Microsoft being sued over X360

eeyrjmr said:
point abt communication skills. Its just in our office (16eng) all of us have extrealy crap (written) english skills. We can write tech documents very well BUT waffly management docu we all sticnk at

I havn't proven MS wrong in anything they have done. I have stated that they are using a line-freq XFMR for main transformation which is in-efficient in power,wieght and size. They chose that route for a reason, I wouldn't of

As to sizes, have a look at a 200W 50/60Hz mains XFMR to get an idea, ill will start searching now
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I'm sorry, but unless this is your second year speaking english I refuse to believe you somehow managed to make it through any respectable institution of higher education without learning how to correctly spell: haven't, about, extremely, stink etc....
 
Erasmus354 said:
I fail to see how you have proven MS wrong in anything they did. You claim you can make a PSU that is 10% the size and weight of the current model. The last time I checked I have never seen a 200W PSU that small. If you could kindly link me to the specs and pictures of a 200W PSU that is half an inch thick, an inch wide, and 2 inches long I would be happy to concede.
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Right standard way of doing it
Take line freq and pass through XFMR to step-down to a usable voltage (28V is common). Then filter and regulate

The XFMR on its own:
http://www.farnell.com/datasheets/58488.pdf


Now a modern way of doing it is to rectify the AC to a DC-level. Pass through a HF SMPS to reduce the voltage down

http://www.vicorpower.com/documents/datasheets/ds_vi-200.pdf


The DC:DC SMPS supplied by Vicor are extremly small (alot small then the XFMR) and thus I have proven my point. Thus a custom SMPS-powerbrick would have been a hell of alot smaller then the power-brick that MS use at present

I am not saying MS should have used Viror (since they are very expensive and are more Aerospace produces so stricter requirements) BUT they could have designed a SMPS


As to yr statement abt Englsih skill, I have a MAsters in Elec&Electronic eng and 5years working in the power industry. I guess it is my and my dylexia then. Dont start having a go at me when technically I am right, even though I might have some spelling mistakes



Anyway what is this thread?
have a go at my English, correct Draax on tech points or the validity of the law suit?
 
Amidst all this engineer prick wavery, allow me to interject a non-engineer consumer based observation.

The power kit will be redesigned over the life of this product. Probably to resemble something more along the lines of what eeyrjmr. This power bar, which is roughly the same size but longer than a computer power supply, could definitely be smaller, and quieter, and will definitely see a revamp.

i'm willing to bet that quite a few of the problems being had are based on people using poor judgement on the placement of this hot noisy beast of a powerblock. They might be placing the vents on the front and back of it too close to something else, so that it is sucking in hot air.

I've run this damn thing as much as anybody, and have had 0 issues. I have an open air tv stand, and I know not to stuff everything back into one spot for air-flows sake too.

You guys need to stop hollering about all this 'I'm an engineer' crap or go get a room. I'm a computer technician, and while that may give me more insight into the technical workings of certain things, it does not make me an expert on the xbox and it's cooling needs anymore than it makes you guys experts in other aspects. Sure you might understand how it parts of it work better than most of us do, but MS hired engineers to build it, and they made the decisions they made for a reason, right?

I think we can all agree that the main enemy of this console was time, and that is showing through in numerous aspects of it's design. The reason the backwards compatibility sucks, the power bar is so huge, and the anything else you can complain about is blah blah blah, is because this sucker was rushed.

Back to topic, the guy with the lawsuit is an asshat. And 3% failure isn't good, but it's not the end of the world either.
 
If M$ was refusing to do anything about the problem, I could possibly see his point, but they are repairing or replacing the ones that have issues free of charge, and the turn around has been very fast (5-7 business days from the few reports I've seen from players that have sent them in). I'm not sure what he's hoping to get out of this case. Compensation due to emotional strain suffered from not being able to jack his gamercard achievements in the first week of release? Please...
 
Man, the guy behind this suit is stupid, the damn thing comes with a 90 Day warranty out of the box, and I think the extra 1 Year (I think that's how long) is like, 60 or so, from what I hear. That and its over night shipping both ways. I think Microsoft has dealt with the defective systems very well, and I have seen a lot of people send them in, and get back a perfectly functional system, and with in a weeks time.
 
Wait... Microsoft is only giving 3 months warranty on these things? I can see a lot of headaches coming up... wasn't 1 year the norm for these things? Next-gen is going to SUCK, since I'm sure Sony will follow suit.
 
steviep said:
Wait... Microsoft is only giving 3 months warranty on these things? I can see a lot of headaches coming up... wasn't 1 year the norm for these things? Next-gen is going to SUCK, since I'm sure Sony will follow suit.
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A 3 month factory warranty isn't all that uncommon. MS offers in the package the option to upgrade to a 2 year extended warranty for $59.99. The nice thing about this warranty is it is fully renewable unlike lots of other warranties. This means that in two years you can then warranty your now 2 yr old 360 for another 2 years, ad infinitum.
 
ameoba said:
A 3% defect rate is pretty large for consumer electronics...
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3% is the average failure rate of electronics. Thats why MS said their xbox360 has less then a 3% failure rate.
 
eeyrjmr said:
Yes it can.

The power supply definitly uses a main XFMR (only way to get it so heavy) and they are basically lumps of iron (laminated as well) and that costs alot!!!

Take a rectifier, a 500V FET a smaller, higher freq XFMR and you can get a 10th of the weight in a 10th of the size (which straight away save on shipping costs) and it is alot more efficient and pricewize it is comparable

Please get yr facts straight before knocking a field that you know nothing abt
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I am sure you know far more about AC adapters than I do, but I am curious about one thing.

How is it that YOU can design a 200+ Watt A/C adapter the size of a typical 75 Watt laptop A/C adapter, and can do so for 1/4 or less the cost of such adapters when the entire rest of the known world can NOT do so?

Sounds a bit fishy to me.....
 
My 360 has seen many hours after many hours of use and not a single problem or crash. The fact that Microsoft is fixing the problems for free and even offering overnight shipping means this guy has no case. It may be that the temeprature in my gaming room hovers around 60-65 degree's at most this time of year, but my system appears to be pretty solid so far.
 
steviep said:
Wait... Microsoft is only giving 3 months warranty on these things? I can see a lot of headaches coming up... wasn't 1 year the norm for these things? Next-gen is going to SUCK, since I'm sure Sony will follow suit.
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That is the standard in electronics for the most part these days. While some devices like TV's, DVD players do have up to one year, most "usable and wearable" electronics devices have very limited warranties. I definately opted for the 2 year extended warranty since it's a good deal for $59. A lot can happen in 2 years when you look at how many gaming hours i'm going to put on this thing.
 
ok ok ok. Back on topic.

The only way this FIB Robert Byers can win his case is if he can somehow prove that MS knew they had design flaw that caused both the PSU and the CPU to overheat.

So the questions that come to my mind are what kind of quality control testing did MS do on the 360. Because I guarantee you their hardware labs pushed the 360 beyond the specified tolerance in terms of heat and power, if the box passed all those tests, how is it that the retail units fail?
 
MovieMan80 said:
ok ok ok. Back on topic.

The only way this FIB Robert Byers can win his case is if he can somehow prove that MS knew they had design flaw that caused both the PSU and the CPU to overheat.

So the questions that come to my mind are what kind of quality control testing did MS do on the 360. Because I guarantee you their hardware labs pushed the 360 beyond the specified tolerance in terms of heat and power, if the box passed all those tests, how is it that the retail units fail?
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IIRC, 5 hours automated, and 1 hour manual testing before leaving the factory, but thats only what I have heard.
 
junehhan said:
That is the standard in electronics for the most part these days. While some devices like TV's, DVD players do have up to one year, most "usable and wearable" electronics devices have very limited warranties. I definately opted for the 2 year extended warranty since it's a good deal for $59. A lot can happen in 2 years when you look at how many gaming hours i'm going to put on this thing.
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So MS is screwing people for an additional $30, for all intents and purposes, for a warranty that pretty much is industry wide. Yes, the el cheapo CD walkmans I get from Walmart only come with 90 days, and the refurbished bluetooth adapters I get at computer warehouses only come with 90 days... but every major consumer electronic I've purchased in a VERY long time has come with at LEAST 1 year. (eg my Ipod Nano, Gamecube, DVD burner, hell my Dell LCD comes with a 3 year warranty!). People who didn't pay extra for an actual warranty are likely going to have some big headaches come March... Parents included. Man between the new "marketplace" (buy the rest of your game ideas), the core system screw and this, they're really trying hard to screw a few extra bucks out of people to make up that $125 loss...
 
So I guess you believe SONY will make a profit on just selling their console all by itself and will give everyone any extras they want and have a full warrenty for the full 10 years they want the PS3 to last?

No.
 
Tiny said:
So I guess you believe SONY will make a profit on just selling their console all by itself and will give everyone any extras they want and have a full warrenty for the full 10 years they want the PS3 to last?

No.
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When did I ever say something as ridiculous as that? I never expect a company (gaming, car, television, hell anything) to warrant the product for its expected shelf life. I just expect a minimum standard of which I should be insured in case this expensive, volatile device with hundreds of fragile moving parts just happens to crap out on me, and 90 days is unequivocally shameful. Would you be happy if you went and bought a brand new Viper and they decided to give you a 6 month warranty, for instance? I fear that Microsoft is setting the standard which other companies will go by, and large expensive electronics like the XBox 360 certainly SHOULD include a decent warranty out of the box - that's not something you should have to pay extra for. I have a very uneasy feeling that after 3 months, there will be a lot of complaining going on, here and elsewhere. Especially with this rushed launch set.
 
Suck it up and don't worry about it. Service plans are the way EVERYONE is going. Nothing you can do about it.
 
Tiny said:
Suck it up and don't worry about it. Service plans are the way EVERYONE is going. Nothing you can do about it.
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Hell yeah there is. I don't buy products which require me to buy a service plan, I buy products with warranties. Seagate, BFG Tech and so on. :p

Ah, the beauty of Captalism. The consumer chooses where to spend their money and companies like Microsoft won't get it if they're not willing to offer a half decent warranty.
 
Not me. You'd be very VERY hard pressed to find me buying a service plan for anything. The only thing I've ever bought a service plan for in my life, was the studio headphones that I use for DJing. Simply because I know there are issues with certain parts that are extremely common, even after the first year warranty that it came with. And I've got my money's worth (new headphones) so many times, that the $30 that I paid has ended up costing Sony well over $600.

My point? I shouldn't need to suck it up. I expect a good warranty out of the box.
 
wait isn't the ideal rate for failure in mass manufactured equipment 1 defect in 1,000,000 units? So micorsoft is sitting at 3,000 defects in 1,000,000 units at their current 3% projection. Sounds like a class action lawsuit to me.
 
I don't have statistics to back me up (nobody does but MS' internals), but I believe that they are fibbing on the 3% figure. I believe it is greater. Probably not greater than 10%, but greater.
 
steviep said:
I don't have statistics to back me up (nobody does but MS' internals), but I believe that they are fibbing on the 3% figure. I believe it is greater. Probably not greater than 10%, but greater.
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Most business's shoot for whats called Six Sigma, which means theres an 3.4 defects per million. Thats in line with what MS is stating.
 
Maybe we can all get together and Sue EA Games as well since BF2 and SF was causing major headaches when SF was released.
 
GT98 said:
Most business's shoot for whats called Six Sigma, which means theres an 3.4 defects per million. Thats in line with what MS is stating.
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I am familiar with Six Sigma. I own a brand new Motorola V360 cell phone that was built with Six Sigma in mind. And guess what, I've gone through 3 units and I still have issues with short battery life, with a 1010mah battery (most phones come with a 680-800mah battery) that's supposed to give me much more than it does. Yes, I do have a point. You can shoot for whatever you want, but when you rush a product to market, Six Sigma means jack all. Did MS even shoot for that?

90 day warranty is still pitiful. Good system with fantastic potential, the X360 is, but that makes it much less appealing to me.
 
How can you sue? Just return the damn thing! Nobody is stopping you! It would be different if it burned down his house. But we are just talking about a defective unit he has.
 
Archer75 said:
How can you sue? Just return the damn thing! Nobody is stopping you! It would be different if it burned down his house. But we are just talking about a defective unit he has.
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Agreed - not like the US court system doesn't have enough frivolous lawsuits to deal with.
 
WS6 said:
Maybe we can all get together and Sue EA Games as well since BF2 and SF was causing major headaches when SF was released.
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Shit might as well, I remember here awhile back they were getting sued about employee overtime compensation or something like that, though I don't remember ever hearing which game/games that were being made at the time, don't know if it could have been BF2 maybe.
 
so my buddy had a bad ps2. he decided to open it up, causing sony's cool little void if removed sticker to magically say void all over it (magic). then he took the cover off of the dvd drive and turned the adjuster nobs for the laser and stuff, marking various points with a sharpy. well, it didn't work that well, unlike another friend with a bad ps2. so he called up sony, when they asked him for his serial number, the lady was like, oh, you have one of THOSE ps2's. ok, send it in and we'll take care of it for free. a week later, he had a fixed ps2 complete with new void sticker, no mention of the sharpy marks, and all for free.
 
GT98 said:
Most business's shoot for whats called Six Sigma, which means theres an 3.4 defects per million. Thats in line with what MS is stating.
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3.4 defects per million is not 3%, it's 0.00034%, so if they were shooting for Six Sigma they failed 8800 times over. However, in electronics hardware Six Sigma is only slightly more likely to ever happen than you are likely to walk to the moon, so you really can't blame MS.

Electronics companies regularly plan on 5% failure rates on new hardware and if they get less they are extremely please. So 3% is quite reasonable as long as MS does there part to quickly replace the defective hardware.
 
Kahnvex said:
\ Sure you might understand how it parts of it work better than most of us do, but MS hired engineers to build it, and they made the decisions they made for a reason, right?
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Which would cost less:
- Recall
- Repair, or
- Higher engineering budget?


Another lesson on economics: Microsoft isn't the #1 software company because of quality of their products.

I'm sure any scientist worth his salt could program, engineer, design better than much of what Microsoft releases. But it doesn't matter, because you'll pay $1500 for it either way.
 
arentol said:
3.4 defects per million is not 3%, it's 0.00034%, so if they were shooting for Six Sigma they failed 8800 times over. However, in electronics hardware Six Sigma is only slightly more likely to ever happen than you are likely to walk to the moon, so you really can't blame MS.

Electronics companies regularly plan on 5% failure rates on new hardware and if they get less they are extremely please. So 3% is quite reasonable as long as MS does there part to quickly replace the defective hardware.
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Not if you're already selling your products at a loss. Then again, you've already lost millions on the initial launch alone. What's another 3%?

pr0pensity said:
Another lesson on economics: Microsoft isn't the #1 software company because of quality of their products.
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You want to be able to download a hardware patch? :D
 
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