360 issues, somebody help me

[Sega DogTagz]

Well I’m in a somber mood.

Yesterday I went out and splurged on my old model 360, picking up Plants vs. Zombies and Halo Reach among other tittles, looking forward to giving the console a bit of love. After a few extended sessions of shooting peas at the undead, I plugged in Reach and booted up firefight so I could knock some of the rust off since ODST.

About 7-10 min into it, my 360 began flashing its Red lights and promptly shut the screen off. Having never actually seen a RROD, I usually assume the worst whenever I see those red lights (like when there is a temporary power shortage) and I sat there terrified for a few seconds. After hard resetting the console (holding the button) I turned it back on and it worked fine. I went back into firefight, but the same thing happed at around the 7-10 min mark. Red lights and all.

Now, as I sit here twiddling my thumbs, I am curious if you guys could confirm this as RROD. I am pretty sure I remember something about Reach having a few bugs, and I am almost hoping this is one of them (I’ll be sure to boot up Plants vs Zombies and see if that works tomorrow).

Shed a tear for my wallet you guys. I got a feeling that this is gonna abuse it pretty good.

Edited October 3, 2010 by Sega DogTagz

[Blue Blood]

Red lights started flashing? All four or them, yes? If so, that's not RRoD. Your video cable is loose. If you had the RRoD your game would have crashed with a messed up screen and the lights wouldn't change until you turned the console off and again. RRoD has three quadrants lit up whereas as disconnected video cable has all four.

[Sega DogTagz]

Red lights started flashing? All four or them, yes? If so, that's not RRoD. Your video cable is loose. If you had the RRoD your game would have crashed with a messed up screen and the lights wouldn't change until you turned the console off and again. RRoD has three quadrants lit up whereas as disconnected video cable has all four.

hmm... I am pretty sure only 3 quadrants lit up on mine, although not the three shown in your pic (my bottom-right icon was blank). I also never got that error screen, just random blinking color screens before it went kaput. Perhaps there's hope for my old 360 afterall.

I'll be sure to give my video cable a good jiggle tomorrow though. Right now its bedtime and I am too afraid to touch it, so I'll let it "rest" overnight.

Edited October 3, 2010 by Sega DogTagz

[Tornado]

Are you sure it wasn't two quadrants? How do you orient your 360?

[Dobkeratops]

Rule of thumb: 3 red quadrants = hardware failure.

To me it sounds like the GPU is overheating. It'd explain why you could play Plants for a while, as it's a very low demanding game, but the moment you put Reach in, the console moves into high resource usage and it's only a matter of time until the temperature reaches critical levels.

There's a possibility it can be a power supply thing though, check if that's running properly (should have a green light when the console is on) .

Edited October 3, 2010 by Dobkeratops

[Mollfie]

Check you cables are all in properly. If you know anyone then ask if you can borrow their cables and power supply to make sure it's not just your cables that have died. If you don't know anyone then maybe call up your local game store and ask if they would let you test it there? We don't mind people bringing them in if they are going to be buying a new console from us anyway if it doesn't work.

If all fails, you 360 has died.

[LunarEdge]

It could be a hardware failure but since your able to play for awhile before it starts to red ring I would say it could be overheating. Are you keeping it in a closed cabinet? (or small one at that) On the carpet? How long have you had your old model? My was starting to do the same but I went to my local Play N Trade and got the permanent fix, which they replaced the metal rings in the motherboard (which cause the overheating) to plastic.

[Sega DogTagz]

Okay, after a ton of cable jiggling, cable swapping and playing of my 360, I can come to a few conclusions.

1.) Disregard what I said before, it is indeed the Player 2 quadrant that remains out when my 360 flashes red. Strangly enough, I still don't get an error screen, just a flash of pink, blue red and then nothing.

2.) The overheat thing sounds about right. I keep my 360 in an open space (and I even have an inter-cooler on it) but the red rings only show up when I play graphically demanding modes of high end games. I can almost play Gruntpocalypse all I want, but when I switch over to something a little more hectic, crap hits the fan really fast.

My was starting to do the same but I went to my local Play N Trade and got the permanent fix, which they replaced the metal rings in the motherboard (which cause the overheating) to plastic.

Huh, never heard of Play n' Trade, but I am scared to ask my local gamestop because in the worse case scenario (involving me buying a new 360) I might be able to fleece them into taking my trashy console.

EDIT: Dear God..... I think it is the inter-cooler. I have the Nyco Box unit that plugs into the power outlet (and the cable plugs into the cooler). I unplugged the thing and my 360 seems to be chugging along fine. Further testing is needed, but I might have just been pointing my ire in the wrong direction.

I am gonna go make it rain confetti and see if I cant achieve a RROD w/o the inter-cooler. I don't know why it waited till now to go bad (it still works) but I got some hope of saving $400 bucks.

Edited October 5, 2010 by Sega DogTagz

[Tornado]

Well, hell, you should have said that before. Those Nyko Intercooler shitboxes are known to be direct causes of RRoD on 360s.

[Sega DogTagz]

Well, hell, you should have said that before. Those Nyko Intercooler shitboxes are known to be direct causes of RRoD on 360s.

Yep, it was the intercooler. don't know why or how, but I was fine without it and I was able to re-create the RRoD when I put it back on. piece of junk.

Still this is glorious news for me. My 360 is alive and well. The question now is, do I dare risk buying another inter-cooler (a separate brand of course )

Thanks for the help you guys!

Edited October 6, 2010 by Sega DogTagz

[Tornado]

don't know why or how, but I was fine without it and I was able to re-create the RRoD when I put it back on. piece of junk.

The passthrough draws too much power from the system because it wasn't very well designed (it didn't fit tightly to the plug, so power was regularly lost through small, and occasionally large, shorts. Think the sparks that you sometimes get when you plug something into the wall, only happening all the time). This lack of power typically caused the system to undervolt some of the internal components, and the internal fans were usually the first thing to cut out. Be thankful that it didn't short out so much that it burned/melted the plastic on the back of your 360.

The question now is, do I dare risk buying another inter-cooler (a separate brand of course )

Well, to be fair to Nyko, it sounds like you have the original model of the Intercooler. For the Intercooler EX, they drastically redid the plug design as soon as the problems started happening, including a much stronger plug assembly that didn't have the shorting problems of the original model. The Intercooler TS that they sell now doesn't use the pass through system of the first two models. It uses separate AC power.

[Sega DogTagz]

The passthrough draws too much power from the system because it wasn't very well designed (it didn't fit tightly to the plug, so power was regularly lost through small, and occasionally large, shorts. Think the sparks that you sometimes get when you plug something into the wall, only happening all the time). This lack of power typically caused the system to undervolt some of the internal components, and the internal fans were usually the first thing to cut out. Be thankful that it didn't short out so much that it burned/melted the plastic on the back of your 360.

Sheesh, that could of gotten ugly if I had left it on then.

Well, to be fair to Nyko, it sounds like you have the original model of the Intercooler. For the Intercooler EX, they drastically redid the plug design as soon as the problems started happening, including a much stronger plug assembly that didn't have the shorting problems of the original model. The Intercooler TS that they sell now doesn't use the pass through system of the first two models. It uses separate AC power.

Ah, good to know. Still, I wonder why anyone is even selling the older models (I brought mine from GameStop a few months ago). That sounds like something that should be taken off the shelves.

[Tornado]

Ah, good to know. Still, I wonder why anyone is even selling the older models (I brought mine from GameStop a few months ago). That sounds like something that should be taken off the shelves.

What does the plug assembly look like on yours? Its it made out of metal or plastic?

[Sega DogTagz]

What does the plug assembly look like on yours? Its it made out of metal or plastic?

Its plastic.

I could take a few pictures of it tomorrow if you want to see it.

[Tornado]

So it looks like the white one instead of the black one?

[Sega DogTagz]

Yeah, its the white one.

[Tornado]

I'm pretty surprised you were able to get one from Gamestop so recently. They went out of production in 2006.

Anyways, if you feel you need to get an external cooler for your 360, you should really get the most recent model (the TS). The EX (which was the black model pictured above) works a lot better than the original model because it is much better designed, but it does still draw a little power away from the system itself, so better safe than sorry (and in case anyone reading this has a cooler with a similar design for their Wii or PS3, keep in mind that the designs of those two systems precludes any power draw problems, so you shouldn't worry).

Edited October 6, 2010 by Tornado

[Sega DogTagz]

I'm pretty surprised you were able to get one from Gamestop so recently. They went out of production in 2006.

I guess they were just trying to clear out stock. I brought mine shortly after finishing up Mass Effect 2 and the store was running an aggressive sales campaign on 360 stuff. Still I'm still kinda bummed about them selling discontinued gear though. I would go try to sell it back to them for a profit, but knowing them they will probably re-package it and sell it to some other poor kid. I'd rather burn this thing than put someone else through this.

Thanks for the info Tornado. I'll be sure to keep an eye out for the newer model inter-coolers.

Edited October 6, 2010 by Sega DogTagz