360, 3 rings of death

dtokez · 4 Mar 2011 at 00:26

Hi all, well I was playing last nite and my xbox froze up and outputted some annyoying noise to the speakers. It also messes up the graphics on screen (hopefully you can see from the photo). I restarted then it worked for about 2 minutes then the same thing. Now it doesnt even boot.

I am aware that there are major issues with the older xbox's and have done a fair amount of research, but I cant find anyone describing my exact fault, and im just wondering if anyone has had the same issue as me, and if the method of re-applying the thermal transfer compound and re-fixing the heatsink has worked for them?

Cheers

MagicBoy · 4 Mar 2011 at 00:32

That's a borked GPU...

I replaced the clamps on mine and got another 4 months out of it before it went again. Re-applied and tightened and got another 2 weeks. Then it died completely.

Ended up replacing it with a Jasper machine which broke it's DVD drive at 11 months old and was fortunate enough that the retailer offered to swap it for a pre-order 360S the week before it launched.

dtokez · 4 Mar 2011 at 00:34

Borked as in fooked and not fixable mate?

edit - ah thanks, so it may be worth a try then? but possibly will still die.

or maybe fix it then sell it quick to one of those rip off highstreet 2nd hand games traders

MagicBoy · 4 Mar 2011 at 00:40

It's a temporary bodge fix at best, whatever you might hear from the parts sellers on eBay and YouTube!

I'd get it reflowed properly to be honest, or just replace it with a slim.

dtokez · 4 Mar 2011 at 00:52

ahhhh I see, so the idea of bolting it down hard is to press on the solder joints so they make contact again then?

do you know if they are bga's?

MagicBoy · 4 Mar 2011 at 00:56

Yep x2. Doesn't work long term though, it's a design flaw.

dtokez · 4 Mar 2011 at 01:42

i see mate. did they ever fix it with the old design?

i might try the cheap fix, then when that flops take it to work and try and re-flow it properly hmmmm

WatchTower · 4 Mar 2011 at 09:02

I'd have thought as soon as the Xbox Slim came out everybody would be rushing out trying to get rid of fats to buy slims. Get money off the slim and get another 12 months warranty. It's what I did with my fat PS3 when I got the PS3 Slim.

With Microsoft track record it's makes the idea sound even better.

McBain · 4 Mar 2011 at 13:42

Mine did exactly the same thing, glad I had another 360 console in the house (slim)

.... I'm going to try and fix it myself, I realise it's temporary but it'll do for the time being.

MagicBoy · 4 Mar 2011 at 15:57

danrogers said:
i see mate. did they ever fix it with the old design?

Nah. Microsoft were swapping the logic board out. The replacement was a later revision which was essentially the early Elite board with a the original port layout so it fitted the old case.

dtokez · 5 Mar 2011 at 00:34

ah i see cheers guys. I dont have the cash to buy a slim at the moment (spending to much on other hobbies!) so I'm going to attempt to fix it I think, and when that fails I will attempt to reflow it