Xbox problems

[Grasso]

Well I've owned a Xbox for about 6 months now. In about the past month or 2 it has started making some funny noises. I think it's when it accesses the HD is when it "rattles", for lack of better words. I'm pretty sure the sound emits from the right side of the console. Is this where the HD is? If I gently push down on system it will go away, but soon as I let up it rattles again. It's not extremely loud, but still annoying and stands out as something not right. This noise isn't constant, it comes and goes as it pleases.

Another thing is in the video review section of the lastest demo DVD the music will skip in and out during the review. I'm guessing this is just a faulty DVD from my past experiences with other demo CD's (Dreamcast!).

One thing I've noticed since I bought my system is how some games jerk very briefly during replays(Rallisport and Moto GP) and sometimes during gameplay(Halo). I think most people would never notice this, but it really annoys me. I'm thinking this hickup is caused by HD access.

One last note, today I ripped AD/DC Back in Black. Back in Black has 10 tracks averaging about 4 min a piece. It took 12 minutes to rip. Would you consider this average/normal?

Even though I have the noise problems it works like new. Never had any problems reading a CD, locking up or reseting. Any thoughts? I'd just like to get an idea with whats going on before I call Microsoft.

[edit] I thought I'd rip another CD so I tried Eminem. Damn did it rattle loud right when it first accessed the CD at high speed then it went away. The HD works fine, but the CD drive must be shaking something for it to do that. [rant]First I had to replace the GD drive in my DC then my PS2 quit reading blue disc and now my Xbox rattles. I guess I'll be buying a darn warranty when I get my Cube soon, but I bet it will never break. A 90 day warranty on these new consoles is a joke.[/rant]

[MechDeus]

Another thing is in the video review section of the lastest demo DVD the music will skip in and out during the review. I'm guessing this is just a faulty DVD from my past experiences with other demo CD's (Dreamcast!).

I have that too. I think the sound coding in that portion just sucks.

[Mode7]

Ditto on the video reviews.

I had the rattling problem as well but, strangely, only when playing Morrowind. Eventually just resolved itself.

[DacaZ]

My Xbox (bought it at launch) died this week. It was turning up chronic read disc errors and it would only boot Phantom Crash maybe once in five tries. I bought a new one for now, I'll try to fix the old one and either mod it or sell it on Ebay.

[GameCynic]

Mine has got some wierd slowdown issues that come and go over time. The games will sometimes run in slow motion, with a framerate well below what it normaly runs at (Project Gotham is the most notorious for this...the game literaly runs in slow-motion; the clock is off about 1/3 of a second). Some games are worse than others, in Halo its barely noticable unless your playing coop. It doesn't always happen, though, and is usualy solved by a reboot, but on JSRF it won't show up until playing hte game for a good hour or so. Also, Gunvalkyrie takes about 3 times longer to load missions, and the sound glitches right before that.

[Bonestorm]

There are 3 possible dvd drives you can have in your xbox: Thompson, Phillips, or Samsung.

Thompsons are bad, and a lot of people have problems with them. Of course some people have no problems with them, but of all the people with xbox dvd problems like 80% of them have this drive. Before the sega bundle came out, about 2/3 of xbox owners have this drive.

The Phillips drive is better, but some people still have problems with it. If you can do the math from above, 1/3 of the xboxes have this drive.

The samsung just started coming out with the new sega bundle, and its something like a 50% of getting either samsung or phillips with the new bundle. Supposedly the new samsung is much better than the phillips.

You can replace the dvd drive in the xbox with another drive. I havent tried going from say thompson to phillips, but I know you can exchange the same model. Head over to www.xbox-scene.com for more info.

[Josh]

DUDE TEH XBOX IS SUCH A WEAK SYSTEM LOOK AT HOW POORLY MADE IT IS I HATE YOU MICRO$OFT XBOX IS TEH SUX!!1

[Grasso]

Well, thanks for the feedback everybody. I called Microsoft, but they offered no help. Actually the first thing they asked is if I purchased the extended warranty. I can pay $100 to have it fixed or wait till it dies. Hmmm...I didn't care for either solution, but I'll choose the waiting game I guess. [edit]Forgot to mention they said they've never heard of this problem and it wasn't in their database. He unofficially recommended I swap DVD drives after I brought up that they've used 3 different drives with the first series being unreliable.

[DacaZ]

Heh. I called them too, when it was clear mine wasn't going to make it. All they had to offer was to mail it back for repair at $100 plus S&H. Didn't seem worth it, since I'd been meaning to pick up an s-controller and Sega GT2k2. Figure around $70 for those, so I replaced it for $130.

Even if I can't fix the old one, it still seems to work fine most of the time as a DVD player. It's just the games I'm getting constant read errors on.

[Dyne]

for some reason whenever i ripped cd's some would take like about 6 minutes while others would take 30+ and they'd be the same length. very weird.