Microsoft expands 360 coverage against RROD

[AndrewTS 0]

Microsoft Expands Xbox 360 Warranty Coverage

 

REDMOND, Wash. -- July 5, 2007 --Microsoft Corp. today announced that it will expand its global Xbox 360™ warranty coverage. Any Xbox 360 customer who experiences a general hardware failure indicated by three flashing red lights will now be covered by a three year warranty from date of purchase. All other existing Xbox 360 warranty policies remain in place.

As a result of what Microsoft views as an unacceptable number of repairs to Xbox 360 consoles, the company conducted extensive investigations into potential sources of general hardware failures. Having identified a number of factors which can cause general hardware failures indicated by three red flashing lights on the console, Microsoft has made improvements to the console and is enhancing its Xbox 360 warranty policy for existing and new customers.

Microsoft stands behind its products and is taking responsibility to repair or replace any Xbox 360 console that experiences the "three flashing red lights" error message within three years from time of purchase free of charge, including shipping costs. Microsoft will take a $1.05 billion to $1.15 billion pre-tax charge to earnings for the quarter ended June 30, 2007 for anticipated costs under its current and enhanced Xbox 360 policies.

Full Text

 

Translation: We had to do SOMETHING before a huge class action suit hit us!

 

Now all they need to do is fix the damn problems with their system (time will tell if the additional heatsink will be the magic cure or not).

[Obi Chris Kenobi 0]

Well, looks like someone at Microsoft is on the AA program or something. First they admit they have a problem....

[Fökai 0]

CAG'ers say that they will be refunding those who had to pay for previous 360 repairs.

 

This is great news. I can finally send in my 360 with 3LD without worrying about the cost.

[In Credible 0]

I really think MS deserves a lot of praise for this, I really doubt a company like Sony would ever extend their warranty not once, but twice to fix their mistake.

 

Almost everyone I know had that disc read error problem with PS2 and you didn't hear people getting them fixed for free.

[Obi Chris Kenobi 0]

Now you mention it, people still get problems with Blue Disks on their PS2s (old or slim line).

[World's Worst Man 0]

This is much, much worse than the PS2, it's not a valid comparison at all.

[Thoth 0]

I really think MS deserves a lot of praise for this, I really doubt a company like Sony would ever extend their warranty not once, but twice to fix their mistake.

 

Almost everyone I know had that disc read error problem with PS2 and you didn't hear people getting them fixed for free.

 

Got mine fixed for free, well out of warranty.

[Karnage 0]

From 90 days to 3 years. The stores that are selling service plans are screwed.

[Guest Smues]

From 90 days to 3 years. The stores that are selling service plans are screwed.

 

That's the best part of the whole thing. I almost wish I hadn't bought one yet, just so I could go buy one from Worst Buy and see them squirm as they can't really offer a protection plan. Or even better try to sell me one anyway.

[El Psycho Diablo 0]

This is much, much worse than the PS2, it's not a valid comparison at all.

 

There's no way in hell it's as bad as the PS2 was.

 

[In Credible 0]

This is much, much worse than the PS2, it's not a valid comparison at all.

 

Actually the PS2 was much much worse than this is. At least people are getting replacements and aren't paying out of pocket (and if they did are getting reimbursed). I know several people who had to buy a second PS2 because of all the disk read errors and general shittyness that was the PS2's durability. I also know a couple people who paid $40 to have Sony fix the disk read problem, I had to crack my PS2 open and adjust the lens probably 4 times, and I didn't even use it that much.

 

Inconvenience is one thing, but having to pay on top of it is another. Microsoft made a mistake and are going above and beyond to make it right.

[Mecca 0]

Whoa I have one that is blinking the 3 red lights.......I had since bought a new one but I still have the other......I should send it in huh?

[AndrewTS 0]

Whoa I have one that is blinking the 3 red lights.......I had since bought a new one but I still have the other......I should send it in huh?

 

Yeah, but I suspect if you call anytime soon you'll be waiting an hour + on hold for the privilege to talk to Habib, er, "Harv", who will diagnose your problem and send you a coffin.

 

MS needs a 360 online web self-service form badly. Although probably if they put one up they won't be able to handle the demand.

[World's Worst Man 0]

This is much, much worse than the PS2, it's not a valid comparison at all.

 

Actually the PS2 was much much worse than this is. At least people are getting replacements and aren't paying out of pocket (and if they did are getting reimbursed). I know several people who had to buy a second PS2 because of all the disk read errors and general shittyness that was the PS2's durability. I also know a couple people who paid $40 to have Sony fix the disk read problem, I had to crack my PS2 open and adjust the lens probably 4 times, and I didn't even use it that much.

 

Inconvenience is one thing, but having to pay on top of it is another. Microsoft made a mistake and are going above and beyond to make it right.

 

Once again, PS2s weren't failing at nearly the rate that Xbox 360s are. I don't know how you could possibly spin the PS2 as being worse, the failure rates don't even seem to be in the same stratosphere. If they were, I'm sure Sony would have been forced to do something like Microsoft has done. But they aren't. The old "well my friends..." anecdotes don't mean anything either, it's a small sample size. I can just turn it around and say that I don't have any friends who've had problems with the system and that mine has worked since I bought it in 2001.

[Mecca 0]

Whoa I have one that is blinking the 3 red lights.......I had since bought a new one but I still have the other......I should send it in huh?

 

Yeah, but I suspect if you call anytime soon you'll be waiting an hour + on hold for the privilege to talk to Habib, er, "Harv", who will diagnose your problem and send you a coffin.

 

MS needs a 360 online web self-service form badly. Although probably if they put one up they won't be able to handle the demand.

 

Actually I called about 20 minutes ago and got to talk to someone within about 5-7 minutes........it was a woman who actually sounded american LOL.....

 

Anyhow they're going to send me a box to put it in and send back through UPS I don't even have to pay shipping charges.

[Scroby 0]

This is much, much worse than the PS2, it's not a valid comparison at all.

 

Actually the PS2 was much much worse than this is. At least people are getting replacements and aren't paying out of pocket (and if they did are getting reimbursed). I know several people who had to buy a second PS2 because of all the disk read errors and general shittyness that was the PS2's durability. I also know a couple people who paid $40 to have Sony fix the disk read problem, I had to crack my PS2 open and adjust the lens probably 4 times, and I didn't even use it that much.

 

Inconvenience is one thing, but having to pay on top of it is another. Microsoft made a mistake and are going above and beyond to make it right.

 

Once again, PS2s weren't failing at nearly the rate that Xbox 360s are. I don't know how you could possibly spin the PS2 as being worse, the failure rates don't even seem to be in the same stratosphere. If they were, I'm sure Sony would have been forced to do something like Microsoft has done. But they aren't. The old "well my friends..." anecdotes don't mean anything either, it's a small sample size. I can just turn it around and say that I don't have any friends who've had problems with the system and that mine has worked since I bought it in 2001.

Sony wouldn't have done jackshit no matter how high the number was about PS2's breaking. Trust me, Sony sucks ass when it comes to dealing with reparing Playstations. I used to have customers come in all the time asking for me to switch out their Playstations with another one because Sony wouldn't take care of them. In hindsight, the 360 breakage is almost just as bad as the Playstation 2 continuesly breakage but here's what makes the 360 issue less than a problem than what was Sony's issue.

 

Microsoft is at least taking care of it, admitting they fucked up, making it so less of their systems have the same issue, and issuing a longer warranty for those whose 360's break. Sony on the other hand...just didn't care. Sony didn't offer any kind of help if you didn't have a warranty with them or if it was up. When I worked for Gamecrazy I would get customers with broken PS2's all the time, just about every day of the week I would have at least one person who would need to return their PS2 and either get another one or want their money back because it was their 3rd PS2.

 

That's what makes the PS2 breakage much more worse than the 360 breakage.

[AndrewTS 0]

The "x is worse than y!" stuff doesn't seem to hold any water--we have *no idea* what the console failure rates are/were for PS2 and Xbox 360. Except they were both a hell of a lot, and PS2s had that problem *much later* than the 360s have. Looper repairs have been extremely common for the 360, "anecdotally" yes, but there's no shortage of anecdotes about it.

 

The internet of several years ago isn't the internet of today, either. We didn't have the huge blog presence then as we do now. You can't cover up a large product failure rate these days. Microsoft was, up until WEEKS ago, refusing to admit there were inherent design flaws and seemingly offering no assurance of a change of design or policy.

 

Of course, the added heatsinks were known about, pictures posted online, and Microsoft refused to comment on them at all.

 

Then BOOM, big press release like this. It's typical corporate ass monkey behavior--"if we didn't say it, it doesn't exist/didn't happen...until we do, and we'll just forget that we ever refused to admit it."

 

Trust me, Sony sucks ass when it comes to dealing with reparing Playstations. I used to have customers come in all the time asking for me to switch out their Playstations with another one because Sony wouldn't take care of them.

 

Starting from the PS2 slim onward, Sony includes standard 1 year warranties on all their Playstation products. PSP, PS3--also one year. And the failure rates on both have been apparently miniscule. Sony learned their big, expensive lesson. MS are learning now too, but it's going to cost them over a billion dollars.

[Scroby 0]

Trust me, Sony sucks ass when it comes to dealing with reparing Playstations. I used to have customers come in all the time asking for me to switch out their Playstations with another one because Sony wouldn't take care of them.

 

Starting from the PS2 slim onward, Sony includes standard 1 year warranties on all their Playstation products. PSP, PS3--also one year. And the failure rates on both have been apparently miniscule. Sony learned their big, expensive lesson. MS are learning now too, but it's going to cost them over a billion dollars.

Ok...but it also took Sony how long to do that?

 

[World's Worst Man 0]

Bringing up the PS2 was just such a completely irrelevant point in the first place, but you know what, maybe it was worse, maybe it wasn't. No one but Sony and Microsoft know the real figures. Which was actually worse doesn't even matter, it's about how the public perceives it, and this shitstorm surrounding the Xbox 360 CLEARLY dwarfs any kind of bad publicity the PS2 got. That is ultimately why Microsoft took action. You can go on about how Sony "sux0rz!!", but this is Microsoft you're defending. You're kidding yourself if you think they'd have done anything if not for the awful, damning publicity.

[MrRant 0]

From 90 days to 3 years. The stores that are selling service plans are screwed.

 

That's the best part of the whole thing. I almost wish I hadn't bought one yet, just so I could go buy one from Worst Buy and see them squirm as they can't really offer a protection plan. Or even better try to sell me one anyway.

 

 

It only covers RROD. If your HD fails for some reason, you're boned. Or the video output decides to konk out or the tray stops opening.

[2GOLD 0]

What I want to know is this, if my system breaks...do I get a new one or a refurbished one like I did with SONY? I got two of those POS PS2's from SONY and both broke down with the same damn problem I had sent the one before in for. So I waited 4 weeks to play 2 weeks before I had to send it in and wait another 5 weeks!

 

Eventually Sony did make fixing the Disc Read Error problem free but they never repaired one damn system really. Eventually you were forced to by the third run system which didn't have the problem.

 

Now if XBox is fixing the problem for good when you send it in, then yeah they have a much better customer service/repair center. But to call one problem or the other big is stupid since both are big problems when a 300 plus dollar piece of equipment is breaking down for no reason other than faulty design.

[Mecca 0]

Maybe they'll send you a new one...

[World's Worst Man 0]

Microsoft sends refurbs.

[Scroby 0]

Microsoft will either fix yours and send it back to you or they'll send you a brand new one. I was told this from them before I sent it in. What their doing with mine at the moment...I have no idea. I'm guessing their gonna fix it then send it right back to me.