According to reports from retailers, the XBOX 360 may have a failure rate of up to 33%. From DailyTech:

EB Games held conference calls for its Canadian stores informing them of the new policy changes and revealing alarming failure rates of the Xbox 360. “The real numbers were between 30 to 33 percent,” said former EB Games employee Matthieu G., adding that failure rate was even greater for launch consoles. “We had 35 Xbox 360s at launch I know more than half of them broke within the first six months (red lights or making circles under the game discs). Two of them were dead on arrival.”
…
The failure rate nearing a third of all Xbox 360 consoles was found at other retailers too. A Best Buy customer service department manager, who wished to remain unnamed, said that failure rates for the console were “between a quarter to a third” of all units sold.

“We see a ton of [Xbox 360s] come back all the time. We strongly push our customers to buy our service plans no matter what they buy, but it is especially important for them with the Xbox 360,” said the manager. “It’s a lucky thing for us that Microsoft extended the factory warranty to one year, because we were having a hell of a time dealing with the launch units. Now we don’t have to deal with those broken [Xbox 360s] until their second year, for those who have purchased the two year plans.”

Sad. If tipline complaints are an indication of truth, we’d say this was true. That being said, we strongly push our readers not to fall for Best Buy’s service plans, but to instead make sure they take advantage of their credit card’s warranty protection program. Most of Best Buy’s service plans are a ripoff, just ask Consumer Reports. Then again, most popular and well-regarded devices don’t secretly have a failure rate of 33%, so that probably sends all our haughty consumer advice right out the window.

Retailers Estimate Xbox 360 Failure Rate High as 33 Percent [DailyTech] (Thanks, Phil!)
(Photo: Spoon Monkey)

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