30% failure rate haunts Xbox 360 image

Mike Bantick
Tuesday, 26 June 2007 16:47

Your IT - Entertainment

According to some reports Xbox 360’s continue to experience hardware issues.  A recent query put to an Australian game retailer puts the figure at a 30% return rate.

Already highlighted in the European community recently, the perceived failure rate of the Xbox 360 game console from Microsoft is beginning to tarnish the platforms image.

A recent article over at Smarthouse describes various anecdotal experiences of Xbox 360 failures and subsequent dealings with the Microsoft support procedure.  Some are not so flattering (my own experience whilst disappointing, left me with little downtime).

From the article; According to an EB Games store manager, who wished to remain anonymous, failure rates for the Xbox 360 have dropped in recent times but still outweigh hardware failures for competing consoles.

"We are definitely getting faulty hardware returns of the Xbox 360, but no-where near as much as we used to when it first came out," he said.

"On initial launch, it was close to 30 per cent of our [Xbox 360s] were coming back faulty".
A Sydney retailer said "Out the Nintendo Wii, the PS3 and the Xbox 360 the Microsoft product is the only one that we have had constant problems with. In fact when we sell the Xbox 360 we tell customers to contact Microsoft if they "Ever have a problem".

"At one stage we were getting calls everyday however this has slowed down. The failure rate must be well over 30% which when you look at a PC or iPod the failure rate is less than 2%

As a statistical analysis, these figures cannot be relied on, Microsoft themselves deny any real problem on perceived high return rates.  The stories of woe however continue to flow.

The closest Microsoft has come to admitting a problem was during a recent interview where VP of Gaming and Xbox products group, Todd Holmdahl hinted that a change had been made to the Xbox 360 warrantee structure soon in 2006.

Whatever the truth is, a high failure rate, if correct damages reputation as well as bank balances for the big M, and if false, needs to be quashed before further image harm ensues.