untitled

I’ve just started what I fear to be a long journey. Like so many other Xbox 360 owners out there, my console ended up with the dreaded three red lights of death. I know Microsoft has recently updated their warranty on all of the existing Xbox 360 consoles, but I fear mine will be a special case.

I initally purchased my Xbox in February of 2006, and I’ve had no problems with it at all. The console sat through hundreds of hours of Oblivion, Gears of War, Guitar Hero II, and countless other games. That is, until one night in June 2007.

A friend of mine was over to watch some TV and have a few beers on an average summer night. After watching TV for three or four hours, we decided we should play some Guitar Hero. I guess that was my first mistake.I turned on my Xbox, and everything seemed to be working normally. I launched Guitar Hero, and everything was still working normally. Then I was greeted with a screen telling me there was a new patch available for the game. “Great” I figure. Maybe they’ve fixed something in the game, or possibly added a new feature. I unsuspectingly agree to apply the patch, and wait for my console to restart. This didn’t seem to disable my console, as it started up again, and I had launched Guitar Hero in no time.

I decided to get a little adventurous and pick Free Bird from the song list, and start playing.I managed to get about 30 seconds into the song before it completely locked up. I’ve seen my console lock up a few times in the past, so I wasn’t concerned. I waited 20-30 seconds, but nothing happened, so I hit the power button, and waited to restart the game. I never got to. The console refused to start up again, and just gave me the flashing 3 lights.  I tinkered for a while, removed my harddrive, etc, but I couldn’t get it to work.

The next morning, I phoned Xbox support to ask about the problem. They ran me through the potential fixes, and then told me my xbox was at the point of no return. I’d have to replace it if I wanted to continue to use it. I was fine with that option, until I’d realized that I was 3 months out of warranty, and the fix would cost me $170 dollars. I declined their repair on the phone, and said i’d try to fix it myself. And so I did.

Since I had no warranty left, I had no problem opening the console to try and solve the problem.I had minimal success with various methods i’d found online in getting the issue fixed. In fact, no method seemed to give me more than an hour of playtime before my console died.  I decided that I was done with Microsoft products, and would have no more dealings with them. That is, until…

Microsoft extended the warranty on all Xbox 360 consoles from 12 to 36 months. Now, my 3-red-light Xbox could have been returned, and I would have happily accepted a new Xbox in the mail. After all, I should have had to pay to replace a $600 piece of hardware 15 months after I bought it (my reasoning is, I still have a functional NES from 1988, so why should something built in 2006 break so quickly.)

I thought I could phone Microsoft and get my issue resolved, just maybe, since I reported the issue on my own, before trying to repair the console. It was, technically, out of warranty when I’d made those phone calls, I should have been free to open the case. This however, did not seem to be the case.

I phoned Microsoft again this past Monday, to ask about getting a replacement unit. Everything was fine until I’d mentioned that I had attempted to resolve the issue on my own. It took several conversations with several agents before they acknowledged that my console could be fixed under the new extended warranty. I was told that I would receive a courier box in the mail within 3-5 business days, and that my console should be returned to me within 15 business days.

Unfortunately, I didn’t receive notification that the shipping box had been sent out to me until 5 business days after my initial call.  In any case, i’m now embarking on what could be a very long journey with Microsoft, attempting to get my console replaced. Hopefully the only news I place here about it, is good news.