Hey All,
This is my first post to a forum but I have a theory that I am keen to bring to other's attention regarding the 3 rings of death. If your 360 had broken down recently then I would be really interested to hear who has experienced the same thing.
Before I go into this I would like to explain that I am not a console fanboy, I own a 360, Wii and recently purchased a PS3, 360 is currently my most used console because the games available (Halo 3, Forza, Mass Effect) more closely match what I want to play and I like the usability of Live and Acheivements so what I am saying is I have no real beef or axe to grind with any console manufacturer but I do feel "put out" but the whole 360 breaking down issue.
So my point is this, I have owned my 360 for 1.5 years, having purchased it in Dec 2006. I didn't play it much initially, beyond completing Gears. I work full time and really only have around 4-6 hours a week for gaming (missus at home, one tv to share - you know the score
. I knew about the 3 rings of death issue and my understanding was that its caused by the solder on the GPU getting too hot, a connection goes and hey presto 3 rings of death.
So while playing GTAiV recently I noticed the 360 was crashing more and more, to the point that I would load up GTA and it would crash around 20 seconds after loading. I tested my other games and same thing. I tested a film DVD and same thing. B$gger I thought its gone. However no three rings of death.
So knowing about this 3 year warranty I head to the Microsoft 360 service center web site. The warranty that was covered in all the major press only covers the 3 rings of death otherwise you pay £50.99. Ok I think that's not great but I'd rather have a working 360 than a brick right? So like a good citizen I pay my money, and get the 360 back in 10 days fully repaired with a note from Microsoft with the Motherboard ticked as being faulty, and saying it had been fully replaced and tested and a one month free membership to Live.
Good service I think.
But then I a couple of days ago I was speaking to a friend on his second 360 (this is a regular theme amongst 360 owners) saying his was screwed - similar fault but more severe as it attempts to load the game and crashes every time on loading - screwed 360. But no three rings of death. I then spoke to another friend whose console broke down a month back - similar fault no three rings of death.
SO what am I getting at here following this lengthy post? Well this - we all know that the 360 failure was caused by Microsoft rushing out the console without testing it fully in an effort to beat Sony to market - fair enough, they did well. But they essentially released a product not fit for purpose. We also know that Microsoft had to set aside just over a billion to offset future repair costs.
It occured to me that it would be pretty simple for Microsoft to "turn off" the 3 rings of death lights in a system update then make us all pay for repairs by stating they only cover that particualr fault in their extended warranty - very sneaky and frankly very Microsoft-like business practises. As I said I have no axe to grind, I don't hate Microsoft, the 360 was the first next gen console I bought but I have a strong suspicion that this is how they have offset their liability - no 3 rings of death, no extended warranty free repair, much smaller liability in terms of repair costs. (I don't doubt the motherboard will have cost more than £50.99 with p and p but that's not really the point).
I'm very interested to know if any of you guys have experienced similar - obviously we're talking recent failures as I think they will have removed the warning in a recent system update....
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