Microsoft "stealth-releases" updated XBox360

[zuludelta]

Looks like Microsoft has realized that with the monstrous popularity of Halo 3 driving the sales of older and used XBox360s, the potential for very bad publicity and consumer backlash coming from the infamous "Red Rings of Death" has been magnified.

This article confirms that newer XBox360s outfitted with the smaller and less heat-intensive 65-nm CPUs and reconfigured Falcon motherboards (with redesigned heatsinks) are in circulation. And even though Microsoft has always vehemently denied that the widespread "RROD" was a result of a faulty design leading to inadequate cooling and poor component placement, I guess this is all the confirmation that we needed.

Still, I don't understand why Microsoft just doesn't publicly announce the hardware update and make the newer consoles easily identifiable. Sure, it'll come off as an admission of some wrongdoing (many contend that the original design, "RROD"-prone XBox360s were inadequately tested and rushed to the market) but they've pretty much admitted culpability in the whole thing by publicly announcing that they're committing a staggering $1.15 billion for Xbox360 repairs and warranties anyway. By "stealth-releasing" the new XBox360s , it's still on the consumer to figure out whether they're getting an XBox360 with the newer, less heat-intensive, design or an older one with a 30% chance of experiencing catastrophic hardware failure (from the article, it seems like the only way to definitively tell them apart is to open up the console... good luck convincing the store to let you do that before plunking down your hard-earned cash for one of these things).

So, on the one hand, it's good news that there's a viable hardware fix finally available, but on the other hand, there's still no reliable way for buyers to ensure that they're not getting a console that has an unacceptable rate of hardware failure (unless people can figure out which lot nos./serial nos. are confirmed to be created with the new design and manufacturing process).