Oh Red Rings O’ Death, why must you haunt us. I’m positive many of you Xbox 360 owners have encountered this woeful occurrence. At the same time I’m certain that more than half of those said people have tried their own form of temporary homemade fix (i.e. towel trick) to counteract sending your box to Microsoft and be without a console for at least 2 weeks. Let’s not get into those of us that aren’t covered under the replacement plan and would have to shell out $99 for MS to fix our box. But alas, there is hope! There is a somewhat new fix that is worth checking out, at least for those that are not scared to open up their Xbox. Red Rings of Death are usually attributed to hardware failure. Before we get into the fix, here is a brief overview of the most common reason for RROD:

Heat build-up inside the console creates heat stress which causes the motherboard to warp. When that happens, the GPU and/or CPU connections come loose and lose connection to the board. The X-clamps that hold the heat sinks down also aren’t that great, so it allows the chips to move around easier. Ok, now on to the fix.

Essentially its a fairly easy process that will take you about 45 min tops. The basis of the fix will be replacing the heat sink X-clamps with a better and stronger implementation. That is achieved by drilling into the inside metal frame and mounting the heat sinks to the frame with the board in between. You will also be replacing the thermal compound on the chipsets with a fresh coat. Sounds crazy enough? Here is a step by step procedure to fix the RROD:http://www.llamma.com/xbox360/repair/ring_of_light_x-clamp_fix.htm Included on that site is also the hardware needed, which can be bought at your local hardware store. I stand by this fix, as I have done it to my own Xbox, as well as many others. Hopefully this little fix will make your gaming life a little less stressful!

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