Got the red ring of death on your Xbox 360? Then perhaps you’ve heard of the towel trick. The red ring of death is a royal pain but it’s not the end of the world. Don’t let your aggravation make you do something you’ll later regret.
The towel trick entails covering up the console with some towels, and then running it for a number of minutes. This heats up the soldering inside the console which makes the solder soft enough to fix any broken connections. In any case, that’s the principle behind it. Although it’s simple enough to understand and to do, does it work and is it a good thing to do to your Xbox?
Although there are tons of videos on YouTube explaining this method, a great deal of these are posted by amateurs and kids. They don’t worry much about whether their fix causes any lasting damage. Better solutions exist for dealing with the ring of death.
All too often, people do permanent damage to their machines while others get a fix that doesn’t last long. If you are getting a temporary fix, continued reapplication of the towel trick will cause additional damage to the electronics. At some point the towel fix will cease to work.
This technique is flawed because you don’t get a fix that deals with the root of the problem. The method makes your machine even more prone to overheating.
The reason for this is that micro electronics are sensitive to extreme heat. That’s why fans and heat sinks are employed to begin with. If heat is used to fix a problem that is also caused by heat, then this should raise red flags about the correctness of the method.
The towel trick is the wrong thing to do. Many people have nothing to show for their efforts except a heat damaged Xbox.
Don’t try this on your machine. Send it to Microsoft if you still have a valid warranty. Alternatively, you can do the fix on your own or have it repaired by a professional.
If you decide to do it yourself, you must get a good repair guide. Of course this means opening up the console. This might result in further damage if you aren’t careful. But if you’re able to use some basic tools and can exactly follow the guide’s instructions, you will do OK.
Having problems with your Xbox 360? Get more Xbox 360 troubleshooting advice about fixing the Xbox 360 red ring of death.
Tags: computer games, computers, games, gaming, home entertainment, How to fix a Xbox, technology, video games, video gaming, xbox, xbox 360, xbox game system, xbox problems, Xbox Repair, xbox troubleshooting
