Until very recently I thought I was one of the many Xbox 360 owners who have suffered the infamous “3 red lights” problem. I went through the tedious process of following all the troubleshooting steps from the web site. Nothing helped. Next I called the Xbox support phone number and had to suffer that irritating “recorded guy” on the phone. When I finally reached a living, breathing mammal, lo and behold, I had to again follow the same steps. Finally, they agreed that it was not a problem that could be fixed and I had to send in my console for “repairs”. That meant waiting for the UPS box they ship you and finding out that, contrary to Microsoft’s helpful written instructions, UPS expects to be paid for picking the box. Long story short, I sent it to Microsoft and in a few weeks received a “new” (??) console that worked very well. And I thought that was it, problem solved.

Ok, now the fun begins. I came back home from work one September evening and my son told me “Dad, the Xbox is not working”. So I took a look at the 3 red lights and realized this was starting all over again. This time I called Microsoft and got to the point straightaway. No waiting to follow diagnostic steps, no irritating Alex or whatever that “voice guy” is called (is he a relative of Clippy??). I even told the lady on the phone politely but firmly that I had already followed all the troubleshooting steps, that I knew exactly what the problem was and that I guessed I had to send it back to them for repairs/replacement. To her credit, she quickly realized that I probably knew something about this problem and told me they would be sending me a box. But here’s the kicker! She then proudly told me Microsoft would be giving me a whole free month of XBox Live subscription, no kidding! Now isn’t that great, considering the fact that I am already a subscriber? When I politely informed her that Microsoft’s kindness did not help and that I needed to be compensated in other ways, she was at a loss. So I knew where that one was going. To cut a long story short, I decided to ask for the instructions to send the console for “repairs”.

Update

I got my Xbox back a couple of days ago. Microsoft’s letter accompanying the console states that in the interest of letting me enjoy the experience of playing games quicker, they have sent me a replacement console with a different serial number. And, of course, I get one month’s free subscription to Xbox Live!!

I was hoping I would at least get the new version of the Xbox 360 with HDMI but no, that didn’t happen. I’d read in a blog (written by a prominent blogger) that he managed to get an upgraded console after his repair incident. No luck with mine. I’m going to start screaming now because this is the second time my console packed up. I don’t even know what kind of hardware/firmware is in my “new” console. Or which poor soul is going to get my previous console after its been “fixed”.

Conclusions

So what kind of a product is the Xbox 360? It certainly provides a great user experience for game playing. It is also a great console for watching movies and images. And I have to confess I usually go for the underdog (Numero Duo) when it comes to purchasing products. My motto is the old Avis one - we try harder. I bought the original console when the PS2 was king. I bought a Sony PSP although the Nintendo DS seems to be the king of the pile. I selected Sirius satellite radio over XM at a time when Sirius was clearly number two. I went for Dish Network over Direct TV although in this case Dish was clearly ahead on its HD programming at the time I subscribed to their service. But this “numero duo” story should be rested for another rant. Let me get back to the Xbox 360 story.

When giant corporations like Microsoft create products, sometimes things do go wrong. However, the Xbox 360 seems to have problems unlike most other pieces of hardware. I’ve owned a Toshiba TV for the last 7 years and it has never broken down. NEVER. I’ve owned a Dell desktop PC since 2000 and that thing has never broken down. EVER. How come the Xbox 360 seems to have these problems? And Microsoft’s way of soothing my feelings is to provide me free repairs and 1 month of free Xbox Live? This after I told them I already have a Xbox Live subscription. I’m going to have to write/talk to Microsoft to see what they have to say. But hey, when they don’t directly answer questions from folks at PC World, what can I expect? Not even a PR response, I bet! I’ll save my fingers till after I’ve tried to speak to Xbox 360 support. And that’s after I’ve gone past Alex.

Looks like Chris Satchell, General Manager of Microsoft’s Game Developer Group is in controlled release mode. Doing controlled release of the fact that Microsoft is not going to bother about Xbox 360 backward compatibility for too long.
I was just reading a Gizmodo post about Satchell predicting that by 2008 Xbox 360 backward compatibility would be a non-issue. Microsoft obliges, as usual! Here is a quote from the forums of Xbox-scene (caution - there are some real trash talking teens out there!):
“At some point we’re going to focus less on it,” he said. “When you get to the end of this year there will be a reduced focus on backwards compatibility. There are so many 360 games out there. I don’t know if it’s important anymore.”

My 5 year-old son is hooked on several E-rated games on the original Xbox console. For unknown reasons, Microsoft never came out with backward compatible versions for most, if not all, of these games. My read on this is that the selection process for these games was probably based on some survey of Xbox Live or general sales volumes of titles. Most of these games are rated either Teen or Mature, probably reflecting the highest demographic of game players. But Microsoft tends to forget that children probably form the second largest demographic.

My original Xbox console recently gave up the ghost and stopped working. After long conversations with Microsoft I was told that if I would have to pay upto $175 to get it repaired. My intention was to get the Xbox repaired so my son could play his old games that would not work on our new Xbox 360. He loves many of the new games on the 360 including Marbles, Bejeweled and even Uno! But he still yearned for his old favorites like Tak Attack, Scooby Doo, and others. I finally found that my local Microcenter store sold used Xbox consoles for between $100 and $120. There were no warranties and I took a risk and bought one for about $115. Now there is a happy youngster and a somewhat apprehensive dad, waiting for the console to pack up.

And now, of course, we hear that Microsoft is going to yank whatever little is left of this backward compatibility humbug. I read some of the comments on the Gizmodo article about how much worse Sony is. I could be hardly bothered because the only Sony gaming device I have is a PSP. All I can say is that after investing in nearly 40 games I will not have any options in case my second Xbox console dies on me.