Great news for those who paid to get their 360 fixed:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070705/...As6EKK2sIE1vAI

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq:MSFT - news) said on Thursday "an unacceptable number of repairs" to its Xbox 360 will force it to take a charge of more than $1 billion for its most recent quarter, and it announced a new, extended warranty for the video game console.

The announcements come amid mounting complaints about Xbox 360 failures on the Internet. Microsoft said it had investigated the sources of hardware failures indicated by three red flashing lights on the console and had identified "a number of factors" that can cause such failures.

Microsoft said it would extend warranty coverage to three years to cover the problem and would reimburse customers who had previously paid for repairs related to the three-flashing-lights error message.

Microsoft also said it has made improvements to the Xbox 360 console.

The charge will be in a range of $1.05 billion to $1.15 billion, before taxes, for the quarter ended June 30, Microsoft said.

Microsoft shares dropped slightly to $29.81 after closing at $29.99 on Nasdaq.

I haven't sent mine in yet, but since I've been playing so much GH2 lately (haven't really played much since Oblivion) it's getting louder and hotter... with this new change in warranty I don't feel so bad that I didn't buy the extended warranty when I picked it up in April of '06.

About time they admitted something wrong with it.

They got mine on 6/22 and they're apparently working on it but they want me to call back in 2 days because the "system" hasn't updated info.

Yeah, apparently they did NOT expedite mine like they said....normal 3 Day Select, so I won't get my box until the 10th. Thus, E3 will be totally missed and I'll probably miss the NCAA 08 launch. Maybe it's time to get it for PS3

I just got my 360 back. Only took a month! If this customer service is supposed to be improved, I would hate to see what it was like when it was broken. They even sent it back to the wrong address after they had a modified ship to a week prior to them even shipping. For my troubles, the are trying to make good by sending me Kameo for free.

There goes any chance of them making a profit this generation. Serves them right for faulty hardware.

um

if anything, it more be for the quarter, not the generation

$1 billion is a LOT to make up in the XBOX division....we'll see how this goes. I'm a bit upset with MS right now as my console is REALLY dead now. The 3 red rings are there for good now. Before it would just cut out every so often. Looks like MS will cost me a month of Blockbuster rentals also, as I cannot watch my HD-DVD.

Yeah, there is no way they are going to make up a $1B-$1.5B hit for these repairs.

And yeah, my GF is pissed that we had to stop watching Planet Earth because my 360 died. It sucks that losing the 360 will cost me a month or so of online HD-DVD rentals. I guess that is a huge drawback to the HD-DVD add-on, the ~month/year that your 360 is getting fixed. I suppose I could try and get the drive working on my HTPC...

That is why since PS2 I've never used my Game sytems for DVDs. Although to be fair, I've considered Downloading TV shows from the Marketplace but somehow that doesn't seem the same to me.

Well watching the shows from the Marketplace doesn't spin your disc drive at all since it comes straight from your HDD so i wouldn't worry either.

I also have to commend MSoft for giving free shows every so often. The free episode of Bullrun got my wife to order me to download episodes 2 and 3 for her to watch.

That's what I did while my 360 was being repaired. Hope you have the horsepower to run it, though!

Do you have a good resource for this?

I have a dual-core P4 as my HTPC, but nothing too amazing. Getting this running would definately ease the pain of my RROD'd 360.

I just did a Google search and downloaded the drivers for it. I found PowerDVD 6.5 was the best for watching on.

Purchased at launch, red rings of death in early 2007. Microsoft did fix it for free (exchanged actually), but I had to pay the shipping to get it there.

Got mine in November 06... started randomly freezing during gameplay last week... red rings last night... service call this morning: going back to MS for repair.

< still waiting for his.

Well, I just got off the phone from my bi-daily phone call....she said the console would arrive the 16th TO the repair center....wow, she can read UPS.com

Said it would be 4-6 weeks to get one back. She said a 1 month LIVE card will be in the box....yeah. I will fight for another month also. I'm still tempted to contact the Better Business Bureau, but I wonder if that would be more of a hassle than it is worth.

I'm still surprised no class action suit has been attempted yet. 33% failure rate is just horrible (if the numbers are true).

Got it back today, so two weeks for my coffin to arrive and another two weeks for servicing. We'll see how long it lasts this time...

Do you have to call and ask for the refund? I'd just for them to credit it back to the card instead of a check, be faster wouldn't it?

My box came with an apology letter telling me that a card for 1 month of Live was enclosed. No card though.

Got mine back on Monday, after about a 3 week wait. Actually I didn't get "mine" back, the letter said due to the amount of time its taking to repair them, they just sent me another one, I hope they at least sent me a "fixed" one.

They sent me 2 1-month cards, which were wrapped up in the plastic bag

maybe you got Gdrlv's card too.

Called again today and they can't even tell me if they looked at it. The guy said they're getting so many each day the repair timeframe was extended.

I want a fuckin' game OR 3 for this.