XBOX melt Down

A similar thing happened with the original X-Box, they had to supply everyone with an external safety switch type device just in case a power supply fault did literally melt down the unit.

Dave.

I think there was some story in the Australian press that Microsoft was accepting that there was a problem but hadn't yet found it.

There is a raging thread over on sci.electronics.design about the problem being due to Lead-Free solder failure due to thermal stressing.

Dave.

Microsoft facing $1bn Xbox bill Microsoft has said that it is facing a bill of more than $1bn to cover the cost of offering extended warranties, after failings with its Xbox 360. The company admitted it had been forced to make "an unacceptable number of repairs" to the consoles after key hardware failed.

Customers who suffer the problems will now be given a free three-year warranty, the company said.

The failures are indicated by three red flashing lights on the console.

Microsoft, has not revealed how many of its machines have suffered the problem, but said the number was "bigger than we are comfortable with."

It added that the move - which will also see some people reimbursed for postage and repairs on consoles which were out of warranty - was aimed at keeping the loyalty of its customers.

"The majority of Xbox 360 owners are having a great experience with their console and have from day one," said Robbie Bach, president of Microsoft's Entertainment & Devices Division.

"But this problem has caused frustration for some of our customers and for that, we sincerely apologise."

It added its Xbox division was still expected to make a profit during the financial year beginning 1 July 2007.

Migration manoeuvre

Separately the company has announced an October launch of its advanced version of the Xbox - the Xbox 360 Elite - in Japan, where it lags behind Nintendo and Sony in the console market.

And the company has also unveiled plans to open a software development centre in Canada which it said was a way of hiring talented people from abroad who would struggle to obtain a US working visa.

The Vancouver location would "allow the company to continue to recruit and retain highly skilled people affected by the immigration issues in the US", Microsoft said.

Story from BBC NEWS:

Published: 2007/07/05 21:11:57 GMT

Colin

thermal stressing: it was an accident waiting to happen.

this is a message I got from a large EU PCB manufacturer a while back:

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if you ask me ROHS is nothing but trouble ;) we completely moved to ROHS in February this year, but had great pressure from Texas Instruments and ST Microelectronics since September last year and the major problem was to move out all components with lead plating on their legs away from our stock, it took about 6 month to completely use all old components and fill our stock with only lead free components.

now we produce our boards with immersion gold finish which increase the cost of bare boards by 20% and the lead free soldering alloy and consumables are at twice higher prices than normal SnPb, all this I could accept, but the final result is about 20% less reliable boards, the Pb is the soft component of SnPb alloy, the new Pb-free alloys miss this "soft" component and are less reliable to vibrations and temperature changes, as Pb-free soldering joints tend to crack sooner than SnPb joints when exposed to cold-hot termal shocks, this is why Pb-free boards are not allowed in medical, military, automotive applications where reliability is must.

It would be interesting to see some figures on lead in landfill compared to other toxins created by the lead free process ending up in the ground added with all the extra waste in the landfill by the increased failures.