According to Engadget, Microsoft is offering free repairs for all 2005 Xbox 360s. No sources or quotes, but if this is true it a good news for Xbox 360 owners. I for one have been pretty lucky with my unit. It hasn't frozen and it has only chewed up one disk. I cannot play the Bridge to Far level on Battlefield 2: Modern Combat. My 360 put a perfect circular scratch about a half a centimeter wide right where I guess the data for that level is stored.

Brian on the other hand is working on his fourth unit. He waited in line for hours at Wal-Mart on launch day and got one of the first systems available. However the unit would either freeze or get the "Three Red Lights of Death". After much yelling and screaming Microsoft fixed it for free. The second one worked for a little while. However when Microsoft pushed a software update, the machine couldn't handle it and croaked. Again after much screaming Microsoft sent out a replacement unit. This third unit was dead on arrival. This time Microsoft refused to fix it unless Brian paid $140. They said they should of charged for earlier "repairs" and he had to pay this time. To make matter worse Microsoft refused to sell him an extended warranty since his machine has had a history of problems. Again after much screaming they reduced it to $70 and agreed to sell him the warranty. Now he is waiting for his fourth unit to arrive.

One hand it is great that Microsoft is doing right by their customers. On the other hand if there wasn't this competition from Sony would they really of offered the refunds?

Sony of Canada was fine for fixing my Playstation-2 after the laser had stopped reading DVD games. The system had been 2-3 years old at the time. I understand from various internet forums that it was a pretty known defect and obviously the responsibility of the manufacturer for selling the defective product. Sony didn't charge me anything for the repair aside from the initial shipping cost (which didn't go to them but rather the courier company). I don't see Microsoft here doing anything exceptional. They produced a whole bunch of early 360s to meet with the hype at a rabid pace... and it turns out not all of them should have passed the quality control. Since there's obviously a problem with some of the consoles, it's up the the manufacturer to fix them for the consumer. And that's what they're doing.

Still, the imporant thing here is that the 360 is being fixed... But if someone ends up with a working one that he can enjoy (the only thing we should be buying console for), then problem solved.


Yeah, with this recent announcement, he probably has grounds to get a refund of some sort on that earlier work if there's a known history of problems with the product (and there obviously is). Of course collecting it is the real challenge since there's most likely no system set in place to reclaim the money or appeal the earlier work. Probably too small claims to make a lawyer worthwhile... but it sounds like there's a valid case here regarding the defective item. BBB maybe? Consumer watchdog groups?

The DVD laser has just blown in my PS2. Sony UK will quite happily take it back even though it's out of warranty but want £55 to send me a reconditioned console. Do I hang on now for a PS3 and keep playing old school Nintendo /Sega or get the damn thing fixed? I could get my PS1 out of the attic and get back into that for a few months.

I hate reconditioned replacements. 9 out of 10 times the replacement unit is broken one way or another.

If you're actually one of those planning on buying a PS3 around alunch, I'd say wait. From the sound of it it seems like you've got plenty of other consoles ot hand back on. The 55 pounds you pay for the replacement will just be another 55 pounds you wont have for the pricy PS3.

Besides this, reconditioned units have a bad histroy of braking down. My friend got his XBox reconditioned, it broke, and he got rid of it and the games.

Not worth the money. Ride it out and save for the PS3. You'll thank yourself later.

The console scratches the disc?!?

Man, say what you want about PC gaming, but that sure is something I never had to deal with... o__O

That's because you never had a CyberDrive unit.

CyberDrive?

I take it that you're talking about some sort of PC peripheral.

Well, in any case I never had one, indeed; but if we're talking about some sort of disc-scratching unit, I fail to imagine why I would ever want to; both my resourceful reader and writer have been doing quite a nice job for a while now...

Cyberdrive is a brand of cheap optical drives that not only were very unreliable (as far as I know, few lasted more than 18 months) but scratched CDs a lot. However, they were the only ones that didn't cost an arm and a leg some 9 years ago (cost around 40 eur when compared to 100 of most others, I think), and I had to use a couple of those before getting a far more reliable Philips unit.

I see... We'll I've always been the kind to adopt new stuff (be it soft or hardware) well after the prices drop and/or it becomes a standard; so I always get a fairly decent and solid version of whatever it is.

I guess people like you need to get a lot of CD's scratched in order for things to come to that point so... I guess... I'm sorry? :P

Coleco's computer, the ADAM came out in the early 1980s and used to ship with a cassette drive. From what I understand, the majority of these ADAMs weren't properly grounded and so magnetization from the computer would slowly "leak" over onto the cassettes, destroying the data that was stored on the tapes.

In the end, the ADAM was never a huge commercial success so there weren't as many of these out in the wild as other systems. After dropping it, Coleco got out of attaching their company name to videogames and computers altogether :)

We don't have a seperate platform for the ADAM right now, as the majority of it's games continued to come out on cartridges which could be read by both the ADAM and the ColecoVision.

Man that's fucked up... I never imagined the 360 horror stories would be so bad.

I love how Microsoft sells faulty machines to people and then acts like they're incredibly generous and consumer friendly when they fix those faults.. for free! Come on! Of course they should fix the problems for free! Or better yet: sell equipment that works in the first place.