I’m sorry, but I still find this picture funny

After years of speculation and millions of little red rings, could the cause of the biggest and most widely known hardware problem this generation finally have been revealed? According to Bryan Lewis, research vice president and chief analyst at Gartner, it’s the 360’s graphics chip.

Up until September 2007, the graphics chip, or GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) inside the Xbox 360 was made using a design created in-house by Microsoft. Normally, companies pay large sums of money to have another company which specialises in ASIC (Application-Specific Integrated Circuit, a specialist chip) production to design it for them. Trying to save tens of millions of dollars, Microsoft decided to do it themselves.

One billion dollars later (the cost of repairing all those RRODs) they probably regret that decision. Due to oversights in the design, the chips get too hot and it’s this overheating which causes the dreaded little red lights and a bricked console.

Lewis said at the Design Automation Conference that it was Microsoft’s attempt to save money which cost them so dearly. When asked for the moral of the story, Lewis said:

Had Microsoft left the graphics processor design to an ASIC vendor in the first place, would they have been able to avoid this problem?
Probably. The ASIC vendor could have been able to design a graphics processor that dissipates much less power.

In September 2007, the GPU inside the 360 was replaced with one re-designed by GPU experts ATI and gained an extra heat dissipater to help cool it down.

Source: EE Time

Tags: GPU, rrod, Xenos

• Analyst Says Spore Likely Delayed Again
• Rumor: Quieter Xbox 360s Incoming
• Limited Edition GTA IV Xbox Tightens Trousers
• Xbox 360 Gets 20% Price Cut in Japan
• Nintendo Tentatively Denies All DS Lite Redesign Rumors
• A Solder’s Balls: 360 Red Ring of Death’s Possible Explanation
• Moving to New Host
• GTA IV Delay: 360 Hard Drive Variable? PS3 Development Difficulty? Neither?

2 Comments »