Gamer suing Microsoft for bad Xbox drives

My Xbox just went on out, with the same problems everyone else is having. When you put in a game it comeback, I get the 'Xbox does not recognize this, make sure it's an xbox game, dvd, audio disc message'. This has become a nuisance, and I want some results. I'll join the suit if it ever comes about.

My Xbox just went on out, with the same problems everyone else is having. When you put in a game it comeback, I get the 'Xbox does not recognize this, make sure it's an xbox game, dvd, audio disc message'. This has become a nuisance, and I want some results. I'll join the suit if it ever comes about.

My dvd drive is also failing in under a year. I recently bought ESPN Football 2k5, and I can't even get the game to load. Half of the time when I turn my xbox on, it loads the console menu as if there weren't even a disc in the tray. I would definately like to join the lawsuit if anybody has the info. Ironically, I thought my friend was the unlucky one to have his xbox fail in the first 90 days. jeff.herrick@gmail.com

i have also been getting a cannot read disk error for all games. i have been hearing that this error is common with xboxs. this is very annoying.

THis is so rididulous. http://www.anetforums.com/posts.aspx?ThreadIndex=6789
on this site it shows that this problem has been ongoing for years now. i cant believe that microsoft can actually get away with this. They sell faulty products and then expect us , the customers, to pay 99$ + s&h to get it fixed. That is ridiculous they should have had a class action put against them years ago. well its about time.

Well i've been pulling my hair out wondering why our x box has been constantly showing up with the dirty or damaged disk and now i know that i am not the only one with the problem my xbox broke within a year and we are now on to our second one but on the second use of it the message displayed again dirty or damaged. My boyfriends dad and brother are all experiencing the same problems.

my xbox also has stopped reading discs i bought the system around when it came out like in dec of that year and since then ive had mulitple problems one started like maybe 6 months after i had the system the big button on the front of the xbox flashed green and then red and then it started to say on the screen that i needed to call customer service for my technical problem but that dont have a number to go with it so that was pointless...i found one and called them to get no answer for my problems...eventually the system worked again. Then my controller burnt throught the plastic in the wires and it started to smoke......then just recently my xbox will not read dvd's cd's and xbox games and now im just left with a box.......please someone contact me bc i woild love to speak with a representitive on behalf of my problems

To the person who wrote coment 43. I just built my own new computer because I hate the prefab junk, for less than 500 bucks and it screams. I paid three hundred bucks for, well,not for lack of better words, a junk boat anchor called an x-box. Microsoft is not hurting for money and if anyone can tell me how to get into a class action lawsuit against them then maybe some of us who spent hard earned money on gaming consoles and upwards of $50 dollars a game can recoup some of the money we spent on a junk, lemon, POS, called the X-BOX.
Sincerely,
Greg King
Gking6@hot.rr.com

my xbox died just like 4 months ago it pisses me off looking at the screen that sais "disk error" but the xbox is way better than the ps2. i have a philips drive damn i wish i had a samsung. someone help me!!!!!!!!!!!

I had 2 xboxes. A year after i bought my first one, i was getting cd-rom errors. EBgames exchanged it for a refurbished one. After
about 3 years the cd-rom gave out, so i bought
one from ebay. My xbox works for about 5 minutes, then i get the famous disc read error.
Could their be other problems related to the cd-rom, that might be related?

I'm interested in legal options also. My XBOX fails to load the games and it takes several reloads to get the game to work. The DVD drive is toast.....

My Xbox has been working fine except recently I keep getting "Damaged or dirty disc", appearing whenever I play Halo on certain levels. The funny thing is that it only happens on two certain levels. I seriously want to get it replaced at no cost to me.

I've had to replace the DVD drive on my x-box and a friends. If you want a good read on how often this happens, check the sales on the x-box DVD drives on ebay. The part I've bought is the TGM600. If you ask the sellers, I'm sure they will tell you that they've been doing a brisk business.

I have been having the same disk error problems starting on the one particular level of Top Spin Tennis (which I could not finish) and now I have gone out and purchased Splinter cell and my XBOX won’t even read this no matter how many times I reboot or turn this off and on. I have had this machine the first week it came out and it owes me nothing. Even so my problems are as follows: 1. If I buy a new XBOX now how long will I have until it is obsolete? 2. When is XBOX2 coming out? 3. Will my old games work on new system? 4. How do I get my current game saves and information off the hard drive onto my new XBOX (if I buy one)?

I also had a hrd drive go bad after about 40 hours of use. Of course it was out of warranty and Best Buy service center told me it was junk and I might as well throw it away and buy another one. Like I am going to do that! I have had a PS2 for 2 years and it has run like a champ and probably has 2000 hours on it. This is so microsoft! Build it, don't support it and then ask you to pay money again for the priveldge of using their products

It happend to me too , actually twice i bought my first xbox maybe tree or four months after the xbox has been released not even a year after i started having dirty disc errors and could not play new games. so i went and got me another one and i made sure to get one with different dvd drive ( i heard that the thomson drives are the deffective ones )but no luck exactly 11 months after the new xbox dvd drive went out too .

Needless to say my drive is stuffed as well. All my kit is secondhand, but as a computer tech, I know the discs at least are near perfect.

My X-Box won't read a disc unless the disc is near mint. Scratch that, make it simply... mint. Then, it works fine.

When you put your audio CD's in a player, they work. If the disc is dirty, the player doesn't care - the music might lose a bit of quality, but odds are a human won't notice. CD players don't CARE about dirty discs. Why won't my X-Box read them?

You're average computer disc stores a lot of information for the purpose of working around scratches and the like. Audio CDs do not store this extra information. A machine which can't read an audio CD?!

When you put a disc in a computer, the computer reads what it can. If a certain file is damaged, you can't read that file. But a disc needs to be in quite bad repair for even a PC to simply REJECT it. Why won't my X-Box even ATTEMPT to START my games? Are they ALL damaged in a CRUCIAL area?

Checking my discs, I see scratches mostly occur near the rim - the most common place for a disc to be scratched. I can see the scratches have been caused by the disc turning, I would assume in a drive. I'm betting the X-Box just checks the quaility of that rim - perhaps copy protection code is stored there? - and rejects the disc without actaully checking to see if it's readible or not.

If so... Well, what a great place to stick the copy protection, eh?

I'm betting the programming of the console has more to do with the problems people are seeing then the drive. Any normal drive bay causes scratches on disc - but any normal machine ignores them. A drive must be very poor quality not to read through these sort of scratches. Most people wouldn't spot them and would call the disc clean and shiny.

Suddenly the drive bay of my GameCube comes to mind - the disc is held above an easily accessible lens (which you can clean at any time), away from anything which could possibly scratch it while turning in the drive. Not that the GameCube CARES if the disc is dirty or damaged, mind you, but it's a nice touch. Never really thought how practical an idea it was until now.

Same thing as everyone... "Xbox can't recognize the disc..." It can play my CDs just fine. What the Fuq?!!!! This is bullshi+.

Does anyone know the status of the C.A.L. against MS? Look everyone, if your roms fail after warranty, spend the 25 bucks and get a new one. This site shows you step by step how to do it http://www.llamma.com/xbox .

It's easy to imagine that most everyone has spent hundreds of dollars in games alone, so what's another few dollars and a little down time. (From the looks of things above, more than a few of you REALLY need to get out,.. 2000 hrs in two years,..ouch.)

Chances of MS doing ANYTHING about this is next to nill. What to get back at them, then stop buying their products. Since Al Gore invented the internet and as often as possible, I have refused to use IE or any MS product. Learn how to build a new pc and put Linux on it as your OS. You'll have a better running system, easier to fix, definitely not as buggy as windows or needing an update every other day.

Now that's something worth getting together on.

P.S. I'm on my way out to get a new Thompson TGM600 for my son's P.O.S. gaming unit. First and last one I'll ever buy. Hey, I've learned my lesson.

My xbox is doing the same thing it's 100 bucks to fix the dirve and only 150 to buy a brand new one. What a rip off. Should have bought a ps2, well i'm not buying the new xbox coming out because of this problem and lack of support for it.

ALL CONSUMER TECHNOLOGIES ARE MADE AS CHEAP AS POSSIBLE. Plus, this is DVD-ROM technology, which is relatively new, Plus the DVD-ROM's are produced by the thousands and there are manufacturing irregularities, Plus the Drives are made by the thousands and there are manufacturing irregularities. They all combine into a "fault nexus" where some/many people will experience these kinds of problems. (No, I am not a Microsoft employee or contractor.")

We should see great improvements in 2nd generation drives and DVD-ROM media, and by the 3rd generation, there should be no problems at all (with the exception of a "few" drives or media disks that had a manf defect).

This is the reality of modern consumer high tech equipment. It is likely that, at $50-80 to repair a XBOX, Microsoft is probably losing money when you add in the overhead to administer the customer support for users with problems. They are probably passing on some of the repair costs to the drive mnfr. (Where does the drive mnfr go to pass along their replacement costs?...probably no where)

All I would like to see is more actual DATA on this so we can actually see which drives and which games tend to have the most problems, what are the common problems, and what are the cheapest ways to repair or replace. All this anecdotal information doesn't help me figure out whether my son's Halo 2 problem is the drive or the media, or even a software code problem.

Any better REAL DATA anywhere?

ALL CONSUMER TECHNOLOGIES ARE MADE AS CHEAP AS POSSIBLE. Plus, this is DVD-ROM technology, which is relatively new, Plus the DVD-ROM's are produced by the thousands and there are manufacturing irregularities, Plus the Drives are made by the thousands and there are manufacturing irregularities. They all combine into a "fault nexus" where some/many people will experience these kinds of problems. (No, I am not a Microsoft employee or contractor.")

We should see great improvements in 2nd generation drives and DVD-ROM media, and by the 3rd generation, there should be no problems at all (with the exception of a "few" drives or media disks that had a manf defect).

This is the reality of modern consumer high tech equipment. It is likely that, at $50-80 to repair a XBOX, Microsoft is probably losing money when you add in the overhead to administer the customer support for users with problems. They are probably passing on some of the repair costs to the drive mnfr. (Where does the drive mnfr go to pass along their replacement costs?...probably no where)

All I would like to see is more actual DATA on this so we can actually see which drives and which games tend to have the most problems, what are the common problems, and what are the cheapest ways to repair or replace. All this anecdotal information doesn't help me figure out whether my son's Halo 2 problem is the drive or the media, or even a software code problem.

Any better REAL DATA anywhere?

I also have this issue. My xbox will read CDs but not DVDs (games or movies). So now i have a bulky expensive CD-player. Should have known better than purchasing another Microshi+ product. Someone should start an online partition to get MicroSux to recall useless xboxs. I think i'll stick to gaming on my PC, repairs are so much cheaper and easier.

Programer says: Bill, we have a serious issue with our xbox systems.

Bill says: Dont worry, just stick it in the manual and call it a feature.

Just found this...
http://www.petitiononline.com/xbox2003/petition.html

A petition calling for the recall of all faulty xboxs - free of charge!

I am extremely surprised how some of you have repurchased or KEEP repurchasing from a company you know full well is ripping you off!? Take the bait and they'll reel you in...(But, that's beside the point.)
I feel Microsoft should have to refund or exchange every XBox that has had these ongoing problems. They apparently are well aware of it, but do not want to admit there mistake. This leads me to believe it may NOT have been a mistake, but a "scheme" for more money. You see, I've always used MS, as MANY of you have (that's why Gates is so rich). But, recently, I've been looking into Linux (which is a rapidly growing market). The fact is, if more people would take a stand & refuse to buy ANY Microsoft products, maybe MS will rethink the way they do business. Yes, it will be a big transformation going from one OS to another/trading XBox for another game system; But, it's the only way to make MS open thier eyes, and be more grateful, and willing to fix thier mistakes at THIER expense. Honestly, Microsoft should have been petitioned to court LONG ago. Makes me wonder who ARE they paying to steer clear of any charges??? BTW, the BBB.... don't bother (search the net about the BBB reputation...). OH, how I love freedom of speech!

I got a Xbox for Christmas and recently just started to not read much of any disks, i think i need a replacemet for it, if you have one or know where i can buy one please email me at Keirster@direcway.com Thanks!!

I got an Xbox about a year ago, and I went to play it yesterday and all I got was a message on the screen that said customer service required. I also smelled something burning up. I took the thing apart and found a chip fried on the hard drive. Is there anyone that knows where I can get a new HDD for my Xbox? Email me at joker72079@hotmail.com

I got my xbox on release day. It started to give me the dirty disk error about a year ago. It's ridiculous. I freaking hate it, it never works.

If anyone needs any Xbox parts go to: www.llamma.com

12 - kernel - DVD parameters (PIO/DMA)
the "12" is the number that indicates the problem with my XBOX I have had it for 1 year and 5 months... it flashes red & green and says to call customer service with the number 12. I keep my xbox in tupperware and never modded it! And, it still got fragged!?

Hey everybody,

I own 2 xbox's and I just realised what the problem was with my first one...
It was the F***ing disk drive!
I used to think it had something to do with the powercable or because of smoke since I always have friends over that smoke and usually while the xbox is on.
I never knew that there were 3 types of disk drives for the xbox!
I found some info about what the Disk drives look like and ofcourse My first Xbox had the Bad One.
It lasted for about 2,5 years before I got the dirty disc error. It started with a few then nearly every disc.
I bought a new one a while back (crystal xbox).
I still have to check what type of disk drive this one has.

I'll give the descriptions for the 3 types of disk drives below so you can check what type yours is.And if it keeps on happening I say we should file a lawsuit against the MOTHERF***ERS at MS. We should start a Gamers Association or something with lawyers and stuff so we have the collective and legal power to stop this kind of bullshit.

XBOX Disk Drive Types:

There are 3 types that I know of:

1: Samsung.

This is the best one. Little to no reports of problems with this disk drive.

Samsung Description:

Easy to recognise because it has 2 small holes in the tray where you place the CD.

2: Phillips.

This one is considered second best. But don't sweat if you have this one because like the Samsung there are little to no reports of problems with this type of Disk Drive.

Phillips Description:

The Disk Tray of the Phillips disk drive has an upside down key-hole shaped opening.

3: Thompson.

This one sucks!Loads and loads of reports of bad experiences with this Disk Drive.
And guess what today I found out that I had one in my first xbox! Finally I know what caused the F***ing problem. I own more than 50 xbox games so you'd think that I've spent enough already! But no I had to buy a new one because repairing it was a ripp off.
All because mister Micro Softy is a greedy bastard!
I had to eject the CD and put it back in untill it read properly.
Sometimes it took more than 10 times before it would read a disc properly! Over time this would be the case with nearly all my games, cd's and dvd's...
That's not what I paid 300 Euro's for!

Thompson Description:

The disk tray for the Thompson Disk drive has a smooth opening in the disk tray. The opening is shaped much like an arched doorway.

Well everyone,I'm glad that's of my chest.
I hope that this info is of some use for you all and let's hope that this kind of sh*t doesn't happen again with the xbox 360.
Or Mister Micro Softy has tens of millions angry gamers looking for him...

Good luck everyone and game on!

Niels.

i have got an xbox with the phillips drive it has gone bad saying cant recognize disk with everything i put in it. xbox will fix for a fee. thats not right if this many people are having the same problem xbox should recall all these units or refund money, otherwise lawsuit.

I've had my xbox just over 4 months, and the dvd drive is burned out. Happened just outside of my 3 month warranty from microsoft so they told me $98 to fix it or go buy a new one.

The driver in question is a Thompson drive. There are literally thousands of these defective drives floating around. There's an online petition signed by thousands of people. Xbox wants YOU to pay $100 to fix THEIR incompentence. Better Business Bureau say's they are a company in good standing and respond reasonably to the complaints; @$@$%@ Anyway, we in Canada are set to start our own class-action upon launch of XBOX 2. The consumers are going to be aware that XBOX couldn't care less about us. I'm buying Playstation next time. XBOX is garbage, and their customer service is even more GARBAGE!

Here's the petition site: when Xbox say's they are unaware of it, their staff were trained to behave surprised; they are certainly aware of it: http://www.petitiononline.com/xbox2003/petition.html

I just recently replaced my own Xbox drive; I dug it out of the trash just to verify it was in fact a Thomson. I have found replacement drives on the internet for $20.00 (about $27 with shipping). The replacement was identical to the drive it replaced i.e.: Thomson.
I don’t personally recommend or endorse taking apart your own Xbox, but my situation was we had it a few years and it was off warranty anyway.
It was a relatively straightforward process of replacing the drive and should take someone who’s comfortable with this sort of thing less than an hour. I would recommend getting the drive removed before ordering the replacement. I don’t want to endorse a particular dealer so just run “XBOX DVD replacement” in a yahoo.com search, I found several but don’t pay more than $20.

I just recently replaced my own Xbox drive; I dug it out of the trash just to verify it was in fact a Thomson. I have found replacement drives on the internet for $20.00 (about $27 with shipping). The replacement was identical to the drive it replaced i.e.: Thomson.
I don’t personally recommend or endorse taking apart your own Xbox, but my situation was we had it a few years and it was off warranty anyway.
It was a relatively straightforward process of replacing the drive and should take someone who’s comfortable with this sort of thing less than an hour. I would recommend getting the drive removed before ordering the replacement. I don’t want to endorse a particular dealer so just run “XBOX DVD replacement” in a yahoo.com search, I found several but don’t pay more than $20.

No reason why you shouldn't succeed in this.I myself took Sony Australia to court for a similar complaint and won $3000 AUD as a refunf for console games and accessories after they failed to provide an effective warranty for their products here.Good luck and i hope to read of your victory.

microsoft sucks

In reply to #89 and others like his post....

You want to sue MS for bad hard drives when you, after the first one went toast? Sue yourself for being so stupid for buying an xbox more than once, heck make that for buying one in the first place.

Comment to an old post here regarding playing xbox games on his pc. Sell your xbox games and get the pc versions, they are pretty much the same thing. You microsheep are to funny sometimes

My Xbox stopped working today. I'd like to know the percentage of Xbox's that stop working within a year of purchase.

My xbox stopped to boot anymore. I think the harddrive is not working anymore since cracking noice comes from it. Could someone point me how to replace it? Thanks.

Hello fellow gamers, My box finally quit today. The hard drive's read write head is making noise, so I took of the hd cover and could see the head flickin back and forth. Don't give a shit bout a warranty, bought it the first day it came out for 300 bucks, years ago. If it wasn't for Halo I'd say fuck Bill and his 100's of billions.I say a free Xbox 360 for all of us with broke dick boxes. When is IBM launching thier game console? Have just started using Linux for an OS,and Netscape for a browser, not a big deal. One last thing,Class action against Billy.

My hard drive bit the big one yesterday, most annoying as I haven't had any other problems with the box since I bought it in March 02. 3 and a half years of gaming gone - booooooo! Still, just means I have 60 odd games to start from scratch again, oh the joys!

the hitachi lg drive is fairly reliable and mod ur xbox its thje best way to get the most out of it i know it voids your warranty with micro$$oft but what use it the warranty anyways you can usually repair ur xbox for less that the shipping costs to get it fixed and if you do have a faulty drive replace the lazer rather than the drive its cheaper and not as difficult as u may think using the xbox repair guide which is only about $10 make this process very easy and i have done many lazer changes for familly and friends and im not exactly a wizz with a soldering iron

I wish I had found your site before today! 1st generation x-box quit after 7-8 months. (Same old story: dirty disc, can't read disc, yadda, yadda, yadda....). Hadn't bought extended warranty & had to pay $99 plus shipping and handling to get it fixed. Microsoft cusotmenr service flat out lied to me, and they told me that this was an UNUSUAL problem! Absolutely NO response to my complaints of a poorly made product!!! Sorry, nothing we can do, your warranty ran out, it's not defective, don't open it yourself, blah, blah, blah. All customer service wanted to know was if I was satisfied with their customer service, i.e., did they respond quickly and in a friendly manner. (If you answer yes, they can report on their website and in the news that they have the BEST cusotmer service!) I told them their product support SUCKED!! Being friendly and responding quickly isn't a solution to their problem--faulty hard drives. 3 months ago, the Xbox died for good. It started making clicking noises and wouldn't boot up. Now, it won't even power up. My husband finally opend it, and the hard drive is fried. He said it was a cheap piece of crap!! My nephew still has his 1st generation play station and PS2, and he has NEVER had a problem with either unit. They both work perfectly!! After spending over $1,500 in xbox, games, additional controllers, video controller, and getting the unit fixed, I'm in no hurry to buy the 360--especially after reading all the complaints about overheating! My whole family is crazy about HALO 1 & 2 and Call of Duty series. But, we're not gonna waste any more money on defective products and a company that won't admit they've made a defective product!! Add my name to the lawsuit any day!

BTW, I'm sick and tired of hearing that Microsoft's losing $ on every xbox they sell! AT the $500 original list price and all the $ they've charged fixing a piece of crap or people buying new units---there is NO WAY they are losing money!!!

Looks like my DVD is dying. I have 14 games, only 2 of them are now recognized. This sucks. You thinking I'm plunking down the money for another one or for an xBox 360?? Now way.....PS3, here I come. Microsoft has given an oft-defective product the cold shoulder and it's customers a bad taste in their mouth. I hope they get trampled to death by the PS3, just like they did with the PS2.

I bought my xbox for christmas 04 and my xbox's hard drive died (07 error code) in oct 05, i'm out of warrnty and microsoft wants to charge me $80 plus shipping to fix a problem that seemes to be very common. If anyone knows of how to make microsoft fix it with little or no money let me know. e-mail @ speedyg1208@yahoo.com