It looks like the Red Ring Chronicles have come to an end. After languishing unnecessarily in a Texas warehouse for several days, my 360 was picked up by UPS. I knew this because the tracking number I'd gotten over a week ago from Microsoft was finally recognized by the UPS website. The next day was a feverish wait for the UPS truck, a wait that did not end until well past 6:00 PM. Twilight Princess and hard liquor were all that stood between me and a state of feral insanity. And then, there he was: the UPS guy. I had discovered a while ago that I would be receiving a refurbished Xbox 360 -- I saw that my serial had magically changed on service.xbox.com, you see -- which is unfortunate. Still, it was all in one piece, no weird rattling or anything like that. The package came with a note and a free 1 month Xbox Live subscription. So, that's nice. But, as any 360 enthusiast knows, there is more to getting back your Xbox than simply plugging it in and making sure it works. Oh no, getting back into the swing of things is a process.
First thing's first, you have to flip that Xbox over and see when it was manufactured. At first, I saw the numbers "07" and was excited that I had received a brand new box. Alas, the feeling didn't last as I collected my thoughts and read the date properly: "2006-05-07." In reality, the box was from May of last year. A bummer to be sure. But wait, what about those fabulous new heatsinks? Was there one in my box? Time for an endoscopy.
From what I could tell, there was definitely something else in there, and judging from other photographs on the net, it looked like I had the new heatsink (note the telltale copper nub on the far left). So, while my box might be refurbished, Microsoft has girded its proverbial loins from future breakdowns at least. Now to see if the dangblasted thing works properly. The power button is a little squishy, lacking the satisfying click of my old box, but I digress. I power it up. I am immediately stupefied by the HD dashboard. Having seen nothing but SD Gamecube and DVDs for several weeks, I had forgotten how pleasing HD really is. I had missed it, perhaps more than I knew. But, time to begin the Gamertag recovery process, which takes nearly 20 minutes, so I stick the progress bar into the "picture-in-picture" on my monitor as I play Zelda. After some productive dungeon exploring, the recovery is complete. I immediately begin downloading everything I had missed and switched on XBLA automatic downloads. BioShock demo: bliss.
So, all told, from the time I shipped my box, August 8th, to the day I got it back, August 22nd, it took fourteen days to turn it around. Not too shabby. Sure, it's a little annoying to deal with a refurbished box (I still have to re-download all of my XBLA games, for example) but at least it's got the new heatsink. If there is one thing I learned from it all, it's that Microsoft has created quite an addictive little machine. The feeling of absolute relief upon hearing the trademark "boo-doo" when I logged into Live is almost alarming in retrospect. Seeing friends online and messaging me right away was pretty cool as well. Now, if this one manages to live a long and healthy life, we'll be in business. I guess the best way I could put it is:
Let's never fight again, okay?
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 4)
8-23-2007 @ 10:36PM
SteveMB said...
That's weird. I sent mine in a few weeks ago and they all said 8-07 even though they said 2005 or 2006 before the repair.
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8-23-2007 @ 10:44PM
pclyons said...
@39 A free game? Do you remember the list? What exactly did you say to them that convinced them to send you a free game? The guy I was talking to had a real thick foreign accent so I couldn't understand most of the things he was saying. Did they say anything about receiving it much quicker than the time before? It killed me when I got the 3RoD again. This 360 is an addiction.
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8-23-2007 @ 10:59PM
KFelon said...
@42 The guy I spoke to had an accent as well. I told him I just got this "new" replacement system a week ago and it fucking died when I got and Catan achievement and I was really pissed. He asked me to hold while he went and spoke to someone and then came back and said he could offer me a free game. I got to choose from PGR3, Viva Pinata, Kameo, & Arcade Unplugged. He gave me a separate case number for the free game as well. He was actually quite nice and seemed to understand how pissed I was.
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8-23-2007 @ 11:19PM
Richard DeV said...
i thought it was funny that your updates went right along with my own red ring process. I got mine back yesterday. So glad i've got it back! So many demos came out in that month lol.
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8-23-2007 @ 11:55PM
Gemini Ace said...
If it's true that all you have to do is delete and re-download all your old content on your old box, that would be helpful information. I'm a loyal reader and I did not know that. You might want to give a breakdown on the site or podcast about this. It's obvious that a lot of us don't know this info.
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8-24-2007 @ 12:13AM
pclyons said...
@43 I appreciate it.I might call back and see if I could get something out of all this. Just sucks I'm going to have to wait another 3 weeks or so.
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8-24-2007 @ 1:17AM
Strud said...
I had my red-ringed 360 repaired recently - new motherboard with heatsink and matching BenQ DVD. All my previously purchased XBLive items were transferred to the new console, as was stated in the xbox.com forums about a month before I returned it. I can still use all the content when not logged on to Live or using a different profile. This was in Australia, but I thought it would be the same everywhere.
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8-24-2007 @ 1:53AM
Jeramy said...
yeah, man, for anyone bitching about needing ms points refunding to redownload xbla games, you are completely mistaken. all you have to do is just delete and redownload when you're connected to xbl (which you'd have to be to use ms points anyway). i mean, you guys sound like those that always said "no, content is saved to your hdd, so you can still use it"
i had the rrod, and i assumed i received a refurb, since the mac address was different (it wouldn't register with my network which has a mac address filter). but, to my surprise, nothing was different when i was disconnected to xbl. so i guess i win?
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8-24-2007 @ 2:02AM
Master H said...
Man right now my 360 damaged with the red ring curse microsoft with their broken xbox 360 now how i suppose to play halo 3...
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8-24-2007 @ 3:43AM
Raymond said...
Hey i just got back my 360 on the 23rd and man i couldn't be happier to see it. I too was also playing some sd zelda and old guitar hero. I am also downloading the demo's i missed such as skate.
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8-24-2007 @ 7:56AM
Mr Hayabusa said...
@ 20: interesting! I didn't know that. I will have to try out my wife's profile to see if she can access the downloaded games (I am on my 4th 360 at the moment, last one took a month round trip, but I'm in Massachusetts). I _thought_ she could, but will have to test it out. One person mentioned that I could just re-download the games (for free), so I might try that first. Wife doens't play that often, so not really a big deal, but still ...
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8-24-2007 @ 8:40AM
Hak Foo said...
For the record Microsoft has implemented some sort of new system for downloadable content. SOME people receive a new or refurbished console, delete their content and redownload it and have access to it online/offline and all other gamertags have access to it.
HOWEVER this does not work for everyone. I for one tried this for days and days and it never worked. I tried every tip on the net to make it work, but I always only had access while I was connected to live. I had to call MS to get points refunded to a new gamertag. This was about 10 days ago.
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8-24-2007 @ 8:49AM
jkdoug said...
My console got RRoD last week. I got a new one at Best Buy (thank you, awesome protection plan!) and I cannot play the XBLA games that my wife purchased. Deleting them and re-downloading them makes no difference whatsoever. I'm going to be calling MS for a points refund, definitely.
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8-24-2007 @ 9:30AM
dunnypop said...
my box just died.
I'm waiting for a box. What's pretty interesting was the wait time for talking to an agent. It took 5 minutes to talk with someone, and both reps that I talked to, spoke perfect english. I'm thinking Canada gets different tech support.
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8-24-2007 @ 9:32AM
Richard Mitchell said...
"Rich Mitch, I have to commend you on your beautiful yard. That's all."
The secret to a beautiful lawn ... is mowing :)
Seriously though, it doesn't look *that* great in real life, but thanks.
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8-24-2007 @ 10:11AM
Matt McClard said...
glad to see it came back safely. and let me just say buy bioshock. its awesome!
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8-24-2007 @ 10:57AM
bvs said...
got the red ringworm for the first time today. it was like finding out i had a terminal disease. not in the sense of being serious as say, cancer, but, in the way i felt that it would never happen to me. you know? like it's always some guy someone knows. i only had mine since like march 2007. i was going at bioshock hard as hell though and overlord before that. putting in work. frail little console.
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8-24-2007 @ 11:10AM
psyborg said...
Your playing Twilight Princess on the cube? come on now, pushing buttons is no way to strike with the master sword. ;)
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8-24-2007 @ 11:12AM
mudvayne_nothin said...
Yeah, why would you have to re-download your XBLA games? it's not like you send them your HDD with it.
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8-24-2007 @ 11:15AM
hdbrown465 said...
I just took my RROD Cancer 360 into the UPS store to ship it off to the repair center, and upon entering the store the clerk asked me if thats an xbox. I asked him how did he know and he said he can tell from the white box and he gets in a couple a week (Alpharetta, GA).
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