what's stopping Microsoft from producing a revised version of the 360 to prevent rrod. Perhaps over hauling the design from scratch. if i may use in example, like the ps2 fat to slim, ps1 original to psone or psp to psp slim etc. im just a bit curious to ask. :icon_bigg
It's the design of the board, regulations, + gpu / cpu heat. 1. They can't use lead based solder in children's toys. 2. The board is too thin and warps under heat from the gpu and cpu. The solder cracks and causes failure. 3. They didn't change the design as they decided it was better to sell fast than redesign before release. The new chips are cooler running, but not cool enough. The heat is still too high. Then new boards coming soon will be 100% redesigned and have lower thermal output. All older systems WILL fail some point in the future (if stock cooled) as the cracks in the solder are assured to develop. It is a fatal design flaw. What I have in my system is an independent fan. It turns on before the 360 is on, and critically remains on AFTER the system is off for appx ten minutes to cool the board.
My brother had a gpu failure on his, without any rings. A lot of people are linking this to the NXE update, which causes yet more heat.
Cost. It is cheaper for them to do small redesigns and reduce component die size (and thus heat) and replace faulty units than to have to pay engineers to redesign it. Microsoft has to outsource their entire product process from beginning to end, and a radical redesign would be very cost prohibitive. Sony does all this inhouse so the cost of redesign is lower than the savings they make from hardware revisions. That's why the PS3 has already seen so many changes in the motherboard etc. (beyond removing the PS2 chipset).
If you're talking about jasper boards, thing again, they have the same design, even if they produce less heat. If you're talking about something else, what is it? Ps: I have a Day-one 360 that works fine. Luck helps :lol:
Yea I really feel bad for people that say they are on there like 6th 360 and above, thats just sad. I HAD a launch day 360 for the longest time(up until a year ago) and I sold it on ebay as a modded 360. I needed a new one with hdmi. but even to the last day I played it it worked fine, it was pretty cool too.
I can't seem to find any accesory that helps cool the XBOX360 that doesn't require opening it up. My brothers bought a model that is just below Jasper (where the CPU is 65nm, but not the GPU if I remember correctly). I see some at gamestop, but they just go over where the rear fans are located and I think that really won't help at all...
On the topic of lead-based solder, it is banned now, at least in Europe. It isn't to do with children so much as the fact that the lead fumes are dangerous to those assembling the PCBs. Therefore, they now have to use lead-free solder. Incidentally, whilst lead-free solder isn't regarded as highly by electronics buffs, it has a higher melting point. Some service manuals actually state that you shouldn't use solder containing lead when repairing the equipment (I've seen it in modern television service manuals) due to the lower melting point. How hot do they expect the appliance to get?!? 60/40 lead solder melts at around 180-190 degrees Celcius. That's hot enough to boil water or cook food! Lead-free solder usually has a melting point between 200-230 degrees Celcius, although the most common is around 215-220 degrees Celcuis. Whilst the US hasn't banned the use of lead in solder, I think they're starting to encourage the move from it, particularly in California. Apparently there's some kind of tax rebate if you stop using lead in your electronics? lol. So when people claim that 360s get SO hot that it melts the solder and messes up the joint, I would ask - HOW?!?! A processor running at 180 degrees Celcius or higher? Really?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLabckoPC0g Maybe they should forget the next Xbox and try to get a slice of george foremans pie.
You can cook an egg at 70 degrees Celcius. I've seen PCs run at that temperature - OK, it's preferable to have them cooler, but they do still run. Incidentally, was he using powdered egg there? I wonder if that would cook at lower temperatures.... Shame the video is such low quality. I couldn't see it boiling the water. I didn't see any steam. It appeared to evaporate. You could get that effect with isopropyl alcohol if you wanted to. As for the Sambuca, I couldn't see a flame there, either. Alcohol boils at a lower temperature than water, around 85 degrees Celcius IIRC. If he didn't use any trickery (including using something that wasn't water or heating the heatsink with that hot air gun), then that suggests the 360 is reaching a temperature of 100 degrees Celcius. Sure, that's too hot, but still way off the temperature of 180-220 degrees Celcius required to melt the solder.
Apparently it does not take much to cause this problem, but yes. A lot more then the old blade system they used. That's simplifying the issue somewhat. The problem is the board warps due to the X clamps when the machine heats up, and that puts a strain on the solder joints.
That makes more sense! In turn, it's most people simplifying the problem to "heats up and melts the joints" which is obviously not true! ;-)
I always wondered whether the issue of using non leaded solder was a contributing factor, doesn't the ROHS/wee directive state all devices must use this solder and not just childrens toys?
There were the Royal Institute Christmas Lectures on TV a while, which even though aimed at kids were very interesting. He had PC running and cooked an egg on the processor as well!!! Also moving off track a little, the youtube below had the audience controlling a car game by movement. This was also one of the lectures noted above http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXLR2QEvmYA
