After just over 5 months, my Xbox 360 Elite has kicked the bucket. I get disk read errors on every disk I put in the tray, whether it’s a game, movie, or audio disk. Good times.

This marks my 6th Xbox 360 to die since launch day. Yes, my 6th. F’ing ridiculous.

I know some people are going to jump all over this in comments saying I treat it badly or whatever, but that is far from the case. My Xbox 360 has it’s own shelf in the entertainment center, with full ventilation from the front and rear. The power brick also sits on the shelf fully ventilated. The console is never moved when playing (in fact, it’s only moved a tiny bit once a week to dust). The console is kept perfectly clean, as are my other systems. I haven’t had any problems with my PS3 (save long install times) or my Wii. Never had problems with my PS2, Xbox, or Gamecube before that.

I guess I’ll be making a trip to Best Buy this afternoon to get this thing swapped out. Maybe #7 will be a lot luckier than the first 6 consoles I’ve gone through. At least I didn’t get the red ring of death again this time.

If you grabbed a copy of Knocked Up on HD-DVD and are having troubles with the Xbox 360 HD-DVD player and getting this disc to even load, you’re not the only one. I spent a good hour tonight trying to get this disc to play, including a return trip to Best Buy because I thought I got a crap disc. I finally found a solution over at AVS Forum. The people over there are amazing.

1. Go to the System blade
2. Go down and select Memory
3. Go down and Select HD Player (NOT Hard Drive)
4. Go down to the bottom entry. More than likely, it will be the largest entry in the list. When the cookie is fully downloaded, it will be 11 MB in size. When I checked for the cookie, it was 1MB in size (at the time i stopped the download). [for me, it was the first in the list, but I deleted all entries in the HD-DVD drive]
5. When you have found the entry, DELETE IT.
6. Retry starting the movie and wait for the loading screen. When you see it, you will know you have succeeded.

Once you do that, the disc should load up fine and come to a loading screen where it will sit for about 10 minutes. Do NOT hit Cancel, because that will just mess up the cookie download, which will bring you back to the same point of the disc not playing.

Seriously, if either of the HD disc formats wants to win the format war, they need to stop making things so damn complicated for the average user.

Yep, the Limited Edition version of Halo 3 has some shoddy packaging. Instead of using normal disc holders in the case, there’s a small pad and clip to hold the discs in place, and it doesn’t do a job. Users are reporting major scratches on the discs, rendering some them unplayable.

Microsoft has issued a statement that it will be replacing those discs. Check out the website here to get more information and fill out the form. In a statement to the Associated Press, Microsoft had this to say:

“We have identified that there are some instances of blemishes on discs as a result of the packaging,” said Microsoft spokesman David Dennis in an e-mailed statement. “This is a small fraction of the total number of Halo 3 games shipped and sold, and is a limited production version of the game.”

If you have some scratched discs, I would say first try to swap it out at the store you bought it from. If that doesn’t work, get Microsoft to send you new ones.

Apparently Robbie Bach admitted to the media in a conference call that all Xbox 360’s have a design fault which may cause them to fail within the first 2 years of console life, as being reported by LazyGamer.

This honestly doesn’t surprise me. I’ve personally gone through 7 Xbox 360’s, and have tons of friends who are on at least number 2.

In the conference call, Robbie Bach told everything this design flaw only recently surfaced. I’m calling Bravio Sierra here. These things have been failing like crazy for almost 2 years now. You really mean to tell me the design team JUST found what’s causing the problems?

Microsoft recently increased the 360’s warranty to 3 years because of these problems. You’d think they’d just fix the damn thing already.

Oh how the PR spins fly. Dean Takahashi of the San Jose Mercury News recently grilled Todd Holmdahl, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of Gaming and Xbox Products Group, about all the hardware issues surrounding the Xbox 360.

Surprisingly to no one, Microsoft acts like nothing is going on. Holmdahl was pressed time and time again by Takahashi, but wouldn’t budge from his crystal palace.

When asked in business terms if a high defect rate would hurt the company’s bottom line, Holmdahl flat out denied that there’s any problem. “I would say we don’t have a high defect rate,” he said. “The vast majority of people are really excited about their product, and that we are targeting profitability for next year.”

Right. There’s no high defect rate. That’s why I’m on my 8th Xbox 360 since launch, and over 75% of people I’ve spoke with are at least on their 2nd box. Dean Takahashi should have just smacked the guy in the side of the head.

Microsoft is being investigated by the European Commission for Consumers about the disc scratching issues with the Xbox 360.

According the The Inquirer, there are apparantly over 1000 complaints from The Netherlands alone, and Commissioner Meglena Kuneva ” wants and expects Microsoft to respond to worldwide complaints about the problem.”

Well, Microsoft responded in their normal fashion, saying there’s absolutely no problems. In a statement to website MCV, Microsoft Belgium stated that it has responded to the inquiry and that scratched discs are likely to have been caused by ‘improper use’ of the console.

“If used properly, Xbox 360 consoles do not damage discs… there is no single root cause or systemic issue with any of the Xbox 360 consoles.”

I’m going to call shenanigans here. Come on Microsoft. If there really wasn’t a problem, why the bloody hell would you be replacing any scratched Xbox 360 games? You don’t just drop that kind of cash on replacements for something not being caused by your product.

I really hope that one day, Microsoft will come clean and admit how many problems the 360 is having. I’m not holding my breath though…

There’s a few bugs in the most recent Dashboard Update for the Xbox 360.

The first bug is affecting Windows Live Messenger. If either your Xbox Live or Messenger account was setup prior to being age 18, you can’t use Messenger on your 360. I know someone who is currently 24 that can’t use his Messenger account on his 360 because it was setup when he was 17 years old.

The next bug is with the official wireless networking adapter. Users with the official wireless adapter are having problems auto signing in to Xbox Live. Changing from the wireless adapter to a wired connection solves the problem instantly, as does using a wireless bridge or third party wireless gaming adapter. Changing the auto sign-in options for both Live and Messenger to Enabled does not solve the problem.

In a call to Xbox Support today, they confirmed they are aware of both issues and are working on fixes. When they’ll be available, no one knows. I’d expect within a week or two.

Have you experienced these or other issues with the most recent dashboard update? Let us know in the comments.

It’s becoming increasingly common these days for products to not work properly. The video game industry is a huge culprit here. From consoles to accessories to games themselves, everything is broken when it ships.

Let’s start with consoles, shall we? I’ve never had consoles die on their own accord. Sure, there have been wrestling matches when I was a kid where a Genesis or NES got smashed, but you have to take those in stride. Even with the last generation, hardware problems weren’t that prevalent. Fast forward to today, and we see hundreds upon hundreds of Xbox 360’s failing every day. Personally, I’m on my 6th Xbox 360. Microsoft knows there’s something wrong. They wouldn’t be changing the warranty and upgrading their product replacement systems if there wasn’t. Maybe some testing could fix the problem up front.

Hit the jump for more…

There’s been rumblings of bad whammy bars on some X-ploder guitars for Guitar Hero II for the Xbox 360. Yeah, guess who’s affected? This guy. If it can go wrong, it’s probably happened to me.

Kotaku got word that two model numbers are affected: 95055 and 95065. You can check either the back of the guitar or the back of the box for the model number. I went to exchange mine tonight (I have 95055), only to find my Best Buy only has that model number in stock. Guess I’m going to have to wait. It’ll give me a break from the game for a bit.

Where’s the QA these days?

My how times have changed in the world of gaming. I remember a time when buying a video game system would be the ultimate in bringing people together. When can 8 grown ass men huddle around and spend hours staring into the virtual abyss of video games. All I have to do is send a text message to a buddy with something like, “Madden?” and he knows exactly what I am talking about. Well, these times seem to be behind us. Nintendo Wii has divided my apartment in two.

Herein lies the dilemma. My roomate is a Dr. , which is good because usually they can afford stuff that broke ass college kids cannot. He made the ultimate purchase last december in acquiring a 56″ DLP Samsung Flat Screen HDTV. All is well in the gaming world right? Not a chance. I have debated getting a Wii for sometime. I saw the Tiger Woods commercial with the Wii mote and I was hooked. Play golf with out putting on pants.?! Finally, its all coming up Milhouse. Like a retarded kid at the circus, I was all giddy when I told him we would be acquiring a new next-gen system. No fucking way he said. Umm, what? It was like I was in prison and my cell mate told me I had to pee sitting down from now on.

Hit the jump for more…