Slashdot Mirror
A History of the Xbox Red Ring of Death Fiasco
VentureBeat has a lengthy story about the situation surrounding the Xbox 360's "Red Ring of Death." It starts with the developmental phases for the 360, looks at the marketing decisions that drove Microsoft to aim for a release ahead of the PS3, and talks with sources and engineers within Microsoft about what could have been done to prevent the problems. Quoting:
"Leading up to the launch in the fall of 2005, the number of defective units would soon grow to tens of thousands. Any other consumer electronics company would likely have postponed a launch with such low yields. But Microsoft had more money in the bank than anyone else. The decision this time would fall to Bach and Moore. The costs of launching with low yields -- where you take big losses on every product sold -- could bankrupt other companies. But Microsoft could afford to do so. Microsoft did delay the launch date from October until November. But some inside the company still believed returns would be out of control."
What if the company is just facing the domino effect of collapse because their engineering and management does not work anymore. It makes me depressed to observe all this. They were unable to deliver VISTA in time. Customers and hardware suppliers actually hate VISTA.
They develop a game console with gigantic losses. They develop the next game console as a second choice. Maybe something is broken in their management of development. I mean look, where is the bugzilla server for the xbox?
Do you remember the story about the lawyer's letter to the parents of the baby killed by an Xbox fire?
But this Slahsdot post finally reminds us that Microsoft was never different. When we look back there is actually a history of autism in the company but it always paid off in the past. Like Napoleon, an insane leader who did every mistake but for some time he was quite lucky.
I'll explain the difference, Dumping is when a company sells a product below cost to bankrupt their competitors.
Loss leaders are when a store sells a product below what they pay to draw in consumers and get sales.
Clearly the video game industry is rife with corruption and 'Dumping' primarily because hardware makers can subsidize the price of a console with license fees from game developers.
depend on 'dumpers' like Microsoft to have some very complex bookwork, and possibly some Chinese shell corporations to sell high priced parts significantly below cost, but only to Microsoft.
there are lots of ways electronics can be sold below price, specifically cell phones and satellite TV boxes, which come with service agreements. but in the cell phone market, you're not locked into a single phone, although each cell provider has their own line of phones... most big players have models for each provider, except in cases where they get more money to be 'exclusive' to AT&T (like the iphone) etc.
some of this stuff is illegal in many places, but as i said shell corporations are shady and hard to stop. because billionaires often engage in venture capitalism, it's not hard to 'invest' in a shell corporation that's going to go into an exclusive contract to say, sell 40 million $40 dollar parts at $1 a part, and have the initial VC funding of say 40 million dollars, while 'your buddy' makes a cool million cash etc... then let the company go belly up, or keep using the same shell corporation with additional rounds of VC funding...
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
We've seen it time and time again, how Microsoft can afford to buy it's way into a market segment. I wonder if it will pay off in the long run, because it seems they've hit a saturation point with this product they have. Not much growth over the last product revision, and barely making a penny in the last few quarters (let's not talk about making up for all the loses to date yet).
With the stock price stagnant, how long can upper management convince shareholders that this is the right thing to do?
AirSpeak - http://itunes.com/apps/AirSpeak
i don't think that is what's usually meant by 'dumping'.
although it does seem to primarily refer to predatory pricing in the context of international trade, it's not when you sell something cheaper in one country than in another. it's simply when a product manufactured in one country is being exported to another country at a price below cost or below the market value in its home market.
as with most forms of predatory capitalism, its legality is fuzzy and often what one nation preaches is not what it practices--particularly western nations which like to tout the virtues of "Free Market" capitalism, such as the U.S.
so if a U.S. corporation wanted to dump products on another nation, they would condemn any protectionist policies which might oppose these actions. but simultaneously, if another country wanted to dump products in the U.S. which competed with domestic industries with powerful lobbies, antidumping petitions would be filed with the Dept. of Commerce.
things like 'fair value', or the difference between 'dumping' and selling a 'loss leader', are entirely subjective. they're simply used in whatever way most benefits a given group.
I'd appreciate it very much if someone could please explain to me, how is it possible that one company sells something at a loss and it's called "dumping" (which you can get in trouble for, IIUC), and another company sells something at a loss and it's called a "loss leader?"
Dumping is a form of predatory pricing under international trade law whereby a product is sold below cost or below market value in the country of origin. Economists sometimes take a more general definition of dumping to mean any kind of predatory pricing but in my experience this is a less common usage. Dumping often occurs when a producer has excess capacity beyond what their home market can absorb so they sell the excess in a different market either to damage current/potential competitors or to gain market share.
A loss leader is basically a sales promotion. One product is sold cheaply (possibly below cost) with the expectation, but normally not the requirement, that customers will be enticed into buying additional more profitable product(s). The most famous version is the razors and blade model pioneered by Gillette.
The important difference is that a loss leader isn't necessarily destructive. With dumping there is no attempt at profitability, at least not in the short term. However predatory pricing in general, including dumping, can be very hard to prove. It's quite rare to have clear evidence that dumping is occurring. Furthermore in some countries (notably China) it's not unusual for the government to hold stakes in manufacturing firms. Naturally it is rather difficult subpoenaing records from a state owned Chinese manufacturer so you can sue them for dumping.
I was playing Halo 3 the other night and my network connection was acting up, then the game lurched, froze and put tons of bars across the screen, followed by a loud screeching noise
so yeah, my Xbox RROD'ed on Sept 1st. I think its kind of odd that this story would pop up on /. within a week of it happening to me. I should pry call Microsoft sometime soon to get it replaced, but seeing as I'm a busy engineering student I haven't gotten around to it yet. Does anyone have any tips for dealing with Microsoft concerning this problem?
wish me luck
Worst console? Hm.
There DOES seem to be a big following online for it with Live. It's pretty cool to play all those old games on the system, and I do know a fair number of people who use the system a lot.
Train wreck? I agree. Will it continue on? Probably. Flawed and broken, though fortunately people actually have a choice in the console market.
It would, however, be interesting if XBOX dropped out and left only Sony and Nintendo.
-
I think that Xbox is the best thing that happened to PlayStation. In the real world, there is nothing like a little competition, especially direct competition. From Wikipedia's article on competition: "Merriam-Webster defines competition in business as 'the effort of two or more parties acting independently to secure the business of a third party by offering the most favorable terms.' Seen as the pillar of capitalism in that it may stimulate innovation, encourage efficiency, or drive down prices, competition is touted as the foundation upon which capitalism is justified."
The point of the post was, that while the xbox is a limited hardware, the whole experience of the xbox live system is really fun (for me).
However, that POS died on my, so I am here with a $500 dismantled box and peripherals, and 10 games ($600) as a waste. And I refuse to buy a piece of hardware that already died on me once because that is just stupid. I heard of people who have 2-4 xboxes, all which died.
On the other hand I took a quick view of other options, and mentioned that the WII does not interest me because my taste of games are not there. The thing is underpowered and can not run call of duty, GTA4 (just an example, I am not a GTA fan, even though I try every time, then get bored of it after a while) and/or support 16+ online shooters. I have limited time to play, so I prefer going online, shoot some people, then do my other things, not to play a story based game for 30+ hours. OK I finished metal gear solid and it took long, so there are exceptions, but like one a year.
Then I looked at the system I got when the POS died. It is the PS3. Superior design and quality. I know, that some people have things against sony, but I am happy with their amps and video components. I have a camera I use for diving from sony which also server the purpose, but it was the 1st and last sony camera I got. So I am not a Sony fanboy. I would also never buy a sony ericsson phone after I had one and it died on me..... (I have a Nokia I hate and an iPhone I love even though it lacks important functions) ....
So even though I love this superior console, I do not like the online experience. The idea of giving a headset with XBL is great, because everyone has a headset that works and people use it. Sony's idea of allowing any bluetooth headset is great in theory, but most headsets are designed for phone applications, so they die after a few hours of actual talk time, and they let all the noise in. This is especially true with shooter games, and is rather annoying. There is also static, disconnects, all the bad stuff.
Many people do not use a headset, making a tactical shooter -SHIT- of an experience.
Also XBL allows people to rate people, which takes care of team killing, offensive behavior and talk most of the time. PS3 lacks these, so you have to deal with assholes who cannot play, and so they go into a no-respawn 10 minute tactical game, and shoot you from the back at the spawn point and log off. Yes, this is annoying, and yes it happens on XBL, but then the person gets a bunch of bad reviews and it shows on his account......
anyway ... it is 4am in the morning, I just could not sleep and saw all these responses...
Then again, I did not want to offend any WII owners, I wish I enjoyed my superior expensive box as much as people enjoy the cheaper, lower performance little white cubes .......
And sorry for the kiddie comment again. I play tactical team shooters almost exclusively, so anything else for me is in the kiddie category.
Oh... I am not a killing or military freak at all, I do not hunt or kill anything (I am in fact a vegan), it is just my competitive self that finds enjoyment in fighting in a team against an other set of people.
I would also play a real WWII plane combat sim if it existed and was as good as Chuck Yeager's sim back in the old days....... but it is all about locking a missile on someone from 10 kilometers in a jet, then hear beep beep for 2 minutes and see a distant explosion .. -> not fun ...
The difference here is that the Xbox cost them a huge amount of money (I don't think they ever made a profit off an Xbox sale), and did not benefit from integration of parts. For instance, one of the most acclaimed bonuses of a 360 (by developers) is the integrated memory (I'm not a hardware engineer, so if I'm off here, correct me). The fact that the memory can be used both as video ram and standard ram allows for serious optimization benefits.
Just throwing together some PC parts doesn't make it better. It may be more reliable and save on R&D costs, but a console like a PS3 would blow a PC equivalent (512mb RAM, 6800GT, let's not talk about the CPU) out of the water. In the console market, you have to build a "console" and not a PC, otherwise you'll never bring down the cost sufficiently, and it won't have a very good lifespan (graphically).
Too expensive, correct- I'm rarely an early adopter, save for a few specific subsets of gadgetry, and who knew they'd slowly lose functionality, rather than gain it?
On a side-note CronoCloud- How did you play Oblivion on a PS2?
(Lastly, thank you mods for the +3, Troll above- I feel I've finally arrived)
"Be light, stinging, insolent and melancholy"
They haven't been resolved. Although the rate of RROD isn't as high as before (it was around 33% before), it still happens to the newer consoles.