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Microsoft Evasive on 360 Hardware Changes

Posted by Zonk on from the it-wasn't-broken-in-the-first-place-huh dept.

From all reports Microsoft has upgraded the Xbox 360 consoles coming from their factories, and modified the consoles heading back to consumers from service calls. The trouble is, they're having a hard time admitting it. The company has always maintained there aren't any excessive heat problems with their console, so admitting now that they've added extra heatsink capabilities would be ... somewhat embarrassing. Dean Takahashi at the San Jose Merc has an interview with Todd Holmdahl, the 'hardware guy' at Microsoft: "We're very proud of the box. We think the vast majority of people are having just a great experience. You look at the number of games they are buying, the number of accessories they are buying, the Live attach. They love the box. They continue to buy the box. That said, we take any customer issue very seriously. We continue to look into these things very deeply. You have seen we have made some changes to our customer service policy."

5 of 106 comments (clear)

  1. So What? by ClosedSource · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If the system has a heating problem don't buy it. MS has no obligation to inform anyone about their hardware design.

  2. Embarrassing? by Green+Light · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I am not sure why adding a heatsink would be embarrassing. If they find an issue, then they should fix it going forward.

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    1. Re:Embarrassing? by powerlord · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It would be embarrassing because they have vehemently denied there was a problem since the console launched.

      Also, admitting that perhaps it has an issue might open themselves up to class action lawsuits (perhaps requiring that the change be made available to every console shipped free of charge), not to mention the bad publicity that would follow.

      All and all not something MS wants to contemplate as the Wii and PS3 don't seem to have that problem, and are competing with it at both ends of the market.

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  3. RTFA...but whats the actual issue by svendsen · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I must be missing something. Rev 1 of hardware goes out the door. Some people have issues with it. They have a fix. So when Rev 1 items go in for repair they put the fix in place (whether or not that's the reason it was sent in).

    What am I missing here?

  4. Re:We Are Seeing The End Of The Xbox Project by twistedsymphony · · Score: 3, Insightful

    ...It is now just a question of when the plug gets pulled. Does Microsoft want to spend the billions to to keep the 360 artificially alive in the market just to save face or pull the plug now and deal with the short term PR hit and move on to other markets.
    Are you kidding? Reports from most financial analysis claim MS has been turning a profit on the Xbox business since last November and plan on getting back into the black after the next holiday.

    MS extended the warranty on the Xbox 360 for over a year, they repair these boxes without question or hesitation... if the problem was really THAT widespread one would think it'd be cheaper to do a recall or maybe fix the problems earlier in the consoles life when they could have started producing consoles that didn't come back in for repair.

    I find the idea of Ms leaving the console business over this positively absurd given their current market position.
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