Quick question for you guys, simply because I'm curious...

My 360 red-ringed 9-days ago, which was no big deal because it gave me a great reason to finally use my PS3 as a gaming machine instead of just a Blu-ray player (and I have to admit I was impressed...)

Anyway, I sent it off to Microsoft, and got it back exactly a week from the day I sent it off.

Oddly enough, I was expecting to get my old loud 360 back (that was manufactured in early 2006), but instead I got a brand new 360 that was manufactured a few months ago (different serial as well of course)... and it was quiet as a mouse (imagine that.. I never even thought this to be possible!)

My question is, considering a large number of you guys have probably experienced the blessing of the RROD, how many of you guys got back your old console repaired, and how many of you simply got a new one sent to you by MS?

I thought they sent refurbs out, they probably just spiffen em up to make them look new.

it depends on whats wrong with your box, i got mine back, they swaped out the disk drive (i went from quite to loud but mine was still a launch series console), and reseated my fx chip.... the mac address is the same so the motherboard could not have been swapped, havent had any problems since

A buddy of mine got a different 360, He swears that the graphics have now improved when he revisits older games in his collection. hhhmmmmmmmm

They do have the Opus motherboard which is essentially a Falcon (80nm GPU, 65nm CPU) without the HDMI port.

Well, I know mine wasn't a refurb, because it was in the factory sealed packaging, and the clear protective tape stuff was on everything... I was actually pleasantly surprised. Plus, it was literally about a two-month old console according to the manufactures date, and I doubt that one that new was being refurbished.

As for the "graphical" upgrade, I'm not really sure. Although, I think that the games load a lot cleaner & more efficiently now. Maybe because of the Falcon setup in it now? I'm not really sure.

Either way, it was a pretty good way to make me feel better about having it red-ring. It lessened the sting quite a bit.

His replacement was defo a refurb but it could easily have been a newer model to the one he previously had hence his claim of better graphics, He also said loading times had improved a little too.

RROD is not nice , But to get a better machine back softens the blow a little huh.

Definitely.  I actually would have been happy with a late model refurb really, but getting a brand new one was even sweeter. 

All I can figure is that either MS is running low on refurbishable consoles, or simply because mine was such a bad failure(?), it made more sense to give me a new one?

Which makes me wonder... does MS check out your profile and see how many games you have bought to factor in what they do?  I mean, everyone knows that all three of the big console makers make most of their profits on the games, and barely make a dime on the system.  Of course, this might not even factor in to their decision, but I thought I'd throw it out there because anything is possible I suppose.

It's been a year since I experienced the RROD (I still wake up screaming sometimes), but I think I got the same 360 back.

Well , thankfully RROD has been reduced massively so theres every chance that they are running out of refurbs, theres a strong chance yours could have had a major problem hence because 360's are so cheap to produce now they just decided to send you a new one.

Interesting theory regarding wether they check your profile/Gamercard to determine which replacement you get, If they do and somthing happens to mine then surely i will get a gold plated limited edition brand new 360, ok silver at the very least lol.