Microsoft admits flaw in the Xbox 360

After more than thousand complaints of Xbox 360 users, Microsoft has admitted Saturday night that there is a flaw in the Xbox 360. That happened in the Dutch television programme "Kassa". The flaw causes CDs and DVDs that are spinning in the player to get damaged.

According to a press declaration from Microsoft, the Xbox 360 can cause scratches. Initially the company denied to be guilty for the damage. Microsoft kept saying for months that the gamers themselves are responsible for scratches on the discs.

After research on the Xbox 360 it was determined that the scratches occur by the lack of a so called "bump pillows" at the lens. From the data of "Kassa" it would concerns a worldwide serial of approximately 1 to 2 million Xbox 360 consoles.

In the consumer programme "Kassa" Microsoft promised to offer aid to users who have complaints in the form of repairing. It is however not possible to get a new console.

[dalectrics]

..to mine, no doubt. The noises that came from my old drive woke the dead! Sent it for repair and they sent me a new console within 5 days, so I don't know about the last statement.

PS - tip for scratched discs, clean them with Brasso (UK product - used for cleaning Brass and metals but works a treat - saved me buying/replacing any scratched games)

[Babylonian]

The last statement concerns only to Holland i think. Espcially after the waranty of the consumers is expired.

But I think that the reason MS is not giving new consoles is because they had 1000 complaints, I they were to give all those people a new console than that would be a lot of money they would lose. If you look at the alternate scource I provided then you can see the programme. It is in Dutch but it shows the research that is done for the show. here is the link also: http://player.omroep.nl/?af...

And another thing if I might add. If the console only has that problem then why give a whole new one, just repair the one thing that causes the problem. And that is why they are only offering repair.

[techie]

That's disgusting dude.

Good news and bad...it's all for this site.

[JasonPC360PS3Wii]

It was the doing one one person that 166 about 156 was one person don't try and use this to your PS3 fan advantage.

[bilal]

what are they going to do about that, release a patch that enables them to run games without spinning.

360 is the crapiest system today, even the ps2 lasts much longer. So when people start talking that a major portion of ps2 sales are due to repairs and replacements, 360 has and would have even a greater proportion.

[Ban Me]

Does it say what drives are affected, or is it all of them.

Real responses please... no fanboy answers.

Cheers ;)

[nix]

i thought they were talking about the "ring of death". but i wonder if they will ever accept that one. would be catastrophic!

[Icryo]

I want to know why the 3 red rings problem arises...

[TheMART]

This only regards the Toshiba/Samsung drives, as they don't have the rubber bumpers around the lens/laser.

I'll copy paste my post from the article just below. Both about the same problem...

Well, they're right about the T/S drive having no rubber bumpers close to the DVD drives lens.

BUT

As long as you don't move the drive while it's spinning, and having the console standing stable, it's almost impossible to get the disc to scratch. I have a T/S drive myself. I know at least 10 persons with a T/S drive. Never any scratches...

The most funny thing is (if you can read Dutch otherwise use babelfish), the research that has been done for this program Kassa said something completely different, read it here

http://www.hardware.info/nl...

In short they say:

Yep, the rubber bumpers are missing. That's a shortcoming of MS's product. BUT we have not been able to actually get the scratches in our lab, not even when we turned the console while spinning. NOT ANY. The discs came out without the scratch 'rings' as mentioned.

And they tested intensively. MS has acknowledged this problem in the mean time and will change the consoles if people want to including the discs.

If you ask me: I think those people have caused it themselves. I have no friend that got scratching like this using the console on a normal way. Their own research showed with intensive testing they couldn't reproduce the scratching. But, the rubber bumpers should have been there for sure.

Go read the link (with babelfish) and verify yourself!

[Ban Me]

Thanks man.

I have the hitachi so should be fine.

As you say though, most of the time it's probably down to user error rather than the drive itself. A lot of people are more stupid than they would care to admit!

[Babylonian]

the link isn't working for me right now, but at the end of the show they say that if you place the 360 stable enough you won't get scratches.

I haven't watched the whole show cause I'm at school right now and they have no sound but I'm gonna listen to it when Im back.

I do think that it occurs often when you move the 360.

*edit* I just read the article, they said that they tested it by using many different disc and without any scratches. They used the console verticaly and horizontily and still now scratches. But they did get scratches from flipping the console whil spinning tin the disc.

[Ugly American]

Tell that to my two 360's that have had the disc scratching problem. Both have been laying horizontal and both have ended up grinding on my discs. One finally rubbed so hard on the disc that it no longer works. The other one is my wife's and gets less play time, but I imagine it will have the EXACT same issue before too long.

I picked up a new Xbox 360 in Dubai for $460.00. I figured it was about as much as I would pay with taxes. So I will get the first broken one fixed(it is a launch Xbox) when I get home from this cruise, and trade it in for the Elite.

I have had no red rings of death, just the disc rubbing. I love my 360, but it is obvious to me that it is not perfect. But at least I have games to play on it vice my PS3. It has definitely run out of usefulness until I get some new, GOOD games.

[schnodder]

360 is electrocrap. ps3 is the pure powermachine this gen. i myself had 2 360s with a ring of death and i did nothing but changing a game.

at my local videogamestore they´re just selling ps3s cause all the people know that its the best system available

[blackmagic]

haven't had problems myself...

[IPlayGames]

I can respect that. But man your company is making defective consoles ON PURPOSE. thats not cool for gamers anyway you cut it.

You say you've done all these test but ive seen it for myself under normal conditions. It not just scratches game but does it enough that you can play them.

so all they need to do is accept that the three light is there doing to. Now im wondering how good they made the Elite.

[artman]

this is no M$ fault, ths is the third party supplier fault... M$ is a SAINT!
your statement is not very clever to read... no matter who's fault... it is under M$ quality check and assurance... now blame the person who is incharge with quality check.

if Cell doesn't working well... blame to IBM and other... hello?
blame china to produce a crap 360, blame hitachi or samsung to make a crappy dvd-rom, blame the chip factory to create overheat design of chip... blame everyone... they are still 360. why don't you blame M$ not to produce everything themself?

windows bluescreen? blame the PC, is not the OS fault, red light? blame the developer...
I see something is missing here...
it's alrite to be a fanboy... but be wise~

I have 360.. and I know how it works ok... yes my 360 didn't scratch my disc yet, but it got red light... and useless now.
that's my fault, because I don't check around the forums (like this one) before I buy.

[Saint Sony]

Do NOT ever change the xbox360 from vertical position to horizontal if you got disc inside. This will most likely damage your game or what ever disc.

Here's a youtube video of one other test which really shows what happens.

[frostbite06]

too bad for quake 4. My personal choice would have been pdz or ridge racer

[id dot entity]

Woah hear that sound when he's changing the stance of the Xbox! But sounds pretty logic to me that you don't move your Xbox when there's a disc inside.

[Nik]

they admit to their mistakes.

[Bathyj]

Ok, now that they've admitted problems with such a bog standard component like a DVD drive whats the big secret about the 3 red rings? Tell us the story there M$. Its time, dont you think.

EDIT: Oh I see someone disagreed with my statement. Don't you want to know why your Xbox keeps breaking down and what M$ intends to do about it? I know I do.

2ND EDIT: Ha, another disagree, but 2 agrees, as well. So from my own little poll of 5 five people (including myself) we can surmise that 60% of people whose X360's break down care about it and think M$ should tell us what the problem is, and 40% of people whose X360 have broken down, dont really care and think everything's cool.

[artman]

so they are not honest to the customer all these times... if dutch TV haven't put that on the show... I doubt that MS still denied the scratchs disc...
how about red light??

honestly... MS had put a lot of junk quality on their 360~ technology advance... yeah ... for use in 2-3 years... quality and reliability ... NO~

[uHuRu]

Xbox 360 hardware is really flawed. the hardware is pure crap.

[calderra]

Microsoft DID talk about this issue, IN THE SYSTEM'S MANUAL!
It says not to tip the system over while a disc is in. And that's the statement that covers this exact issue.

If you leave your system stable on a good surface like you're supposed to, you will not have any problems.

Understanding the whole issue/10!

[Babylonian]

but during the programme there were also people who didn't do anything wrong with their 360 and still got the same problem.

It is also hard to believe that 1000 people all moved the console while letting the disc spin. You can't say all those people are dumb and don't know how to take care of their console.

[hamburgerhill]

I have 2 360's and have yet to see a scratch! 360 isn't crap and I would still buy another one over another platform which I feel is crap!

[FadeToBlack]

I myself have also had 2 360's and know about 5 friends that have never had this problem. When you look at the big picture most customers dont experiance any of the problems some flaming fanboys claim to have on this site. Same goes for the other consols also. Someone hears about a problem 1 person has and they use it as flaimbait for the consol war agenda.

[darthkojima]

why buy that crapy console huh? the consoles engineering sucks big time.. the first time I saw the 360 diagram it really sucks. resistor and capacitors are junks too bulky.. compare it to PS3's chipsets engineering design was just meh..

[TheMART]

Don't talk sh!t man... You know nothing about engineering if you say this clearly.

BTW the PS3 has strange engineering...

Sony thought the Cell could also do all GPU tasks. Late in the design process they found out it was to weak for that, so they went to Nvidia with a bag of money. Said: What can we buy for this amount of money? Nvidia gave them a standard PC card, already outdated. It's integration isn't flawlessly.

The 360 has a special build GPU, optimal integrated with all parts. Now that's engineering.

What has a DVD drive to do with the way the 360 is build BTW? In it's origin this is Toshiba/Samsung's fault. They should have had the rubber bumpers in place just with their PC drives!

Hitachi did the job right there

[cuco33]

are you an engineer? are you an electrical engineer? are you a manufacturing engineer? did you look at both board layouts and understand what you are looking at? or did you just see the different circuit layouts and components on each and preach your brand loyalty that one is better than the other or that one LOOKS better? even if sony's layout is better, your post obviously shows you have no clue what you are talking about.

copied from the OTHER thread below...
"first off... ps3 has NOTHING to do with this article, so dont bring it up. this is a message to all, DON'T BRING IT UP. this site continues to go to crap because of all the fanboyism and brand loyalty

second off... before people start crying out malice and say the 360 is a hunk of crap and that they dont care for their customers, note that initial complaints aren't enough statistically to show the specific problem does exist. it takes many to pinpoint what exactly is wrong with what system, what serial, what components and is not an isolated case... that is why managers are more than likely to blame the end user and not their product. this happens across the board with game consoles, radios, cars, refrigerators, everything... for this particular case initial specs for the drives most likely didn't state to have the bumpers in them, and since this is business, the vendor probably saw fit to not utilize them for cost savings. ever hear a penny saved is a penny earned? yeah... business... the good thing is that most likely the requirement spec for new drives will have this feature, all be it to the cost of a frustrated customer and bad publicity. you don't really think that a company can be in business with so much bad press do you? their fans would turn on them. and that would cost them more in the long run. also dont forget that sites like these blow things out of proportion every time the 360 red rings or the bad ps2 lasers are mentioned... it reminds me of the imus sharpton crap going on as we speak..."

i'm not saying MS is at fault for admitting the issue only now, but i am saying STOP YOUR BULLSH*T PEOPLE! ps3 may very well resort to similar issues as it hasn't been out on the market long enough or been used to the extent the 360 has been, hells my sister's laptop is a sony vaio and is the biggest crud of crap i ever came across. she spent well over $400 to "fix" an issue that was supposed to be done under warranty. what they did was reformatted the HD, reinstalled windows xp and the same issues arose. now is that MS's problem for their OS or sony's problem for their laptop not being able to start without an error, charge correctly, loading issues numerous times via their LITE ON branded sony dvd-r drive, etc? the issue could very well have happened if she mishandled it, or if someone delivering the package to the store dropped it.

[Nervsys]

Yes this may be a serious problem for some, but at least 360s are being stress tested (playing games) by their owners rather than just collecting dust like most PS3s.

[level 360]

It's good that Microsoft has admitted to these faulty consoles, now they should also put-out a statement on their websites about this problems and possibly repair/replace them. Every consumer deserves to get their money's worth considering how expensive these consoles are, and also the game softwares. And to those fanboys who keep defending that it might be the consumers' who are at fault - let me tell you, that you are also one. Don't defend these rich manufacturers especially on this sort of issues, they were definitely cutting on cost which has made them pay dearly.

[Marty8370]

Problem solved.

[Says you]

XBox 360 has flaws its kind of to late to be admitting that right now considering they have been waiting to tell the XBox 360 fans for 3 years.

[omansteveo]

The reason you dont here this about ps3 i bc theres no games to buy for the system to scratch

[ItsDubC]

This was either a witty potshot at the PS3 or a fanboyish assumption that the PS3 will have the same drive issues. Entertaining to say the least.

[TheExecutive]

you can scratch blu-ray discs all day and they will still play... unlike the DVD.

[brianodom]

ROFL

they hid it in the 360 only section of this site...HAHAHA

[decapitator]

it was on the main page..dont know why it got moved though.

[tehcellownu]

but it came back and haunted their as$ i remember xboxfanboys was blamin the people who owns it and not microsoft..i was laughin so hard..why fight eachother when microsoft hardware is the main problem..

[BubblesDAVERAGE]

I know at least 5 people with a broke 360. But I know at least 10 with a broke ps3. Maybe that a good thing the more broken systems means the more replaced systems . Worked fine for sony ,even I went through 1 broke ps2: then got another one.

[fenderputty]

/chuckle

[THELANDSOFSAND]

umm, i remember this 'secret' flaw being discussed about 4 months after launch- people were moving their console with the disc in and scratching up copies of PGR and perfect dark- microsoft told people not to move the console when the disc was being read (i.e spinning). they offered to replace copies of scratched games for people who were unfortunate to catch this flaw. they also moved to replace the offending samsung drives with new parts from hitatchi and in the past month, BenQ.

Gamefly also sent out a message to its subscribers about this issue at the same time, about 4 months after launch. It's fairly well known in the gaming circles.

i have yet to scratch a disc in my console while playing- i had a launch console and i am about to be using my 3rd console from microsoft as i seem to be burning out my dvd lens's with too much weed smoke, incense or endless Gears Of War frag-fests (!). both times i had my console replaced microsoft customer service was very helpful- the first console was replaced for free out of warrenty and the time i was given a yers Live subscription and a years warrenty for free as well as a 50% discount.

my new console will have the benQ drive in it which is supposed to be a lot quieter and more reliable- I'll let you guys know how it really is in a few days.

[id dot entity]

I saw the episode of Kassa and I was pretty surprised that Microsoft admitted the flaws (finally).

I am planning on buying an Xbox 360 next week... keep my fingers crossed that mine has "bump pillows".

[TheMART]

Yep it will.

MS only delivers Hitachi drives now with the bumpers. I've been following forums on repairs, all T/S drives send in came back with a Hitachi drive

[overrated]

ha

[The BS Police]

And best of all, my 360 is a launch console, I never heard of any problems with scratched discs unless if somebody tilted the 360 with the disc inside.

[Babylonian]

just a certain few. But it's quite funny though, Sony as getting a lot of bashing on the PS3 about their hardware and at this point I haven't heared a lot about defective PS3.

The PS3 also has a Blu-ray player and it should be noted that many people thought it would have many issues because it's new technology and all, ironically it turned out to be the Xbox 360.

[shotty]

I had 2 cracked disc but none were scratched (I have a console made oct 2005 btw), the console works fine though. I remember reading that the newer drives all have rubber padding to prevent scratching so if you are so determined to see the rings of light flip when you move from horizontal to vertical then do so but please take the disc out first ;). None of us hopefully dont flip our PCs or DVD players while they are spinning disc, also DO NOT leave your console or any disc based deivce on top of a Subwoofer or right up next to it, it will cause the disc to bounce around and possibly crack.

We all spent alot of money on our games and contrary to beleif, neither microsoft, sony or nintendo can't defy the laws of physics and every reaction has an equal opposite reaction so shaking a console which is spinning at 10000 RPM is going to cause that disc to exsert most of its energy against the side of the drive in a fraction of a second.

[EZCheez]

I don't care what system I own. If I had a game console that broke down repeatedly, and the manufacturer took over a year to acknowledge the problem (while still avoiding an even larger one-red ring), that company would lose my support. I have never supported ANY company that ignored the problems of it's consumers. What I think is really crazy is that this seems to be the only venue where Microsoft is lacking. I love Windows. I love IE. I love Microsoft Office. So don't say I am choosing sides. Both companies make quality products, just of a different type. Oh well. If only Sony made the hardware and Microsoft developed the software for it. I can only dream.

On a side note (don't get mad, some of you guys are too serious)

THINGS 360 OWNERS DO WITH THEIR 360 TO SCRATCH CDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

1. Dance?
2. Put them in a pillow cover and beat PS3 owners
3. Throw them across the room after dying in GeOW
4. Driveby 360 tosses at PS3 owners
5. Cuddle with them
6. Sleep with them
7. Have breakfast with them
8. Enjoy walks on the beach with them (sand really messes it up)
9. Share candlelit dinners
10 Take them to amusement parks

PLEASE ADD TO THE LIST IF YOU KNOW MORE!!!!!!

[kidd2446]

the 360 has so many problems,usually when a company puts a product in the market and people start reporting and complaining about glitches and hardware issues/red ring of death.the company has to make a recall of that product.they should admit to the other defect that bricks the system after a year in use....RECALL! RECALL! RECALL!

like i said many problems not just scratched discs but ALOT of red rings that warrants a total recall

[The BS Police]

A few faulty Disc drives in not enough to warrant a recall.

The Xbox 1 and PS2 had similar problems.

[JasonPC360PS3Wii]

but I have heard of a one or two cases one with my friend from Canada but MS fixed it. Don't try and spin this most CDs are still scratched by owner neglect by moving the 360 with a CD in it.

[PeeStree]

omg!! They should be selling that 360 crap in junkers.. There is NOTHING xbots can say to try and spin the fact that M$ [email protected]#ked up..

and you xbots are so blind that you will try endlessly to explain when this is only happening and how and why, as if yall were M$ employees.. They were stoned while they were engineering that piece of [email protected]#t.. PERIOD

Give me a break.. Better say: Yeah we got a lot of games right now but a sh|tty machine that won't play of all them before crapping out on me..

The less the bubbles... The more i'm gettin on xbots nerves.. yesssss

[Bonsai1214]

problem... i thought they were addressing the ring of death.. oh well

[Blackmoses]

it's been a bad few days. First Guitar Hero's controller being all jacked up, then the patch bricking systems and to top it all off Microsoft admitting to one of the problems with the 360 (not the reason behind the rings of death, but a problem none the less).

Dreamcast .... Dreamcast!!!... Major Nelson....Major Nelson!!!....

who?...what??...huh???...who said that??!!

[power of Green]

#24 is correct!... Any fanboy can make a company seem like its having a bad day(s).

[power of Green]

The anti MS post will never end its one thing to have an opinion about a story its another to go out of your way to spite a company with malice driven hate.

[kingboy]

aaahhh!! poor guy ,go report sony fans to your boss microsoft.

[AudioRage]

it would appear that a man with lack on intelligence said that.?

Also, i must be the luckiest man, the only piece of tech that has ever broke for me, was an ipod. and like every ipod breaks, so thats no biggy

[Blackmoses]

are you guys getting paid by them cause your sure are ready to jump to their defense if things don't appear to be going to hot. Would you really support every company like this if they had the same problems? Let's say this was a car....would you just say "oh well so and so is working out the issue, although this is like my fourth time bringing it back" would you really be this calm?

O.K maybe the car metaphore was a bit over kill, you obviously didn't pay that much for it (unlike the Sony guys, yes I'm one of them..lol...it is a lot of money to dull out).

It seems to me you guys are settling, your just willing to accept it cause....you just don't wanna appear to be wrong in all the things that have been said regarding the two consoles. Regardless of whats going on it's always the same story..."I've had mine since laucnh ...never had a problem..." I've heard this more often than not, it's pretty sad.
The bad thing about it, those that say they have had a problem you accuse them of either being a idiot and not taking care of it or say their sony fanboys flamming. Surely not everyone on here claiming they've had a problem is a sony fanboy. Someone somewhere has had a problem at some point, even you.
Yeah sony has had their problems with the controller and the resolution scaling and even wifi disconnect, but you know what none of these problems have kept them from playing GAMES!!! The problem microsoft is having is preventing just that.
Look it's this simple...Microsoft put their name on the box, therefore they must stand by it good and the bad. Yes that means admitting that the problem exist and that means working to find a resolution to it as well. You guys act as if they could do no wrong and when someone does point out a problem....you downplay it and try and make light of it.
Look if somewhere down the line I had problems as rampant as the 360 with my PS3 and Wii, I'd be mad as all hell (and I'm not saying I haven't had problems with mine, just no where near as many).
You guys really need to get a grip....you bash on Sony for so long that if the tables were turned as they have been the last couple of days you can't handle it comming back at you.
Hypocrites!!!

[silent ninja]

i think people also don't know how take care of their products. i mean some carry 360 while a disk is spinning u can't blame microsft

[DJ]

of stationary 360s chewing up fresh discs and making them obsolete. Don't try and blame legitamite Xbox 360 owners who have been unfortunate enough to suffer through issues that Microsoft is responsible for creating AND denying.

[Hayabusa 117]

OK, this clears some sh!t up.

Firstly, I don't think it comes down to people not taking care of their discs. Neither me, nor my brother have ever had damaged a disc deyond use (or even made it difficult to read) and I have never had any problem with discs in the 360...excpet for Gears of war.

The first one was my brother's disc in his 360 (I was playing), right in the middle of the menu montage, it stops. I took the disc out, and it had split from the centre of the disc outwards (not scratched - literally, split). This happened to two more discs in my brothers 360 - and most recently, in my 360.

We are fully aware of the problem with moving the console while the disc is in it, and so have never done so. And no other game we've played in either console has even been scratched.

This problem of the lens not having a cusion could be the cause, although I don't know why it only happens to Gears of War discs. Perhaps something to do with how the game streams content? I know about two other people on my friends list who have also had problems with their Gears discs (one says his disc has split, but he can still play it...the other just keeps having read error messages...again, only with Gears of War.)

@DJ

Except it's never happened to Oblivion, and we've played both just as much.

[DJ]

Gears is one of the few titles on the 360 that's constantly streaming data off the disc, so that makes sense. I'm sure the same thing would happen with Oblivion (and potentially GTA)

[kidd2446]

a gaming system has to be built to handle any type of roughness because its a gaming system the maker has to keep in mind that it do have people/kids that is goin to handle the system in a way they feel shouldnt affect the hardware that will damage it...come on dude if microsoft admits to this problem why are we debating about it the 360 do have problems including the red ring brick thing so stop defending microsoft and let them fix these problems

[Bonsai1214]

who the hell carries around their system while its running with a game in it?

[snoop_dizzle]

fortunetly I'm lucky, i haven't had one problem with my 360. Even if i do, i can get it fixed for free so I'm happy. I didn't give up on my PS2 when it broke. I'm also wondering if the consoles that are having problems are the ones that came out at launch. I was smart to wait. I do that with every console.

Just because a console has many issues doesn't mean it wont sell. like the PS2.

[sajj316]

Just how many of the 360 consoles 'sold' according to MS are replaced? Anyone have the metric? I just see people say ... "I've replaced mine 2 times" ... "I replaced mine yesterday" ... As an Xbox owner, its worrying. If I were MS, I'd concentrate more on hardware QA. Let's be honest, they are no experts when it comes to hardware at least from a manufacturing standpoint.