Ooops

I know, we talk about XBox here. But, Sony, in it's bid to out-do the 360, may have made a big oops. Sony announced that the PS3 is delayed. That's really not news, everyone new their timeline was aggressive for 2 technologies not even released yet (new cell processors and Blu-ray).
And this is really not too surprising either: the speculation on the cost of building each unit will be around $800. Personally, I think that is actually kind of low. I was speculating around the $1,100 range considering Blu-ray is not even released yet.
Also, developers are starting to complain that game development is extremely complex. Well, by making this statement, I am expecting games for the PS3 to run about $100.
MS needs to take this all into consideration and start doing a huge marketing campaign. The next step would be once the inventory meets demand, to lower the price of the console once the PS3 is released.
But, it's M$. It's about money. We'll have to wait and see.

The quest is the quest. 360 saga ends?

Not much to update. Got the second replacement yesterday. Using all the will power I have, I did not even look at the box. Made artificial meat stir fry, ate dinner, and watched Survivor. Oh, Misty, why did you have to get voted off. She was my entry in the Survivor pool. When I saw her name and career, I figured she was first to go. I was close, she was third.

I digress. My attempt to prove my strength failed when the CSI episode was a repeat. Was not a hard choice, CSI rerun, Olympics (I mean commercal fest), or the 360. I gently walked the little guy to the basement. I needed to do this alone, no one around to hear me cry if it failed again. Well, not alone, I took Nikita (my dog) with me for support. Yes, I am named after a dog.

I hook up all the cables and it WORKED. Reloaded my profile and even played PDZ. I had to wait to Spawn of Killer (daughter) stopped playing Warcraft to get the media connect going. Now I have to replay PDZ to get all my weapons back.

All in all, it ran for two hours before I needed to get some sleep. Tonight Whacky and I will push it to the limit.

360 replacement saga - continues

As of this point, I have shipped back the defective replacement and I am waiting for the next replacement to arrive. I did not get the shipping box until Friday and dropped it off a a UPS store on Saturday. Since there is not pickup until Monday, I figure they got my replacement today. Last time, they shipped out the replacement the day they got mine. If this happens again, I could get it by the weekend.

The only mystery then is ... Will it work?

May never review a 360 game....

My latest posting on Xbox.com forums

The people getting the shaft are those who got the first machines. We are the ones that made the launch a success, and we are the ones getting bad box after bad box

I just got off the phone trying to find out where the replacement box for my defective replacement is, as it was supposed to be here yesterday.

Point 1: After talking with a supervisor (who is afraid if I use his name) he admitted that when they say they are shipping it out next day air, it means WHEN they ship it out in 3 - 4 days, it will be using next day air.. so you should not expect it for 4 - 5 days.

Point 2: All repairs are refurbished machines... so good luck everyone. If they are using returned machines only, then the odds are good you will get another lemon. If there is one problem with a box, the odds are there are other problems and unless the machines is totally retooled, you can expect more problems with your replacement (like I noted, I am waiting to ship back my second 360 and get ANOTHER replacement

Point 3: If you are not satisfied after talking with the supervisor, they will NOT give you the name of their supervisor. They give you the following address to contact.
Microsoft Legal Dept.
Attn XBOX Legal Group
One Microsoft Way
Redmond, WA 98052-6399

That seems like a strange way to handle customer service issues.

Remember, get the name of everyone you talk to!!!!

Broken 360... The saga continues

Got my "repaired" 360 back last night... Here is what I posted to the xbox forum regarding my saga.

"I got my 360 on launch night and a week and half ago, if started freezing after two minutes of playing any game, but at least I could still use the dashboard. Sent it back and today received a replacement, in worse shapes physically and mechanically than the one I set back. The hard drive was scratched, it had a profile already on it, and the dashboard was in Spanish. Just as I changed the dashboard to English, the box froze and would not work again. All I got was a blank screen. Called support and now I get to wait for another replacement that ... This is an xbox quote.. "Hopefully, will work this time".
I have a simple solution to everyone getting broken replacements. Write in permanent marker on the 360 and hard drive you return - "DOES NOT WORK". Then the repair center cannot ship a bad box out to someone else.
I wanted to bet the supervisor and rep I talked with that this was NOT the first time that they took a call about this. Guess what... They did not want to take the bet and said this is a repeated issue.

I bet this does not stay on the forum for long!!! "


Now I wait again for another box to ship another broken 360 back for replacement.

haiku time again

Broken promises
We will fix your 360
Promises broken


Fool me, shame on you
Fool me again, shame on me
Fixed third try, no way!