XBox 360 Foibles and Fixes
I’ve always wanted to use the word foible in a post title. Goooaallll!
Anywho, lots of grumpiness and grumbling since the 360 launch about all the problems with Microsoft’s poster child of ineptitude (I only partially kid…the 360 sounds great in some aspects, but it’s functionality is hampered by lack of foresight and some rather questionable design choices). I’ve steered clear of jumping on the bandwagon, largely since because I don’t have a 360, I haven’t experienced these problems and can comfortably bite my thumb at the poor dears who blew upwards of $500 for a buggy hunk of plastic.
With the news that the XBox 360 can mangle an expensive game disc in less time than it takes to heat up a coffee, it may seem like a good idea to have a completely non-functional console. You can still show it off to friends when they come over, but you’ll save yourself the aggravation of having to replace discs when the system is done gouging massive scratches in the surface. But say you were infinitely wealthy and didn’t mind the dent in your disposable income…what other problems could you encounter and how can you steer clear?
Well first up we have the infamous 360 overheating problem. Even with a power brick the size of a small dog (and including a built in fan) the silly thing still can’t handle the load required of it and the console can end up frying in the midst of a face-paced PGR 3 league game. Not cool at all. It’s no wonder that the poor little brick can’t take the heat considering that Will Greenwald at Alpha tested the 360’s power consumption to see how much juice it used, only to discover that
the Xbox 360 draws about 160 watts of power, over twice as much as the original Xbox, which draws 74 watts, and the PlayStation 2, which draws about 50. In fact, the great white beast chomps down more electricity than almost every piece of living room electronics we tested, including the JVC RX-D702 A/V receiver, the Denon DVD-3910 DVD player, and a DirecTV HD TiVo. The only pieces of A/V gear that draw more power than the 360 are big-screen high-definition TVs. (via GameInsider)
What can you do to help your little plastic darling from melting? Voodoo Extreme reader Jedipunisher had the time and thought to hack out a piece of his home entertainment system and install a 120mm case fan to cool off his blue baby. Follow the link to see his handiwork, and perhaps get some home renovation idea of your own. Just in case your fellow inhabitants might not appreciate you making alterations to the furniture, a simpler solution of lifting the power supply off the ground should do the trick. Suspending the big black brick using string or wire will allow air flow underneath the supply, giving it more surface area from which to vent heat. Or buy this t-shirt. It’s kind of neat.
Can I help you out at all with the fact that the XBox 360 fan sounds like an airplane jet at close range? Sorry, you’re on your own there, though perhaps only playing with earphones, or sitting across the room with your nifty wireless controller would work.
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