 days ago. i’ve had it just over a year and have played it for less than an hour a day since i got it. i’ve hardly put much strain on it and yet it still breaks. i feel completely let down…
I think you’ll recall that every system has had it’s own particular set of issues. Where you could pile two Nintendo games on top of each other to achieve playability, or continually blow into your old Playstation and dust off the games if they weren’t loading, the 360 in this case seems more of a failure of epic proportions.
We have been lead to believe, and were always under the assumption, that the products we purchase with a monetary transaction will work and perform reliably.
Microsoft, for the most part, has remained invariably consistent and clean of largely exaggerated product failures. Yet, the Xbox 360 has such a poor consumer satisfaction and reliability rating that the majority has either already experienced or will expect to experience a failure of some degree. No longer do we purchase these products with the expectation of consistent reliability, but realize rather that it will work “sometimes;” and we provide Microsoft money knowing full well the risks we take, for the thrill of the Game.
Who are you referring to? And what does that even mean? Are we going for console wars plus casual xenophobia? Do stop it.
Look, literally EVERYONE I’ve known who has owned a 360 has had it fail on them at least once. My brother in law. My son’s friends (3 or 4 of them), my best friend from my old home town. EVERYone. In my book, that sounds more like a 100 percent failure rate. But, even if it isn’t, the spectre of possible failure looms over every 360 owner — and that should NEVER happen. Consumers should simply demand better. The fact that they don’t means that they are just lining up to get screwed.
And that’s my concern. That it will become “normal” to have hardware fail on us. Companies HAVE to feel the pain of their mistakes before they will change the way they do business. It has to hit them in the wallet. Microsoft is completely disingenuous in the way they’ve handled all this (big surprise.) They’ve been sued left and right, but it still hasn’t made them own up to the problem. When confronted, they ALWAYS try to derail everyone by saying “yeah, but look at our GAMES!” Just look at their latest quotes on N4G if you don’t buy what I’m saying.
The exact numbers on the failure rates don’t really matter and you will never get them(because Microsoft knows that publishing them would be suicide for the 360). The only thing that matters is here we are talking about this 3+ YEARS AFTER LAUNCH? Everyone knows numerous people who’ve had the thing die. Someone above suggested that people can’t be expected to just give up their 360’s because of what’s been invested in them. I disagree entirely. I say that NOT doing so is simply fostering more shoddy hardware and shady denials and redirects. Microsoft absolutely COUNTS ON your gullibility to survive.
and that’s what I mean, people have become gullible and companies are cashing in on that.
That is practically the root of the problem, like I said they were lucky in garnering a large enough fanbase to survive because they came first. People wanted to see the great graphics, physics, etc. the next gen has to offer and sadly the 360 was the only one to give it to them at the time.
Once the public was very much exposed to “next-gen”, the ps3 came out and of course had it’s share of problems.
Didn’t the stiq of joy run an article where 3/4 of RROD sufferes said they’d buy another unit? the failure rate is horrid but the majority of system owners keep coming back for more
I have a 360 and ps3, i have to say i have never really been a fan of xbox since the first and the only reason i got the 360 was to see what the big deal was about halo 3 and fable 2. As far as how many games the 360 has compared to the ps3 i think most ppl are just going by the kind of games they like to play and not how many are actually out for each console… so that is basically just a matter of opinion. As far as comparing the defects on each console I bought my ps3 when it first came out and haven’t had any problems yet. I have not had the RRoD problem on the 360, but have had a problem with it not reading the discs i went on youtube just to see if there was a solution bcuz microsoft wanted like $100 or something to fix it but all the solutions require me to open the box which i don’t wanna do or bang on it while the discs is loading til it works i don’t wanna do that either so now I have to shell out money for microsuck to fix it >:(
I have to say i don’t fully agree with that statement.
the poll staging could be true, and I’ve have game informer but when i did subscribe to it i never read about xbox bcuz i didn’t have one.
However you can’t just brush off all of the 360 defects as people not being able to take care of their consoles I have both a ps3 and 360, I’ve had the ps3 since it released and the xbox i bought about a year ago both of them are treated well however now my xbox won’t read discs and i’ve barely played this console I’m usually on my ps3 or my PC. So bcuz my ps3 is still working I should just assume that everyone that has defects on it didn’t take care of it and its all their fault?
RRoD is just the console version of the BSoD on a PC which is usually a hardware failure (from the inside) or there was a problem with the software that u downloaded for ur hardware, so i don’t see how a person has control of that unless they physically took their 360 and just kept throwing and slamming it everywhere but spending 300 – 400 bucks on a console I’m sure not what loon would do that. All I know is that next time my 360 acts up I’m gonna put it right on ebay because surely someone will buy it, known defects and all.
I own both consoles and have far more games for my 360, possibly because I’ve owned it longer. I’m currently awaiting its return after it being sent back for the third time. It’s reached the point where I’m going to start favouring the PS3 for multiplatform releases purely because of reliability worries. Whenever I install a new PC game, there’s always that worry that it won’t work for some inexplicable reason, I don’t want the same thing to happen with my consoles. At the moment, the 360 gives me those worries.
Oh boy. Lewis you’ve opened Pandora’s Xbox.
Personally, mine broke. Did you know that in the UK, any product that breaks more than 5% of the time is deemed unfit for manufacture or sale? Interesting fact when you consider more than half of the consoles break. I vote for a class action lawsuit.
He’s not just opened Pandoras box but also the Ark of the Covenent from ‘Raiders of the lost ark’ where the nazis faces melt off judging by some of the comments on display.
My 360 broke, it was the E74 error which at the time was not covered by warranty but now it is and every one gets a refund!, good luck getting it though as we’ve been trying for about 3 months now with no joy. Microsoft really are a bag of shite
BUT
I still bloody love my 360 and I wouldn’t trade it for a PS3 for anything.
I am not sure it is possible to discuss a topic like this for long before the school kids join in. I guess at that stage of development it is important to establish some kind of identity for yourself, and purchasing your way onto one side of a hotly contested topic is a relatively effort free way to feel like you are part of something.
As far as the failure rate goes, I do agree it is very poor, suggesting MS rather rushed development. I also suspect if there is even a hint that the next Xbox has any tendency toward failure it will cost them heavily in sales. That said I think people vote with their feet and sales suggest that however unhappy people are they haven’t stopped buying the console. I accept that once you have a collection of games and hardware you are reluctant to change, but I doubt that all the new sales of Xboxes are replacements.
Personally I found MS very helpful when my console broke, and I had the good fortune to trade in a broken second hand console and receive a brand new one in return. I also doubt my experience of next-gen gaming would have been that much different if my friends and I had all bought PS3’s. The most important factor was always that almost all my friends (and certainly the ones with most games to lend) have 360’s and so the choice was already made for me. I like that there are rival consoles. It drives the market to innovate. Whatever you say about MS, I really doubt that online would have progressed so fast without them.
It says a lot about people these days when the majority seems to be unable to grasp the simple, but very important fact that 54% of Game Informer poll takers does not equal 54% of every 360 owner on the planet.
A more recent poll conducted by SquareTrade Warranties of 16,000 people has resulted in figures about 23% on 360 and 10% on ps3 (and 2% on wii)…and even these are not truly accurate…because if you actually read the details of this poll you’ll notice that these answers were received from 11,000 wiis, 2,500 360s, and 2,500 ps3s…hardly balanced and again 2,500-5,000 people is a small percentage of the actual owners out there…
Main point being the 54% figure is complete over-exaggerated crap…and sorry ps3 fans, but you’re deluding yourselves if you think your ps3 doesn’t have a pretty disgusting chance of failure too. Yes, it’s ridiculous of both companies to have as many failures as they do, but that doesn’t make either of them bad and unenjoyable products. Seems pretty silly to sit there saying “ha ha your system has a possible 2/10 chance of failing while MINE only has 1/10!”
[...] known failure rate is more than 5 per cent. Certain reports have suggested that the Xbox 360 has a failure rate of 56 per cent. This is unacceptable – but there’s little grey area because it’s a legal issue, not a [...]
“Statistics are like bikinis – what they reveal is suggestive, what they conceal is crucial.”
There is an amusing and disparate mish mash of ideas above, some pertinent, some not. One of the key points here is that the failure rate remains unknown, but is – anecdotally at least – too high. I’ve suffered one RROD and one E-74 error from a total of three consoles. For me, that makes the failure rate 67%, but clearly that is not a universal figure. The matter of which console is better is irrelevant; this topic is about expectations as a consumer.
I feel Microsoft has done what it could to redress the issues, including throwing out new chipsets (the Jasper) and returning/replacing for free. The only two gripes I have are that the warranty shouldn’t be time-limited on these specific failures (given that it seems to a design/build flaw), and that retailers have somehow washed their hands of the problem.
I live in the UK. In Greater London, in fact. None of my local shops will accept the return of any 360 after a year, unless you’ve taken out their insurance. Okay, so we’ve established the console failure is down to Microsoft – but High Street retailers can’t have it both ways. Either they can make a profit from selling consoles, and assume any responsibilities to the consumer therein, or stop selling them. I fail to see how a manufacturing fault gives them absolution. If a toy was dangerous or faulty, it would be recalled and shops would issue an immediate refund or exchange, surely? How has the High Street dodged the bullet here? I think that’s rather cheeky.
As for PCs – the first poster summed it up best. If you tinker with a machine (even when you know what you’re doing), and set its working parameters beyond its retail condition, then I think you’ve got to hold up your hands and say “okay, it’s my fault” if you fudge it. Or even if you MIGHT have fudged it. Yes, component parts shouldn’t just break, but then there is the vast minefield of compatability to consider. Your component pieces might be fine individually, but align them with the wrong bits of hardware/software, and you can hardly be surprised if your beautiful new labour of love falls over*.
*technical term