my 360 has just died on me and as it's an old 20gb model i've been looking for an excuse to buy a new one. 

The question is does both the premium and elite model have some new board in it that lets out less heat or something?

thanks for your help everybody - I just bought an Elite so lets hope this one lasts me longer than 18 months.

My 20gig died (bought in January 07). I bought a 60gig and it runs much better. It's quiet, games load faster, runs cooler, has HDMI support, XBox Live Marketplace seems faster, and I got an improved headset, Kung-fu Panda and Lego Indiana Jones (awesome game!!). You did the right thing. Coulda got that 20gig fixed, but it would probably break when you least expected (mine broke every November!). Enjoy your Elite!!

Sell the old 360 too. Just make sure you get the free data transfer cable from Microsoft.

I may be wrong but I believe they actually put in a new motherboard in the broken consoles. I don't think Microsoft lost a billion dollars doing just quick fixes.

Wow, who buys a new console when they can have their existing one replaced for free? That is a lot of games you could have bought...

I'd heard of this happening too.  In a couple of instances, even on this site, I've heard tales of people who sent in black Elite 360's and got white 360's in return!!  I guess the ones with simple problems are fixed and the ones with serious problems are replaced.  I got my same one back, though.

If it was RROD you could still get a new console. Call up MS and tell them its died within the three years warranty period.

Get the Coffin and send away. Two to three weeks later refurb or brand new console.

My friends died last summer and he got a brand new console.
We discreetly marked the case and Motherboard.

Sweet

Yeah, just send it for repairs and re-sell.

I think you're right - I thought it was just my imaginiation about the marketplace as I downloaded several demo's last night and it seemed way faster.  I thought they may have had a better network card in it or something, it was very fast whatever the reason.

The reason I got a new one is cos I earned an extra £1500 last month in overtime so I treated myself to this and me and the wife to a holiday in June. I was totally fed up with the 20gb when I was deleting installed games off the HDD to make extra space to install a new one and I accidently deleted my Mass Effect game same rather than the installed game (I was on my third playthrough as well).

Thats when I thought enough is enough.

For less than half the money you could have upgraded to a 120 Gig drive.