Xbox 360 defects: an inside history of Microsoft’s video game console woes

[Squilliam]

Final-Fan said:

Squilliam said:
Because Nvidia should have known better. Especially based upon the lessons from the Xbox 360. Because Nvidia did not forsee issues with the creeping temperatures and the problems it was causing the packaging, then how could Microsoft have forseen?

Sony is either lucky or unlucky depending on how you spin it because they could have bought a GPU with the same design flaw in the packaging as the Laptop GPUs which failed. They were all within specification in the Laptop designs and yet they failed, so put that same flaw into the PS3 and the failure rate would have skyrocketed.

I'm not very familiar with that NVidia recall, but proper quality testing would certainly have exposed the RRoD, and responsible engineering would be to fix the problem upon discovery.  That did not happen and it wasn't due to "bad luck" but rather MS rushing development to an incredible degree.  Sony didn't do that and we all can see why now.

By the way I bet the NVidia defect won't have a 25-33% failure rate.  And I bet NVidia didn't stonewall and deny all reports of the problem until it was about to get slammed with massive lawsuits.

Actually the failure rate for the GPU has been listed at 20-40% and the warranties on the laptops gpus are being extended (RROD warranty take 2?). But the thing is, these designs were tested by computer hardware companies no less. Dell/HP etc were caught with their pants down there and it wasn't due to incompetence on their part. Furthermore Nvidia pretty much blamed everyone but themselves for the problem and denied it until the last possible moment.

The Xbox 360 GPU has a similar problem with its own packaging. The solder joints break and one of the simple fixes for this is the Xclamp mod which applies increased pressure to the GPU die to force the solder joins back together. Its even possible that due to differences in manufacturing vs test units the problems were not aparent until manufacturing due to the use of lead solder in the hand built testing units. It was only once they were mass produced that the problems started showing up en masse. No company knowing the full gravity of the error would actually go ahead a release a unit like that.