Xbox 360 - 'Ring of Death'

[Bren's Mom]

My dss got the ring of red lights (aka ring of death) on his Xbox 360 a few weeks ago. I guess that means a complete system failure. He was devastated. It is almost 2 years old, so it was out of warranty. Or so we thought. Apparently this is a common problem. When my dh went online to find out if there was any possibility of sending it in to repair, he found out they are extending the warranty to 3 years because of this problem. He was able to print a prepaid shipping label off the site and off it went. They will either repair it or send us back a different one.

Just FYI in case someone has a disappointed teen on their hands and an over 1 year old broken Xbox 360 that they thought nothing could be done about!

 

[livie1205]

thank you!! I had never heard of this and I just got my ds one this christmas! I would be POed if something like that happened...

 

[jt'smom]

we've been through this 4 times with my son's xbox 360 over a 2 year time span! microsoft is really good about the repair for this and normally, it only takes about 2 weeks to get it back. we did end up buying him and extra arcade (the cheapest one) version though, since he already had the hard drive from his elite version and he eventually ended up swapping the repaired one out after the 3rd "red ring of death" episode!!!

one thing that will help in the future is to sit his xbox up on something to get air circulation underneath it and to add the intercooler fan. that way it won't overheat if he's got friends over and they are playing for several hours

 

[Julia M]

My dss got the ring of red lights (aka ring of death) on his Xbox 360 a few weeks ago. I guess that means a complete system failure. He was devastated. It is almost 2 years old, so it was out of warranty. Or so we thought. Apparently this is a common problem. When my dh went online to find out if there was any possibility of sending it in to repair, he found out they are extending the warranty to 3 years because of this problem. He was able to print a prepaid shipping label off the site and off it went. They will either repair it or send us back a different one.

Just FYI in case someone has a disappointed teen on their hands and an over 1 year old broken Xbox 360 that they thought nothing could be done about!

Good to hear! Our XBox is 2 years old and the same thing happened just this week. (DS got it for Xmas 2 years ago)

I am irritated-it should last more than 2 years.

Julia

 

[blessedby3]

This happened to us- we sent it off and they sent us another one plus a free trial to xbox live.

 

[brittsmum1998]

Thank you! Britt got this for Xmas and I hadn't paid for the extra warranty yet at Target. I had planned on doing this this week. Now w/ a 3 yr warranty I won't bother.

 

[Bren's Mom]

Thank you! Britt got this for Xmas and I hadn't paid for the extra warranty yet at Target. I had planned on doing this this week. Now w/ a 3 yr warranty I won't bother.

I wouldn't assume you have a 3 yr warranty. It's possible that only older models with this issue have it. Or that they're only covering it for 3 years for the red ring of death thing. I'd call Xbox to confirm for YOUR model specifically before making that decision.

 

[jstack]

When my son told me about the red ring, I thought he was joking. Turns out the company is aware of the problem and did a great job repairing the game system. It has worked fine for the last year.

 

[bgohre]

I love the term "red ring of death"!

My nephew has had that happen to him 3 times. Seriously, what a mess this system is.

Tip: By a Wii or PS3. You can play on line for free with those systems.

 

[Sammyjo]

This is our 4th red ring of death in 2 years.

Recently an error code is started and the console has stopped working. I learned by calling Microsoft this error code was also covered by the warranty of 3 years recently.

We get a newer console each time. I would like very much that Microsoft fixes the problem once and for all, the problem exists since the release of the Xbox 360, several years ago. My children can not do without it when done with it.

 

[cougar242]

Question?? We have already sent ours in once for the ring of death and it has recently done it again. Do you only get one chance for them repairing it for free, will we be charged the $100 this time?

Thanks!
Kim

 

[Disney Hot Mama]

same thing happened to us.. RROD - my son looked up on the computer and got what was needed to send it back.. We received it quickly - a newly restored system - didn't think we received our origional back plus one month to XBOX live. Promptly sold the unit to Game Stop and bought a Wii which we are all having much more fun playing.. But I agree with everyone that Microsoft fixed the problem quickly and we were very pleased.

 

[Pungodingy]

can you tell me where you found the label? this just happened to our machine also, but I'm not finding where I can print the label...

tia

 

[Bren's Mom]

http://support.xbox.com/support/en/us/nxe/default.aspx

That should take you through all the necessary screens.

 

[shortbun]

Ya gotta keep 'em cool folks. they overheat easily if not equipped with cooling fans. We bought an aftermarket fan and ours got the death ring when the sun was baking it on a summer day. We moved the whole unit to a cooler spot when it was returned good as new.

 

[Mrs. Charming]

It amazes me how widespread a problem this is!! DH's just died *again* for the 4th time, he's been able to fix it up until now. We just ordered a new one from Walmart with a new 3yr warranty. (Ours was out of warranty, and it would have been voided anyway b/c he had fixed it himself.)

 

[ZachnElli]

We've had the red ring a few times and we've always just let it cool down for a few days and it starts right back up. We've never sent it in and we've had it for 3 years.

 

[funnygarcia]

Yep, buy those coolers if your kids are heavy user "game vidiots". We had the ring of death once already, cooler slapped on as soon as it returned and has been fine ever since. It's on a large portion of the day as we use it for Netflix and dumped local and cable TV.
The Wii is not exempt from overheating, we had errors and it locked up/ power fail. Added a cheap after market cooler and it works fine. Recently it got tipped over causing a game to be stuck inside, bracket inside broke causing blockage. Way past warranty and with current price drops it wouldn't be worth it to send in for repair. We did our own "fixing", it's a bit cannibalized with the front cover off but it still works.

 

[Heather1101]

We just got ours back from being repaired..took about 2 1/2 weeks. We actually got a refurbished replacement, which works just fine.

We had ours in a well ventilated area with the cooling fan hooked up to it and we got the 3 rings of death right at the end of our 2 years of ownership. DS left it alone for a bit and got it to work again, off and on, for 6 more months before it totally crashed for good at 2 1/2 years of ownership.

 

[eeyoregon]

My son's Xbox has gotten the ring not once but twice. Both times were well after the warranty period but all it took was a phone call and they sent us a prepaid mailing box and in a few weeks we received a replacement Xbox (I compared serial numbers and they were different machines both times). I really appreciate that they are standing by their product.