The Red Ring plagued some 360 owners in the past but with little to no reports of it happening in these few months it seems like its over........... or is this just the calm before the storm. With games like Mass Effect, Halo 3, and Blue Dragon, it may be the biggest test this season for the 360 owners (like myself) and the consoles, but with the untested 360s still on store shelves it may become a problem for new consumers. So with all the new games and unrefurbished 360 consoles in stores, what are the chances the Red Ring will become in issue this holiday season? To answer my own question For new consumers 70% to 80% chance For current owners 0% to 10% chance

If you get a white 360 yep it will happen, even if you get the elite. The 65nm is going to have some of the same problems just prolongs the life.

Santa getting kids the Red Ring...? Yeah, I can see how that will be used by Wii and PS3 fanboys...

guys sorry about the question marks my PS3 browser is having problems

Depends if things have improved with the updates.

If they haven't, will definatly be an issue. Reliability is often mentioned in mainstream media reports on the 360. Surely that will put parents (and anyone else) off.

If red rings of death seem to have become a rarity, people have short memories, and it wont affect things.

Microsoft has an opportunity here to address the problem. It will really depend. Since they announced the 3 year extension, I'm sure they have a flood of units coming in. If (and it's a big if) they get them all turned around QUICKLY and the fix is for real -- i.e. as good as any other well made electronic device, this will fade before Christmas. They are kind of in a catch 22 though. If they make a big deal of how they have addressed the hardware failures in popular media then they risk alerting parents that would otherwise have just bought the thing becuase that's what their kids asked for. The other side of the equation they risk the general market not believing in the product and not really knowing if the fix is solid or not. I hope they get the backlog of bad machines fixed and fixed well. If they do, I think they will keep a low profile and hope the furor dies down before November when the real shopping begins in earnest.

That's a bit of a strong statement given you aren't part of the manufacturing and testing process for the new motherboard design don't you think?  Looking at it another way... even if 33% is the actual failure rate which by some accounts seems about accurate, that still leaves 66% of machines that won't break down.

once the 360's with the 65nm chips come to stores it should be less of a problem

That just leaves you with a 1 in 3 chance of your 360 breaking down on you, just like those other 3+ million if the percentages are to be believed.

1up editor(s) were guessing this too that because of the big games coming out such as Halo 3, tons of people will get them and really stress their 360's by playing games in prolonged sessions, which could definatly raise the amount of breakdowns that occur. 

How do you know that?