The 360's "Ring of Death" - An Anomaly or An Epidemic?

I fully expect my Xbox to give me the ring of death sometime within the next year, not sure if I'd be any less angry than you are now when it happens, however.

It really is a great machine. It just has a horrible failure rate. Here's to hoping that the new "elite" models work better.

I seem to be extraordinarily lucky when it comes to MS. Every product of theirs has performed like it was supposed to, with one exception: the HDD for my 360. It crapped out about four months after I bought the system (I was an early adopter, got a first gen 360).

When I called customer service, they asked for my address, and two days later a new HDD arrived in the mail. They said (the rep may have broken protocol here) that I should send the old drive back in the box the new one arrived in, but really that it was up to me. The day the new HDD came, the old mysteriously started working fine again, so I sent the new one back. It's been over a year since then, and I haven't had another problem. The disk tray seems to get stuck every once in a while, but that's the extent of it. Oh, wait... I did get the Ring of Death once, but I just powered it off, plugged the 360 into a better UPC, and restarted it. Never seen it since.

Now, I'm not so stupid as to think that because I haven't had any problems, the problems aren't out there... It is kinda weird that I've messed around with MS since DOS and Windows 2.0, and I've never seen a hint of these horror stories I always hear about.

Caspian, I am sorry to hear of your hardware failure. Of my XBL friend who purchased launch day units, about 20 in all, there have been two failures. In one case, we are certain that a repeat failure was due to chronic low-voltage at his house. He added a UPS that features automatic line conditioning, and has been solid since. I hope that Microsoft gives you great customer service and you get your system back online soon.

Thanks for the responses. I sent this article along with a plea to Microsoft's marketing department in the hopes that they'll hook me up. The rough data supports my idea, Timo, that the true failure rate is really about 10% (Not as bad as IGN says, and not as good as Microsoft says).

It's a great system, but it should be optimized to run well based on the average consumer's home voltage. Instead of me having to spend an extra chunk of cash on a line conditioner, perhaps Microsoft could incorporate one into that already massive power brick.

OMG! I have been through 4 XBOX 360 now!

1: This one was DOA. I bought this one during the launch time. The DVD player wouldn't read and would make a loud horrible clicking noise!

2: This one would not boot. It would just freeze on the XBOX screen.

3: I had a weird video issue, the screen would make crazy color patterns and eventually did not turn on. I called and it was out of 90 day warranty. Luckily the warranty was extended a couple months later.

4: Of course, got the three rings of death! I only had this one for less than 60 days and probably logged only 15 of play time total! Now the warranty was out. They wanted $139.99 for the repair, but I was furious at this point. They had a "Special" rep contact me a couple days later. Amazingly, they actually called me back. The rep offered me half off of the repair and gave me two free games (which I am still waiting for the second one that was promised to me). Now my XBOX is in its shipping process, and we will see if this new one will be better. Now I will be forced to buy the extend warranty or I will have a $400 paper weight and accessories and games that will be pointless!

I'm glad you're not going through the repair process :) I received my 360 back from the repair centre after the red rings, only to experience random freezes which ended up at a complete boot failure over the course of a day. I sent it back a second time, got it back last week, and fired it up today to the lovely e74 boot error. It'll be going back for its third time in less than a month tomorrow.

I'm hoping I'll be able to contact someone from Xbox New Zealand this week and complain properly.

My 360 went 14months after release i am starting to think ms are doing it for the money they know its an issue so why charge

I've bought a refurbished one a few weeks ago, and when I tried to run for the first time, I got the three rigns of death. I've requested exchange and waiting now.
Failure rate can't be one digit!

second system just failed (launch one was dead on arrival)with a manufacture date of 29/09/2005 .
microsoft is insisting on a repair fee for this second console(2 month out of warranty) , a pre 2006 system with known manufacture date problems.
i refuse to pay for the repair , when they know fine well there is a real higher failure rate than they are letting on .
pretty upset to say the least , but little folk like myself dont exactly have the bribery channels that some others do , and MS have basically said like it or lump it , just weeks after the UK watchdog article on the company .

I'm positive that the number is hovering around the 10% instead of the 3-5 that MS is offering.

I've been lucky thus far. I bought ming in May 2006 (mfg's in March 2006) and it's still running well. My family have it on about 5-8 hours a day between DVD playing, Media Center(Vista version) and Gaming. I've bought an Intercooler that I put on when playing games that I've noticed crash my unit (Viva Pinata frequently and Crackdown occasionally) and take off when not running those.

I do however funny intend it to die in the RRoD fashion which is why I bought the 2 year extended warrenty from MS (25$ cdn per year).

Hey!

I've had to replace 4 Xbox 360's already with this ring of death thing...The fourth Xbox I decided to try the "towel trick" where you wrap the 360 in a blanket or towel for 10 mins and let it overheat...The thing turned damn hot after the 10 mins and I had to let it cool down for 10 mins before turning it back on...

The result? SUCCESS!!! The damn things been working like a charm for the passed two days with extensive 12 hours of gaming with Gears of War...Try it out yourself and see if it fixes the problem!

Hi guys

It really is a shame. I've had Xbox since the launch of their first version....

My 360 just stoped working and gave me a big red smile last week.....

I'm still trying to understand what will Microsoft do in order to respond apropriately. For now it really seems that they are under-estimating the problem.

Microsoft should definetely extend the console warranty even if just for those know hardweare failures.It would be an absurd to simple make early adopters pay for this.

Martino

Wow! Some crazy stories here. I bought mine in the fall of 2005 (pretty early on) and had no problems up until my Hard Drive crapped out 3 weeks ago. I was using it very heavily too, as my main DVD player and gaming 4-5 hours per night. After they outlive a certain point (6 months or so) you figure with most devices you'll be fine at that point. Not so with the 360. It seems in a lot of cases they're a time bomb just ticking until your 1 year extended warranty is up. It's a damn shame too- it's the best system out right now.

It's just like the PS2 was. Sony was always bragging about how many consoles they sold... Well no shit, everyone who bought one had to buy 3 or 4... I honestly do not know anyone (among people I hang out with) who owned a PS2 that did not have to replace it at least once. Microsoft is in the same boat, there should be a class-action suit against them. I'm sure more than a few surveys will easily confirm that their failure rate is much higher than claimed and higher than what would be considered legal in in the marketplace. Microsoft is the one extorting money from it's own customers.

"So, you got all these games here, and a live subscription, some accessories... Pay us $399 or you'll never use them again!" -MS

I am now on my 3rd 360.

Twice the store I purchased it off refunded me (it was within two weeks of purchase each time) the next time I thought I would by one second hand from cex.com - it broke after a month - I telephoned the support line - and for some odd reason they shipped a brand new one out to me!

Five of my friends have one - six including me. 6 of us have seen the ring of death, each one of us purchasing them from totally different vendors, months apart..........great machine - but its life expectancy cannot at the moment be assumed to be above 6 months!

Caspian, unfortunately I'm in the same boat as you are.

My 360 decided to crap out the other day, and now only displays the ring-of-death. I tried calling MS and they want $140. Tried complaining a little and they decided to cut it down to around $100. It's a joke.. They've known the problems and they still want to charge to fix them.

I was an early 360 adopter, camped out for the launch, and now i'm screwed because my warranty is up. The sad part is..I've played my Xbox maybe a total of 20 hours since i've had it.

I don't know if you can help, but anything you or anyone can do/suggest is appreciated.

Another console failure here. My xbox crashes after about 10min of use. Mainly when the game loads a new map or jumps into a cut screen. I either get a hard crash/freeze or I get an unreadable disk error. Doesn't matter which game... gears of war, rainbow six: vegas, GRAW, Madden... I can physically hear the disk drive grinding and then it does a hard stop. Has done it since about 60days into ownership. I recently sent my box in, at my cost ($30). It was shipped back by MS less than 24hrs after the repair center received it. Got the box back, guess what - nothing was fixed, same disk drive and everything else was the same. In fact, now the disk tray was stuck closed, had to shift it over so it could come out. I will now send the box back again to be repaired - hopefully... It's not right.

The failure rate on this thing cannot be a single digit number, 10%, or even 15%. The failure rate seems to be at least 50%. The people who say "I've had my 360 a long time and never had a problem" are extremely rare and get rarer every time these accounts popup. Not only do you see constant reports of the problem but most of those tales report being on their 3rd, 4th, 5th 360. I only know one person with a 360 and it worked great for months, and then 2 weeks ago he told me he had to send it in for repair.

I think this is a widespread hardware design flaw that affects all 360s. Therefore, I think the failure rate could be 100%, and the people who do not have a problem just have an unit or gaming use habits that just hasn't caused their 360 to deteriorated enough to cause failure. The friend that I mentioned said that he didn't use the machines extensively, maybe a half-hour a day, and that probably accounted for the long lifespan of his system.

@Steve:

I usually do two hours a day gaming, and use it as my primary DVD player and music player (It's hooked up to my good stereo, and consequently sounds a lot better than my little Logitech 2.1 speakers). So total, that usually means my launch-gen 360 is on between four and five hours a day.

Dude, I don't get it either. The only thing I can say is that I've got it hooked into an extremely good UPS, and very, very clean power. As Caspian said, even if (which is doubtful) the problem is that the 360 is extremely sensitive to power fluctuations and voltage dropouts, that doesn't get MS off the hook; they should have a good regulator in that big-ass brick of theirs. I really have no idea why it's been this long without burning out on me, and maybe it'll happen tomorrow, but I really don't think the failure rate is 100%.

There really should be a study done to see what the differences are between the people whose 360s screw up left and right, and whose 360s have worked like a charm. Does the amount of usage or type of usage factor in? How are the respective power grids? Where is the unit placed, etc., etc.
Lastly, a study should be done by examining a unit that's lasted for over a year, and one that can't go sixty days without screwing up. When and where were they manufactured, do they have any different parts, etc.

Maybe I missed it, but I don't recall any real comparison studies being published.

Microsoft should send us 5 free 360s. Yeah, that's it. One for Caspian to replace the broken one and one for a backup, one backup for Frodo, and two for me for one to use and one for a backup.

Get right on that, Microsoft.

My brother had to get his Xbox 360 replaced twice already; my boyfriend's Xbox 360, which I use to play COD3 on almost daily, got the ring of death yesterday; and about 3 or 4 of his friends' Xbox 360 consoles broke within the last month (one today). The rate of failure is *definitly* higher than 25%. More like 80%. It is simply ridiculous.

NO there something wrong with the 360

i bought my 360 in may 2006 and lasted about nine months ever since i bought it on may, my xbox has been under a -no break + regulator- and has been put under a very well ventilated area, yet it still died, i thought mine was going to live a long time at least a year,still i called microsoft they replaced my 360 with a new one, only to find out that this one died only 1 month later, now im on my third xbox and all i am thankful is that i bought the 2 year extended warranty for like 60 bucks i think, smartest investment ive done. but yet people saying that the rate is like 15% is no way near . both times UPS came their truck was full of this things. MS better do something about it.

I purchased my Xbox 360 in January 2006 and it is still going strong and has never locked up or given me any problems at all. However, I do expect it to fail at some point soon, why? I know four people who are on their second or third Xbox 360's, all red ringed or simply failed for no apparent reason. Thats an 80% failure rate based on the people I know, either we are all extremely unlucky or MS is not telling the truth regarding the 360 failure rates ... i suspect the latter.

You should be able use a console with confidence and not be wondering each time you switch it on, 'will it red ring today?' If it fails I will try MS first, then the 'towel' trick if MS do not help, failing that the 'hot gun' trick, failing that purchase a PS3.

Shame on Microsoft.

I am now getting the red rings, the code that I get from the system is the 0102,or the Unknown problem.It seems MS is having too many problems with the 360 and it's getting out of hand.I thought people paying $600 for a ps3 was nuts,but my friend and many others are $800 or more invested in the 360 and still having problems.I have been an xbox fan since the launch of he original,but I begin to wonder if I a supporting the losing side.The ps3 console itself seems to be running strong,so do I make the switch??I love my 360,but I would love a reliable system more.

I just got the ring of death so you can count me among this supposed 3% (my AS%!).

Anwway, let me relay my story of calling Microsoft.

I called them told them I had the ring of death, the operator laughed as if he hadn't heard of it. I told him he had to be kidding and type in "ring of death" into google and he'd come up with a million hits (type it into MSN and you'll come up with nothing most likely).

Anyway, he says it's $139 to fix it. I say back to him "is it always 139 for every customer?"
"uhhhhh.... basically..... yesss" he says after a pause.
I reply "That sounds like sometimes no. When and how do some customers get it for less than 139?"
The operator states "When they dispute it and escalate it to a manager."
I reply "I want to dispute this price and immediately escalate this to a manager!"
"One sec." he states.
--- 30 second pause ---
"okay, the manager has approved 25% off for you so it'll be $104.50".

Point being - dispute the price and escalate it to a manager and hopefully you get the same deal I did or better - 104.50 vs. 139! Saving $35 for 30 seconds is obviously worth it.

This makes me angry though because it becomes very obvious that Microsoft is making a huge profit for all their returns. Seems very unethical to me.

o.k so microsoft are saying that there recall rate is 3 to 5% this i do believe to be a lie i have the three rings fo death once again, so if there recall rate is 3 to 5% why do they insist on us paying to have it repaired my guess is because more then 50% of there units are recalled thus them loosing money on repairing the supposed 3 to 5%. As my 360 is past its warranty i decided to open it up and have a look at there workmanship and discovered that only my cpu had thermal paste on it and the gpu had none. thanks bill you really are 1 in a million what a TW@T and thats putting it lightly in future my money will not be spent on your products like they have in the past . I'm now left with an exspensive paper weight and £500+ worth of games that wont make half that when i resale them. SONY FOR THE WIN

My xbox 360 gave me the death ring of lights earlier tonight. Reading all the posts in this page, i supposed the 360 failure rate is way more than 3-5%. I bought my 360 for a little over a year, but I have never played it that much, around 5-10 hours a week. I just bought a racing wheel last week to play forza 2 which was the main reason i bought the 360, now the thing crapped out even before i get to play the full version of that game.

i think microsoft should be fixing the 360's for free, to shut them up i think someone could sue them for false advertising because they say that its like under 5% failing rate, this must be untrue, someone with the ring of death should try sueing them then everyone would catch on and start sueing them and then they will fix them for free so they wont get sued again. Reading all these stories about the ring of death put me in a odd persition because it my birthday in july and i can chose from eather a 360 or ps3, and all my freinds have 360's but i worry that when i buy one i will get the dreaded ring of death

(p.s. to reader: sorry if theres some spelling mistakes in my comment)

I was a believer of the 3-5%. It happened to a friend, which sucked and we all felt for him. This past month it has happened to myself and today another friend. I have ten friends who have a 360, right now we're at the 3 out of 11.

I'm believing this is an epidemic and that the 80% range sounds like a more believable rate.

I hope they find a cure for this plague or ms can consider themselves sunk.

I was even thinking of getting one of the Xbox360 console, and i have been boasting/arguing that its better than the Sony Ps3, but later when i saw these comments, to my surprise i was shocked and even too ashamed not to argue again and not to buy one anymore,well with these intuitive comments of you guys, i hope the Microsoft Co-poration should adhere/apprehend changes to this complains and not to turn their deaf hears, because without the customers they can not sell, and they will definitely fall in sales. i wouldn't actually want to rate the game, but since its compulsory i gave it 2, based on you guys comments and because i have not own one before, but i have played it on several occasions, well thanks guys for your advice. Its really sad story to hear this from you guys.

But my question is: Is the ps3 also behaving like this? If not, then is it better than the 360 ( but on exception of the 60gigs hard-drive)

Micro-soft should also take time to assemble computer games or other electronics very well, before putting it on the market for sale, because later in the future the micro-soft might no be existing in terms of competition,but have laid a good foundation from the start.
And even though they bring up a better game console in the future the customers wont want to trust it, due to the failure of their previous development the 360.

Peace y'all, and i hope you guys that have experienced the ring of death would get your system back on line too,and to some of you who were lucky i pray it wont give you those 3 red lights

My word to y'all that are having the 3 rings of death is that, you should try keeping your 360 from dust and particles,reading the manuals carefully, and store in a cool place,the reason for the over-heating thing might be due to the sophisticated technology used in building up the 360, graphic display also, the processors e.t.c. and try not using the external cooler due to its unreliability and try not lending to other people(but of course they can come and play it in your crib(house) its okay)

Well no one is above mistake, don't be disappointed, because the Lord God Almighty is the one capable of no mistakes, we are humans and we are not perfect and not above mistakes, but the greatest disappointment is to fall in this same mistake once more and not to realize correction. So MICROSOFT Listen to your fellow customers and reimburse those who have paid for repairing their 360 due to Microsoft's negligence and capabilities, its not the customers fault c'mon.

Thanks for your advice, hmmmm...its really bad! and very sad to hear this.

I HAVE HAD 2 ,BOTH GOT THE RING OF DEATH, NO MORE FOR ME,THE SUPPORT SUCKS AND I HOPE THE 360 FOLLOWS THE CUBE. DEATH TO MICROSOFT.

I bought the XBOX 360 for my son who is a straight A student and I felt he deserved it. Lot more money than I wanted to spend but what the hec. Had it for around 8 months and OH NO, dreaded rings of death. Sent it in, listened to my son complain for about a month and finally got it back right at a month later-same unit serial # matched. Everything was going fine until...OH NO, dreaded rings of death again!!! Now to a 11 year old this is the end of the world, especially at Christmas when 90% of his Christmas list was XBOX games. Called up support and they are sending us a box AGAIN and this time I demanded to talk to someone so I could vent. Spoke to a Matt, id# 6708 who asked me a question right away...is your unit plugged into a surge protector? I immediatley said yes, because it is and he informed me that that is the problem. Well, needless to say I got a little upset because as usual, somebody is blaming someone else for their problem. I asked why hadn't anyone told me this before and why isn't that on any of the sites I have looked at for suggestions on what to do and he informed me that it is in the manual. I proceeded to tell him "you mean to tell me that all of these millions of blogs of people like me complaining about this piece of crap product have all caused it themselves by using a surge protector" and he said yes, that most of them probably were. Well, I owe it to the world to let them in on this secret- that it is your fault, you the consumer who spent your hard earned money, you who wasted hours talking to XBOX support and weren't told this secret, you, you are the problem!!! When I get this next unit back I vow to not plug it into a surge protector, I vow to leave it in a well ventilated area and I vow to read the owners manual as I was so smartly reminded by the XBOX support man, Matt id# 6708. This isn't XBOX's fault, this isn't an inferior product, this isn't a huge waste of money since they don't send you a new unit, they just "fix" the one you have...which by the way, breaks again 3 months later...This is my fault and I accept responsibility...now its your turn!

yo ppl

my xbox 360 got the red ring of death like everyone else. my best friend got his red ring of death like a week ago and i laugh in his face because i was like u must got a glitch one.... i had my xbox 360 for 2yrs and for one week i plug it in to a power surge and boom here comes the red smile. im pretty sure if i tell mircosoft this they will say its ur fault. but is it really my fault. mircosoft knew the problem since day one. they could of told us. but nooo they use it for their money. i used to say sony sucks and mircosoft rules..... but now i say death to mircosoft and praise sony... cant belive how long i defended mirosoft............

I agree that it's frustrating to have something you love and something you've spent so much money on break after 2 years, but that's really no reason to throw Microsoft out completely. Sure, it sucks that they knew that there were hardware issues and sold units anyway, but does that mean that they will never make another quality product again? No. Life isn't about absolutes, not everything is so black and white. Quit being dramatic and just play games. :)

i feel all your pain ladies and gentelmen i to am a victum of this bull#$%& this is my 2nd 360 the first one just kept freezing up i went and took the game back got a new one same thing i went back to sears a few days later they gave me another one and the 2nd 360 had a poster unlike the first one i was like cool had no problems at all until now ,, all this time i owned a 360 and never played xbox live until a few days ago its very cool when everything works out for you,,,,,,,,,, but then all of a suden im all happy after a hard days work come home eat some dinner then go xbox live and have fun,well the fun ended for me ,, what a joke hope your injoying my money there bill doller sighns in your eyes gates,, maybe you should put your ps3 down and pick up your own system and play it see how you feel after spending all kinds of money for your broke down systems ,,,,im pissed now... the only good thing is that its getting repaired ,,shipping for free,,but does not solve the problem what do i do when this #$%* happens again,, anyone from microsoft has a problem with this message email me freakziilla@sbcglobal.net id love to hear the excuses,, i should have just gottin a ps3 in the first place ,,,damn shame because i really liked the 360 until now ,,ps take a look at squar trades 360 problem reports the #1 system with problems the xbox 360 and its been out for what 2 and a half years you still cant get the system reliable you suck,,

i just got the ring today and i am torn between going with sony ps3 and buying another 360 i don't like spending money on something that i am waiting to break on me. I am going to call costumer support and see what little they can do for me.