Survey shocker: 75 percent of respondents' Xbox 360s died within 18 months of purchase
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Look at CNET, breaking news left and right. The site ran a little survey asking its UK readers how many times their video game consoles crashed. No surprise: the Xbox 360 leads the pack with a full 60 percent of heaving died (due to the red ring of death). The PS3 comes in at 16 percent (yellow light of death?), and the Wii is only 6 percent.
Let’s focus on the Xbox 360 numbers. The most amazing thing to come from the survey is how quickly people’s Xboxen broken. It turns out that only 25 percent of those broken Xboxen lasted more than 18 months. So, 75 percent of those Xboxen didn’t even make it to month 18. That’s ridiculous.
One thing to keep in mind about this survey: it wasn’t a random sample. So we’re not saying that 75 percent of all Xbox 360s will, or have, broken within the first 18 months, but that 75 percent of respondents’ Xbox 360s broke within the first 18 months. It might well be that put-off Xbox 360 owners filled out the survey to “stick it” to Microsoft. Owners of broken Xboxes, unite! That kind of thing.
But the overall story—the Xbox 360 is not reliable—is nothing we didn’t know before. I’ve had two Xbox 360s die on me since August, 2006.
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