Xbox 360 defects: an inside history of Microsoft's video game console Options

[Xbox-Scene]

Xbox 360 defects: an inside history of Microsoft's video game console woes Posted by XanTium | September 6 15:25 EST | News Category: Xbox360

From venturebeat.com: [QUOTE] Microsoft knew it had flawed machines, but it did not delay its launch because it believed the quality problems would subside over time. With each new machine, the company figured it would ride the "learning curve," or continuously improve its production. Even though Microsoft's leaders knew their quality wasn't top notch, they did not ensure that resources were in place to handle returns and quickly debug bad consoles. There were plenty of warning signs, but the company chose to ignore them. The different parts of the business weren't aligned. Microsoft's strategy depended on beating its rivals to market. It couldn't afford to stop and delay the launch in order to solve its quality problems, or so upper management believed. What Microsoft's leaders didn't realize was that getting to market first with a flawed machine would only win them a battle; and it risked the loss of the war. "They got enamored with the idea of the Microsoft army rolling everything out at the same time," said one knowledgeable source who asked not to be identified. The quality problem negated much of the advantage of going first, and it has delayed the company's plan to aggressively market the console and slash its prices. (Microsoft disputes this point; it cut the price of all three versions of its Xbox consoles by $50 to $79 on Wednesday. And the company believes it will sell more boxes than Sony will. But prices ought to be lower still during this stage of the console life cycle). That has stopped the company from reaching the broader market of consumers that Nintendo has won over. It has lowered its ambitions, hoping instead just to get a clear edge on third-placed Sony. The future profits that the company once hoped for are now likely to wind up in Nintendo's pockets. "Fundamentally, their thinking shows that they are a software company at heart," said one veteran manufacturing executive. "They put something out and figure they can fix it with the next patch or come up with a bug fix." [/QUOTE] Full Story: venturebeat.com (6 pages)

[Chancer]

Quite a damning insight into the whole fiasco. It is worth the read of the whole article.

[Thick9"]

I own and love all 4 of my original xboxes,but have yet to get a 360 because of the hardware problems.I would love to get one,but will not waste my $ on something that has a 33%+ death rate.I wont go Wii either,as it is same power as original xbox.That leaves sonys PS3,but I will not get one of those because of all of Sonys lies,as sony cut half the promised features of the PS3 before release,not to mention their habit of removing useful features throughout a systems life cycle(PS1 lost RCA out,link port,and serial port)(PS2 lost firewire port,And HDD slot)(PS3 has already lost at least PS2 emulation,what are they going to remove next?)

So looks like I will be sitting this generation out,unless MS actually gets off its ass and fixes the XB360(unlikely,as it has already been several years).So,maybe see you next genereation(If someone gets it right).

[bucko]

Everyone slated the PS3 for being a year and 3 months late to the market, but imho I think this has helped Sony so much. You don't even see many problems about PS3's with threads even on this forum. Same go's for the Wii but that is lower power. I really do hope MS has learnt there lesson, hopefully with the PS4 coming out in around 5-10 years (so they say?) this will help MS sort out there problems and think twice about rushing to the market.

Edit, I just read the full 6 pages (took me almost an hour lol) what a brilliant article, and everything seems to make sense. But ge

The initial yield on the most critical chip, the three-core microprocessor designed and manufactured by IBM, was only 16 percent. For every 100 produced, only 16 worked

, holy fuck!

This post has been edited by bucko: Sep 7 2008, 12:21 AM

[tutu]

After all this - where is Jasper??

[gokyu]

Talk about compounding problems the Cimtek decisions beggar belief.

[feflicker]

@Thick, they have fixed them. The new design with the new GPU heatsink, haven't seen one of these dead yet. MUCH more reliable. It's dumb to sit out an entire generation just because you are scared it will break. That's what warranties are for anyway!

[wyldstallions]

The whole fiasco is a big disaster and all in the interest of saving just a few $ per console, or having a case just a couple of inches bigger....


bet the next version is well over engineered...

[Mailroomview]

@Thick, they have fixed them. The new design with the new GPU heatsink, haven't seen one of these dead yet. MUCH more reliable.

Perhaps the writer can expound on his information? What version of xbox 360 manufacture date have you been told of manufacturing changes that do not require repair / replacement of the X Clamps?

Give us a manufacturing engineering design change change that has improved the quality of the 360 Xbox Motherboard, that does not fail?

Most people have already spent $600 or more to obtain their consoles in year 2006, 2007 and 2008 until the price changes to add larger HD's over the old 20 Gig HD. All these price changes for persons using LIVE to play their consoles and download games on the larger HD's have not had any Engineering Design Changes to prevent OVERHEATING.

Get Real People, MS is only after your $$$$ and keep you buying junk consoles.

[Chancer]

@Thick, they have fixed them. The new design with the new GPU heatsink, haven't seen one of these dead yet. MUCH more reliable. It's dumb to sit out an entire generation just because you are scared it will break. That's what warranties are for anyway!

You haven't seen too much of them then I take it?
The newer stuff still fails.