SquareTrade: Because you love arbitrary data

The gang over at The Tech Herald have posted up the results of a hardware survey taken by warranty group SquareTrade, which apparently indicates that almost a quarter of all 360 consoles will be effected by the red ring of death.

Tell the truth, I’m getting a little bored of reading about something that all 360 owners acknowledge, yet no company can seem to pin a definite number to. This survey contradicts a recent reader survey taken by Game Informer which reported the failure rate at a whopping 50%, and also manages to contradict an earlier survey taken by SquareTrade themselves which seemed to say that only 12% of consoles would RRoD in the first two years of their life.

I mean seriously, if everyone could just quit throwing around arbitrary data, that’d be great. The RRoD is a huge problem, and the 360 has dubious hardware and cooling, everyone knows this. But a reader survey means diddly (especially if a bunch of PlayStation fanboys decided to bump up numbers), and a third party warranty group’s figures have around about the same significance considering all RRoD consoles are covered by an extended Microsoft warranty.

Until someone leaks us some hard figures from Microsoft’s repair centers, I’ve kind of had it with looking over pointless reports which everyone knows the results of.

If you’re not however, by all means, check out the article (and the report itself!).

It's hard to cuddle an Xbox with both of your faces in shot

That’s right, because today was the return of the mack!

After two and a bit weeks Xbox-less, my bouncing baby boy is back from hospital.  I’ve once again carefully saved the sculpted foam packaging and coffin, just to be prudent.  You know, not because I’m being fatalist or anything.

Well in any case, the reason I’m so happy its home is because I was recently the winner of Shadow Complex (with many thanks to Gamer Limit).  While I was really happy about winning (especially after draining over 9000 hours into Google Images), irony of ironies, I had no friggin’ console to download my ill-gotten gains to.

I’ve heard fantastic things about the game, so I’ve been looking forward to getting it downloaded.  So now my Xbox is back, imagine my disappointment then when I find out that Xbox Live is experiencing difficulty tonight in the AU.  Oh dear.  This means, between my dodgy, capped internet and Xbox Live being stuffed that I’ve managed a WHOLE 6% DOWNLOADED in three and a half hours.  Sigh.

Looks like we’ll be getting that one reviewed later this week!

The new Xbox 360i. It's six times the slim of "another leading brand"!

A very interesting article on Industry Gamers has taken a bit of a vox pop with leading video game analysts to ask them “What are the chances of seeing an Xbox 360 Slim?“.  Now that the PS3 Slim has been confirmed, and everyone has decided to fire up MS Paint to make “confirmed” concept images of a slimmer Xbox 360 instead, it’s nice to hear some thoughtful and interesting opinions on the topic.  Here’s a quick excerpt:

Any reduction in the physical size of a console certainly adds a lot of financial benefits to the manufacturer. A reduced size decreases shipping costs, packaging material, and increases retail shelve space. There are costs, however, such as the cost to re-engineer a new console as well as the cost to modifying the manufacturing process. If the distribution benefits outweigh the costs, Microsoft should (and likely will) one day release a smaller Xbox 360 unit.

-Jesse Divnich from EEDAR

Now while advice and opinions from experts is always a good start for a discussion on any particular topic, we all know what we’re talking about the evolution of here.  Yes, it’s the Xbox 360i™ Lite VX (promotional shot top left).

Sony’s announcement of the PlayStation 3 Slim has started another skirmish in the theatre of console war.  A proverbial “Battle of the Bulge” if you will (not a literal one, obviously, the Ardennes have seen enough bloodshed). While at the beginning of this generation of consoles the race was presumably between technology and computing power, it has recently turned to size, and as the old adage goes: it’s not how big your console is, it’s how you use it.

Some may argue that no-one looks at the entertainment unit while they’re stoking the fire.  Others that a PSOne in the hand is worth a PS2 in the bush.  An even more vocal majority would quip that if it ain’t broken, Microsoft didn’t build it.

And that last adage (I promise!) is kind of the point.  While I’m sure all us narcissistic Xbox consolers would just love a tighter, curvier and slimmer version of our beloved entertainment unit, has anyone stopped to quickly consider the consequences of such cosmetic undertaking?  If the Xbox 360 has an assumed fail rate of around 40% (I’m being generous, I know) at present, with all of the air-venting, bulky fans and heat sinks, what chance would it stand if we crammed it all into a unit the size of your average VHS cassette?

So while we’d all like to think of a brighter future that includes the Xbox 360i™ Lite Limited Edition (Now with Septuple-xCore™ technology!), please don’t forget that you should check the batteries in your smoke alarms at the beginning of both the financial AND calendar year!

In less longwinded fashion, do take a look at the original article, it has actual sane opinions on the matter.

RRoD failures have been known to lead to stress, depression and unplanned pregnancy (sometimes all three!)

At the risk of sounding like a drunken teenage girl, this survey is ALL ABOUT ME!

The Consumerist have reposted a print-only survey taken by Game Informer magazine. The survey, taken from almost 5000 readers, indicated that within those readers just over 54% had experienced hardware failure related to their 360 console.

This would appear to be a little higher than the generic “one in six” rate Microsoft seems to claim every now and then, and a little closer to the “five in six” rate that most gamers know all too well. As my second Xbox is currently off at the repair centre, having succumbed to the red ring of death once again, I can only nod sagely at the results.

However, what interested me the most, and something else that describes me quite well, is that from presumably the near 2500 gamers who had bricked consoles in the past, only 3.8% of them would never buy an Xbox again.

At first I was a little surprised by this, but then realised that I was in the same camp as the 96% of loyalists. It’s not even really that the gamer feels any of any sense of loyalty to the brand, I don’t think, just that by the time that you’ve created your gamer profile, amassed all the games you wanted, purchased the myriad of accessories needed and racked up all your achievements, to just dump it all seems like a waste. Sure, you’re pissed off and rightly so, but just like a frustrating game, it’s rare that you ever become so angered that you quit forever.

In conclusion, if over 50% of these consoles are bricking out, I can see why they revoked the free coffin policy. It must have taken epic-scale logging to acquire the amount of cardboard it needed!

Peruse the statistical news at the Consumerist.