Gaming

This past Tuesday, I had to ship my Xbox 360 Elite to Microsoft again. Last time I had to send it in for the infamous RRoD back in June of 2008. This time it’s for the “Open Tray” error & since the unit is out of warranty… I paid them $99.00 which includes another year warranty. Xbox Support said they’ll most likely replace the unit for their latest Elite version which is supposedly quieter and runs cooler… we shall see.

When an Xbox 360 cannot read a CD/DVD or game disc, it may not recognize that it has a disc in its drive. Instead of “Play Game” or “Play DVD”, an “Open Tray” option appears. The issue is linked to a dirty laser in the DVD drive, a magnetic problem that prevents the drive from spinning, or insufficient lubrication of the drive motor. However, disconnecting and re-connecting the Xbox 360 sometimes works. Taking out the disc, closing the tray, then re-inserting it can go around this problem, as the opening and closing of the tray tells the Xbox to read the tray for content. Lately some cases in which the Xbox 360 can not read any more discs reporting this error all the time have appeared.

UPDATE – 06/27/2008 @ 4:32PM: Received repaired console. The serial number was the same, but the manufacturing date was different. So, it was pretty obvious that they replaced the sticker on the back of this Xbox 360 Elite.
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UPDATE – 06/15/2008 @ 12:02PM: Well, what I thought was a cooling problem was not. I got the three flashing red lights again yesterday. I received the box from Microsoft to ship it to the repair center, which is what I’ll do tomorrow.
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UPDATE – 06/09/2008 @ 1:07PM: I moved the Xbox 360 from the entertainment center and is now standing upright. I played for a little bit last night & this morning without problems. So, I’m hoping it was just a cooling issue.
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Yesterday while playing GTA IV, it started to lock up on me. So, I wanted to make sure it wasn’t the game as there have been reports of GTA IV locking up on some PS3’s and Xbox 360’s. So, I started to play Guitar Hero II and that locked up on me also. This is the same thing that happened with my other Xbox 360 before it got the infamous three flashing red lights. So, I called Xbox support and it never flashed the three lights except while on the phone with the first agent. They had me perform normal troubleshooting and told me to call back in fifteen minutes. I called back and talked to someone else. They decided it was a hardware issue and that it is going to cost me $99.00 to fix since it’s out of the warranty timeframe… by a month. I explained that it was getting three flashing lights also at random times. The person said he’ll mark it as a three flashing lights issue since that issue is part of the extended warranty, but if they don’t get the three flashing lights when they receive it, they would call me. They are sending me the box within 3 – 5 days and I will ship it off to them. After I got off the phone, I tried four times to turn the Xbox 360 on and got the three flashing lights. I’m hoping they experience the same issue as it will be a bummer to fork out $99.00 for them to fix it.