When the 360 was released I had to be one of the first ones to have it. That's just how I'm programmed. Although there were not that many games out yet, I had to be the first one on the block to have one. So, the hunt was on and I phoned all the electronic stores in town until I finally found one. I rushed over and an hour later I was up and running. That Xbox lasted about a year until I got the Red Ring Of Death, the infamous 3 flashing red lights on the console that signify that your system has met its demise. My warranty had lapsed at the time and I was all but sure that I was going to have to buy a new one to keep up with my on-line addiction. But that was around the time when it was well publicized that the failure rate on the machines were significantly high and so, biting the bullet, Micro$oft extended their warranty for consoles manufactured at that time. But instead of them fixing my console, they had me ship in mine and sent out an already refurbished system (#2). Basically, the failure rate created this cycle of import and export; take in the bad system, send out the refurbished system. So, some kid in Indiana probably is playing Rock Band 2 on my first system.
I received my refurbished system after a week of being out of the Xbox live loop. But as I got back into the that wonderful world of playing on line, something was nagging in the back of my brain. My fear was that because it was a refurbished system eventually it would fail as well. So, I decided that I would do a little charity work, for a friend and myself. I ended up giving my refurbished system to a buddy of mine, for free. Yeah, free. This buddy actually gave me a car once, so I thought I'd return the favor. For myself I bought an arcade version, because I already had the hard drive. And that was my 3rd system. That was about a little over a year ago.
A few nights ago, I was in the middle of Team Deathmatch in Modern Warfare 2 when the colors on my HDTV go psychedelic and then eventually the screen went black. No image whatsoever. I tried switching to standard analog, thinking maybe something was wrong with the HD signal. Still nothing. I called a buddy and a few days later he loaned me his cable, thinking perhaps I had faulty cable. Still nothing. At this point I know it's something to do with the console itself.
So, when I called Xbox customer service I already had an inkling that my warranty had lapsed but not by much. You can imagine my surprise when they explained that my warranty ended in November of 2008. Surprised because I had purchased the system a month later. My warranty had expired a month before I was even the owner. Strange to say the least. Of course, I don't have the paperwork to back up my claim. I figured since my first console was part of the initial release and the batch of systems that fell into the extreme failure rate group, what were the chances of anything happening to another system? Apparently the chances are good. I should have seen the writing on the wall. Every single friend, no exaggeration here, every single one of my friends has had their Xbox fail. If there was any sort of survey amongst the Idiot Ballroom group of friends, that would be a 100% failure rate on Xbox systems. That is absolutely unacceptable.
My suggestion to Micro$oft and Xbox is to get their crap together. Especially, when Natal hits this year.
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