Guide: Common ways to ghetto “repair” the Red Ring of Death on the Xbox360

Guide: Common ways to ghetto “repair” the Red Ring of Death on the Xbox360

1.The hot towel trick.

How: Wrap the console in a towel to insulate it and block off the air vents while running it until it gives you 2 red lights.

Common theory to the repair: Apparently it uses the heat from the CPU/GPU to soften the joints and cause a mechanical join on the GPU / CPU / RAM. In fact there is no evidence to support that this is little more than “shock therapy”, besides the fact that sometimes the console sometimes runs again for a few more minutes or weeks.

Does it work? Temporarily a desperate attempt that can cause permanent damage.





2.The heat gun trick.

How: Take a Heat gun and remelt the GPU/CPU and RAM joints

Theory to the repair: The heat gun remelts the solder joints. In fact there is no evidence to support that this is little more than “shock therapy”, besides the fact that sometimes the console sometimes runs again for a few more minutes or weeks.

Does it work? Temporarily a desperate attempt that can cause permanent damage.





3.X clamp replacement or silicone spacers

How: Use various methods to re-brace the motherboard around the RAM GPU and CPU.

Common theory to the repair: To create a mechanical join over the cracked solder.

Does it work? Temporarily. This seems to have been in the past the most effective ghetto method of bandaging the problem, but again is only a temporary fix.





4.Fan mods and / or liquid cooling

How: Increase the fan speed, use an after market add on fan, or liquid cooling.

Common theory to the repair: The problem is obviously heat related, so any sort of extra cooling should be good right?

Does it work? As a prevention this is a good band aid, but overall not very successful as a mainstream solution as these fixes are almost never correctly thermal controllered.  Besides, there is nothing "wrong" with the xbox360 cooling system.



5. Replace the lead free solder with lead based solder.



How: Remove the processors and change the the lead free solder joint composition to a more flexible lead based composition before replacement.

Common theory to the repair: Lead free solder is not very tolerant to heat fluctuation. Replacing with lead based solder should allow the components to flex with the board as it endures heat stress.

Does it work? Temporarily, it will buy you some time while the motherboard continues to flex and damage other parts.

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Correct repair of the Xbox360 does not employ any of these ghetto backyard “fixes". :D