One of those moments where I have clarity over the hatred of "fanboys"

[smork]

With a max repair cost of $125 (out of warranty), there's no reason to buy more then one 360 per year unless you're being an idiot and opening them up.

I've had a 360 for 2 years and have about 40 games. This statement makes me greatly reconsider the wisdom of that investment...

Out of some 40 or so consoles I own or have owned, i've only ever had to get two replaced -- an original PS2 (which I screwed up) and my 360. Why is it that others can make consoles that just work, and work well (I'm looking at you, Nintendo) and MS coughs up a pile of substandard glue, clamps that warp, and ruin?

If my Elite goes out -- screw getting a new one, I'll just sell the games and play the PS3. No point in encouraging their shoddy hardware, no matter how much I like the games.

[Frankie_Says_Relax]

the reason MS won't allow more then one activation per year is due to the publishers. You could, in theory, transfer all your shit to a console, transfer the DRM to that console then leave it off the internet and do it to another console. Basically it would give you infinite copies of any game you want.

Instead, here's what should have happened, Never let anybody open your 360 for any reason. They can't fix it, they're not customer serviceable and you get screwed in the long run. If you had sent the console in to MS for repair, the most it would have cost you is $125 and they'll transfer your DRM rights over for free. It doesn't count against your single transfer per year.

With a max repair cost of $125 (out of warranty), there's no reason to buy more then one 360 per year unless you're being an idiot and opening them up.

So the gist of the story is that you used the Rights management tool for astethic reasons, and then had someone void your warranty and you're mad at microsoft because they refuse to grant you special privledges?

Re read my initial post.

I understand the reason the DRM is in place.

I acknowledge that I used it for aesthetic reasons.

My frustration lies in the fact that MS failed to deliver on repeated customer service PROMISES.

Additionally, I clearly detailed the monitary value of purchasing the arcade unit.

For the cost of repairs for this uint (which would have likely maxed out at $125) I purchased a new arcade unit which included HDMI output which my previous unit didn't have, a new wireless controller, and a game immediately worth trade-in credit. When all was said and done with some trade-in merch, my total cost out of pocket was $128 in cash ... considering that a wireless controller retails for $40, and I'm not even sure what those HDMI add-on ports cost (I'll assume ABOUT as much as the controller) ... that's really not that drastic a difference cost-wise, with no wait for shipping (AND I now have a console with a fresh RROD warranty).

... even though I had to think on my toes in the moment regarding the decision, I resent being called an idiot - or being lumped into some category with those you'd consider to be.

I'm not "mad" at Microsoft. I'm very self aware of the decisions I made and I'll stand by them as reasonable ones.

I'm only "frustrated" that every single "customer service" experience I've had with them has been disasterous in terms of them not being able to be reasoned with logically.

I've been in customer service for many many years, and in management for the lions share of those years - and it goes without saying that in some cases, especially ones where there is ANY evidence that the corporation has failed to make the consumer satisfied/happy - rules are made to be bent and/or broken. With the amount of "free" extended warranties and MS points cards/codes that I've heard stories of MS giving away due to long, bad, customer service experiences, I'm just frustrated that I couldn't get them to help me out ONE TIME based on what was largely THEIR initial failing.

And, if you think about it. Technically speaking you can still put your software on a quote-unqoute "infinite" amount of offline 360s ... if you do it ONCE A YEAR via their automated tool.

And as far as "not opening up consoles" ... I think that the Technical and Restoration segment of this site would disagree with that sentiment. For the most part, most console "repair" work consists of simply "replacing" defective parts. If someone is familliar enough with what parts break, and the proper way to replace them, it's simply a matter of doing just that. There are probably a hundred DP users that can do repair work from replacing a flat ribbon cable to re-soldering a processor chip on a 360 without batting an eye. Yeah, it doesn't say "MS repair tech" on their pay-check ... but 10 years from now, once Microsoft STOPS servicing 360's those are the people that I'll be bringing my console to for repairs.

You can't send a JVC X-Eye or a 3D0 in for repairs, can you?

[mailman187666]

sorry to kinda switch the subject, but I've never actually found out where the "tool" is to switch the DRM to a new console. I need to do this to my 360 so that I don't have to be online to play my XBLA games. I've heard of it but never knew what I had to do to get all this set up on my new console (my 3rd console). Anybody have a link or anything they can throw in here?

[Frankie_Says_Relax]

sorry to kinda switch the subject, but I've never actually found out where the "tool" is to switch the DRM to a new console. I need to do this to my 360 so that I don't have to be online to play my XBLA games. I've heard of it but never knew what I had to do to get all this set up on my new console (my 3rd console). Anybody have a link or anything they can throw in here?

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/support/sy...on/default.htm

In the immortal words of Family Guy Spider-Man "everybody gets ONE" (per year).

[TonyTheTiger]

The whole "hating a company" thing actually extends to a philosophical argument. The fact that an entity that's essentially a legal fiction, that is not capable of really doing anything, can earn either respect or hatred is pretty interesting to me. This goes into pretty serious matters, too. Think about how corporations can face criminal charges. The cynical person might think of criminal liability for corporations as a way to punish the wholly innocent stockholders because of all the fines that the company has to pay out while the real bad guys who actually made the decisions get to walk away because the corporation was the criminal, not the people who made it up.

So when something like this happens, who is to blame? Who is the "bad guy"? That's not an easy question because what you end up with are a whole bunch of people who concoct a corporate policy while at the same time the people who deal with the customers might actually believe something should be done but cannot bend out of either fear of losing his or her job or just because the option isn't available.

Because these individual decision makers and/or people in middle management who have limited power are all generally "faceless" to the public, it is much easier to declare "I hate Microsoft" as opposed to "I hate...John Doe #1, John Doe #2, John Doe #3, et. al."

I remember not too long ago I had a big problem with Mass Effect. There is a glitch rather late in the game that if you save at a certain point you can't progress upon reloading. Essentially, I had to restart from the beginning. BioWare was more or less useless. I don't even know if they fixed the problem in the PC version. I didn't really expect anything in return. How do you value time lost in a video game? It's not like I would have been working during those hours or anything. But I basically just felt like being a pest to see what kind of responses I'd get and if I could be loud enough to get a patch released that would fix the save file.

That didn't happen but I did manage to find the phone number for the Vice President at Microsoft Game Studios. I spoke to his secretary and was using vague terms like "I think some equity is in order" because I honestly didn't know what I could or should get for my troubles and needed an "in" so to speak. His secretary gave me his email address and let's just say he was rather surprised I managed to contact him so directly at his office. He requested my phone number so he could call me directly. Much to my surprise I received a phone call shortly after.

Now imagine someone who had called just about every number he could find for both BioWare and Microsoft (both public and intentionally well hidden) and emailed just about everyone I could all the while being met with either no answers or transfers to foreign service people who kept asking me if my disc was defective. I was not exactly happy but this was an ongoing excursion so I wasn't enraged, which I rarely get anyway. My mood was more of a tempered frustration than anything else. But by the time this phone call ended, I became surprisingly content.

You see, it was very clear from the outset that this man I spoke with had virtually no PR experience. He didn't try to bullshit me or anything and more or less said "that royally sucks but I can't help." He was clearly nervous during the early parts of the conversation. I guess he was afraid I was going to scream at him or something. Halfway through the call I realized something that made me relax to the point that I didn't care about the save file. Here I was talking to someone who not only had nothing to do with my problem but probably didn't even know the glitch existed in the game at all. I obviously wasn't being mean but I was more or less calmly bullying an innocent person who doesn't know me from Adam. It was the first "human" moment I had since as far as I was concerned, all the my previous conversations were failed attempts at speaking with "the corporation." In a way, being able to contact someone beyond the corporate line you get fed at 1-800-4MY-XBOX was its own form of "equity."

This isn't to say that everyone should walk away empty handed but with some phantom bluebird on his or her shoulder like I did but I find it makes more sense that if I'm going to hate anything it should probably be BioWare and/or Microsoft Game Studio's QA rather than the companies as a whole. I can hate this policy or that oversight but to lump the entire company into one big ball of hatred bothers me. Forgive me for being a little inflammatory at the moment but it reeks of the same kind of thought process that drives people to say, "A member of X minority wronged me so therefore the entirety of X minority is vile." We make more allowances for "EA corporate heads did X number of bad things so therefore EA sucks" because it's a faceless corporation and not a human being so the analogy to racism doesn't come into play as strongly but I don't see how the thought process isn't the same. It might not be nearly as serious a moral offense but when a corporation is just a name and a name alone and exists solely because a large number of people are employed under that banner, it just sounds backwards to hate the banner itself. Which is even more philosophically relevant because I'm not sure anyone who says "I hate (insert company)" will necessarily say the same about any individual employee of that company. So what are they really hating?

[blue lander]

I think this thread just convinced me not to get a 360 this Christmas...

[Frankie_Says_Relax]

I think this thread just convinced me not to get a 360 this Christmas...

well...the faulty hardware has been a persistent issue since day 1 and really isnt a reason not to get a 360 (and certainly noy my intention in terms of making this thread).

you get a decent warranty for hardware failure (rrod) these days too.

like I said... I love the thing, but dealing with MS customer service? Not so much.

[MarioMania]

I want a 60 Gig PS3 & SC4..They don't sell the 60's no more

[RyanMurf]

I feel like programmingace is hating on me

[kupomogli]

I want a 60 Gig PS3 & SC4..They don't sell the 60's no more

If it wasn't for the Ad-hoc party about to be released, I'd sell you my 60GB. Sorry, but Ad-hoc party is going to make my PSP much more awesome than it already is.

[lazyhoboguy]

"Instead, here's what should have happened, Never let anybody open your 360 for any reason. They can't fix it, they're not customer serviceable and you get screwed in the long run. If you had sent the console in to MS for repair, the most it would have cost you is $125 and they'll transfer your DRM rights over for free. It doesn't count against your single transfer per year.

With a max repair cost of $125 (out of warranty), there's no reason to buy more then one 360 per year unless you're being an idiot and opening them up.

So the gist of the story is that you used the Rights management tool for astethic reasons, and then had someone void your warranty and you're mad at microsoft because they refuse to grant you special privledges?"

any1 else see the problem with this? Why in the hell should you have to even replace a sytem once a year. They are supposed to work , that is what you are paying for. If you just keep buying flawed hardware every year what is the company's incentive to make their hardware work?

[s1lence]

I'm going to say also that the DRM issue is crap. I've had 3 systems replaced and they don't transfer the DRM, they DON'T....period.

I had to do the DRM fix and then of course I had an E-74 error. I get the letter that the licenses transferred when I get another system back. Tried it....nope. DRM was not transferred. I still have to wait another 4 months to fix this problem.

I hate DRM.......hate hate.

[blue lander]

like I said... I love the thing, but dealing with MS customer service? Not so much.

No video game console is worth that amount of hassle to me. I spend enough time on the phone with ineffective customer servants at work, I don't want to have to do the same thing when I'm trying to relax at home.

[Sabz5150]

No video game console is worth that amount of hassle to me. I spend enough time on the phone with ineffective customer servants at work, I don't want to have to do the same thing when I'm trying to relax at home.

Preach it, brotha!

[Frankie_Says_Relax]

No video game console is worth that amount of hassle to me. I spend enough time on the phone with ineffective customer servants at work, I don't want to have to do the same thing when I'm trying to relax at home.

Gotcha.

[RyanMurf]

Uh OH!!! it looks like this thread attracted all of the die hard nintendo and sony Fanboys hating on the Ole Xbox! The bottom line is IMO that the xbox 360 has the best games out rite now. The reason why people go through all of the hassles is because they like the games. Id much rather go through the hassle of getting my 360 fixed over buying a ps3 or wii that will sit on a shelf forever and have nothing but shitty games to play except for a very few exceptions.

[nintendoeats]

But...we aren't talking about the games here, just the terribleness of MS customer service and Quality control. In case you hadn't noticed, most of the posters OWN xboxes (plural). Nobody is saying that all the games suck, just that the hardware is infuriating.

And don't you dare call me a nintendofanboy, because I exited that stage of my life 2 years ago.

P.S. I loves my PS3 AND my Wii. so nyaah.

[RyanMurf]

But...we aren't talking about the games here, just the terribleness of MS customer service and Quality control. In case you hadn't noticed, most of the posters OWN xboxes (plural). Nobody is saying that all the games suck, just that the hardware is infuriating.

And don't you dare call me a nintendofanboy, because I exited that stage of my life 2 years ago.

P.S. I loves my PS3 AND my Wii. so nyaah.

Hey buddy listen you probably misread my post. I was talking about about how people are complaining about xbox 360's because of the defect rate and the hassles to get them fixed. If you spend the time to re read my post all I talk about is how it is worth it IMO to go through the hassles because of the fact that the games are great for the system. I was also trying to throw some humor and sarcasm in the post also so cool your guns pal.

[SegaAges]

But...we aren't talking about the games here, just the terribleness of MS customer service and Quality control. In case you hadn't noticed, most of the posters OWN xboxes (plural). Nobody is saying that all the games suck, just that the hardware is infuriating.

And don't you dare call me a nintendofanboy, because I exited that stage of my life 2 years ago.

P.S. I loves my PS3 AND my Wii. so nyaah.

No need to get all defensive if you get called a fanboy. Everybody who has seen more than 3 of my posts knows that I am a Sega fanboy. I am proud. Whether you are or not, be proud either way.

[nintendoeats]

I'm kind of less angry about being called a fanboy (which I wasn't directly, nor do I infer that I have been called one, so in fact I was being preventive rather than defensive). It just that every time people criticise something they called a fanboy for the other thing. It's like the ID-evolution war: so much mudslinging that nothing ever gets accomplished.