Vertical Xbox 360s endanger disks; play safe, play horizontally

by Vladimir Cole { Nov 27th 2005 at 2:30PM }

hosed xbox 360 disk

The photo above demonstrates $60 good reasons to orient your Xbox 360 horizontally. If you orient it vertically, a clumsy roommate, sibling, or pet might knock the thing over, and you'll be left with a DVD that looks like the one pictured here: all scratched up and unplayable.

Sure, the Xbox 360 looks better oriented vertically, but it's simply not as stable. Player beware, especially if your roommate's a nubcake, like mine!

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Z @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Also, standing up, it looks like a women's hygiene product.

nojok3 @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

*sigh*
I said this all along that vertically it would have same problems as ps2 had vertically...

splash @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Is this any different than having your PS2 vertical? Where exactly are people placing their consoles? On the ground in an area subject to walking traffic?

Is the 360 any more susceptible to being knocked over than other consoles that are setup vertically?

Not Impressed (Dmitri) @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Wtf. I bought my PS2 2 weeks after it released. Ever since then I have been using it Vertically. Not a single problem, EVER.

I guess some people just suck.

Russell Clow @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Well according to an article on our site (360Monster.com), an xbox 360 hardware tester tipped that playing the 360 horizontally would actually cause the disks to scratch.

Looks like you're never going to win! :)

Spence @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

I actually e.mailed Nintendo about this issue, because I want to use my revolution upright, because the stand is really rad.
They gave me this response:

"Wow! Thanks for all the great feedback, I will be sure to forward your comments to the appropriate departments here at Nintendo for review." after all they did say they wanted feedback at Tokyo game show?

I had this problem with my PS2.. I think they really need to sort out these disc drives, with blu ray discs going to be more susceptable to scratches. Anyone willing to content this I have 5 friends who suffered the same problems.

Bob Dole @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

This happened to two of my games! thankfully the store took them back, and the attedent told me that at least 5 other games had been returned with similar problems. My advice, if one of your games did this, return it before the retailers catch on.

pryingender @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

man same thing happend to mine, except i flipped my 360 on purpose to watch the little light change to stay in the upper left hand corner...that's right i'm an idiot

Cdaghostie @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

the article from 360 monster the guy said about
http://www.360monster.com/newspost.php?id=0000000210

it says "Hardware : DVD Drive
Unrecognized DVDs should display a message that says the disc is unrecognized, but often doesn�t.

Moving your 360 during gameplay may lead to the scratching of discs.

Playing of console horizontally is not advised and could lead to scratching of discs."

This is a rumor from a guy so it could be an idiot trying the screw up all xbox 360 games

Art Guy @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

I was playing my GameCube and got mad and shook it violently and the Cube ruined my disc. My PS2 stopped working after I tried using it in the bathtub, and my Xbox hard drive went out after I started storing my industrial magnets on top of it.

They really need to make these things better.

Not Impressed (Dmitri) @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

...In computer engineering my teacher tossed a magnet lightly across the room and it was forced right into a computer, knocking the computer over.

Now. If that can happen a computer. Don't you think that knocking a cheap piece of hardware, like the 360, over... Could damage it?

nubs. They never learn.

Jeff @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

"I said this all along that vertically it would have same problems as ps2 had vertically..."

Five years of vertical PS2 playing on two separate PS2's and no problem whatsoever here.

Where do people come up with this stuff? The thing was designed to play vertically and it plays vertically just fine. This is not rocket science; there have been vertically-capable optical drives since around 1985.

Why is it the Xbox 360's fault that it scratches disks when you tip it over as it's playing? This is like blaming a laptop manufacturer because your hard drive died after you drop your PC onto pavement.

Some people just need to treat their equipment a little better. That's all. The moral of the story is not that the Xbox 360 (or PS2) can't play discs vertically, the moral of the story is don't tip over your Xbox 360! Seems like it'd be common sense to me...

refinedsugar @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

lol... brilliant use of sarcasm.

Not Impressed (Dmitri) @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Oh btw. Only a retard would purposely tip over a console while playing it.

I want all of you on desktop computer, to tip their tower or desktop or whatever you may have over. Just let it fall.

You have now officially become a n00b.

Matt @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

haha oh man my friends came over to play my 360 and they brought their games over and so we were playing madden 06 and my other friend knocked over my 360 and of course i was like wtf man but thought nothing of it, then like 20 seconds later the game stopped working. now i know why.

Agent X @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Jeff (#12) explained it pretty well already, but I'll try to expand on his comments.

This is the same situation as PlayStation 2. You can choose to orient the console either horizontally or vertically, and it's equally capable of playing your discs in either orientation.

What you should not do is CHANGE the orientation WHILE THE CONSOLE IS POWERED ON. If you suddenly decide that you want to change the orientation of your console, then be sure to eject any discs and power down the console before doing so. This applies to PS2, and I'd imagine it would apply to the X-Box 360 in the same way.

If your home environment is such that your console would be prone to getting tipped over easily, then your best bet here would be to keep it horizontal just to play it safe. Remember, it's CHANGING orientation during use that is damaging the discs--not the orientation itself.

chudgoo @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

One problem I see for Sony (and everyone really who switches to higher density storage mediums) is that on a relatively low density medium like a CD a 1/8" wide scratch might result in corruption of, say, 10MB* worth of data.

A Blu-Ray disc, with the same type of scratch might end up with 1000MB* of corrupt/unreadable data due to the higher storage density.

* Numbers are complete guesstimates/pulled out of backside.

I'm not saying that we should all go back to CDs or anything stupid like that, only that hardware makers should plan for this type of thing by designing improved drives that isolate the disc from the internals of the drive better. (ie, an axle/spindle that comes up from the bottom of the disc and locks into the top of the drive and limits yaw movements...or something like that)

I'd much rather have a thicker drive than one that scratched discs...

chudgoo @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

And to make a bad analogy, if I can...

When your basket needs to safely hold more eggs, you need to use a better basket...

or the yolk will fly...

Seb @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

If a DVD is spinning changing it's orientation may cause the disk to skip out and scratch on the vertical retainer clips. open your disk drive tray and it should have "vertical spin" retainer clips ( those 4 little pieces of plastic that keep the disk in place when vertical ).

The scratches are caused by the high spin speeds of modern DVD/CD readers and when the orientation of the drive changes rapidly the disk may become unbalanced and skip out and grab one of the retainers. I can cause my Sony External DVD burner to shred a CD if I shake the thing while it's burning at 24x. Of course no one in their right mind would do that right?

As for Blu-ray and the new HD-ROM disk technologies, the likelyhood of getting those disks scratched is going to be the same as current xbox/PS2/etc, same retention method, same media size, etc.

GunForHire @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

I bet the guy was using a wired controller. Old-style noobs just won't learn.

Wireless is the way to go baby. No tipping over your console that way (unless it's recharging of course). Either that or the guy was just plan dumb and somehow knocked it over himself. In which case, *duuuuhhh*.

IanC @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Some of us would rather use wired contorls than buy new batteries all the time, GunForHire.

ivanoski @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

don't any of you idiots know blu-ray has been engineered to have a hard coating so it won't get scratched?! here's the link you ignorant 360 fanboys!!!http://www.durabis.com/en/con00100.htm

foxhaze @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

The same warning applies to all instances in which the CD drive is run sideways. This is why PC CD-ROM drives have been re-oriented.

AceMilo @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

I have mine in my cabinet on a flat surface and is comepletly out of the way, no way for anyone to knock it over and I haven't had any problems with it being vertical. Just be careful where you put it.

rjman @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

He's not the only one it's happened too. Good thing I have the receipt so I can trade in the game. Is buying the vertical stand a good idea or what?

vc @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Guys - never said that vertical scratches disks. I said that if you orient it vertically some idiot is more likely to knock it over. In homes with pets, rambunctious kids, or high traffic, vertical orientation is more risky.

Brad Twitty @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

I was playing my Nintendo DS, got pissed that some guy beat me by snaking the whole race and I threw my DS across the room into the back of a couch. It it the seat of the couch and slammed into the floor, I remembered there was still another race, ran over to my DS, ripped it off the floor and lost again. Thank you Nintendo. Can a PSP, Xbox, PS2 do that, no. I will say that I dropped, I mean dropped a old style PS2 three times in one day all from about 3 feet, all on accident, you know a little too much Kool-Aid, and it still worked just fine.

Good Design Bill.

Brad

Ian @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

We've had several games come back like this at the video store, and the Xbox360s have all been recalled to be replaced...

richard @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Don't the discs lock in? Why is it so hard to put a few ball bearings around the spindle of the disc?

Badison @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Post 24 (author): lol you lead people to believe that with a title like "Vertical Xbox 360s endanger disks; play safe, play horizontally". But yeah this reminds me of any other device that might fall over or malfunction due to taking an accident (not sure how this is anything new). I mean will this kind of article be run on all the future vertical standing systems (lol unless it has some kind of safety mechanism for all those people getting their systems knocked on the floor).

SG @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

I THRU MY PS2 AT A WAL AND RAN IT OVR W/ MY CAR AND DUNKED IT IN WATERR AND SOHKED IT IN GASALINE AND LIT IT ON FIRE AND IT STIL WORKS PERFFECTLI!1!!1 ZOMG1! 360 SUUXXS!!!!1

vc @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Badison: we expect you to read more than the headline. The post body is very explicit and clear on the cause of the issue.

Donald @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

I did the same thing with my PS2 and it now also plays Xbox games.

Jon @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

the moral of the story is, don't knock over a console while it's standing vertically and loaded with a cd/dvd spinning inside.

Jeremy @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Yep. I did that to my copy of Perfect Dark Zero.

The 360 is now sitting happily horizontally on a sturdy shelf.

Frank @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Hey ivan the idiot that coating reduces the chances of the disk getting scratched it does not make it scratch proof calm down PS fanboy

xvex321 @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

yeah, i done this very thing yesterday. i waited about 7 hours in line to get my xbox 360. then yesterday i went and bought perfect dark zero. i stood the system upright (note i did it while it was playing though..so i guess i was asking for it..lol ) but it scratched the crappppp out of my game, i took it back to walmart and got another..man im glad...i got lucky on that one.

Jake @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Badison said:"lol you lead people to believe that with a title like "Vertical Xbox 360s endanger disks; play safe, play horizontally""

It does endanger the disks, it directly increases the risk of it being tipped over, cuasing said scratching. How much chance of it tipping and scractching a disk if its horizontal?

This is a problem for people with wired controllers for sure.

I can roll my gamecube around, sometimes I get mad and kick it, nothing happens. It's called a good design. Walkmans don't scratch discs if you tilt them, and if you drop most, the actual walkman will break before it scratches the disc (well, with a good walkman that is)

Of course these consoles aren't meant to be portable, but they still should consider these things. Video games are toys, and toys are subject to abuse, no matter what the cost. Especially if you shape your console like a menstral pad. I'm going to guess it's fairly easy to tip over.

Dmitri, your the biggest moron I've ever seen on any forums, it's always a mental effort not to reply to your dumb posts, but this time I'll let it slip because there was more to my post. Your desktop computer is not meant to be tipped over, no, and would take a huge amount of damage most likely. However, your computer weighs much much MUCH more, especially if you have an aluminum case like me, and won't tip over as easily. Also, your computer doesn't sit in the middle of peoples basements on carpet hooked up to a TV, with possibly wired controllers attached to angry gamers, tugging and throwing them when they lose (mice don't count, you barely move mice)

Your analogy is crap. Go away.

Badison @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

VC: yes, I read it, but this isn't really news anyway I thought (but I guess it is for some people).

Jake: Kicking your gamecube is moronic (my friend's has all kinds of disc read problems from getting pulled off a table during a party). As far as wired controllers, I see your point. And yes, toys are subject to abuse, but you are really running a risk not being cautious with your TV, VCR, game CONSOLE (controllers I understand I guess), DVD player, or any toy that is expensive electronic hardware. You abuse an electronic device, expect it to malfunction and break at some point.

LoL Best Buy and othere stores offer full coverage insurance with no questions asked replacement of purchases, for this very reason. Intentional lack of control related abuse of expensive toys and accidental abuse are covered.

Oh yeah on a side note, someone at my school had 4 units (4 controllers each) at 12am launch day, so around 100 people stayed and played them for a few hours in an auditorium. The wireless controllers sometimes got crossed with another system's up to 10 yards away, causing PG3 and Call of Duty 2 o PDZ to pause and ask for you to reassign the controller (which is a huge pain in the ass to have happen every 5 or so mins to 1 of the 4 or 2 controllers). I realize that was a strange set up to have 16 controllers at once, also there may have been other devices in the area we used that caused problems, but has anyone heard anything about this wireless controller connection issue?

elle @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Cartridges don't get scratched.

(ducks)

Rare Hare @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Badison: actually, X-Play did a test on the Xbox, the PS2, and the GameCube. this test involved dropping the consoles themselves off of a ladder, using them as hockey pucks with a sledge hammer as the stick, and finally dropping what i believe was a large cement brick off of a raised platform onto the consoles.

the only console that survived was the GameCube, and even though it was horribly mangled it still worked fine. they did the test 3 times, all with the same results. Nintendo makes damn sturdy products.

Ryan @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Badison: I think I read somewhere that an X360 can only use 3 WIRELESS controllers at once. Maybe that had something to do with it?

Rare Hare @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

i've intended from the beginning to place my Xbox 360 (once i acquire one) horizontally anyway. it's just safer.. even though vertical does look better.

CRP Addict @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

This is absolutlty crazy. All the marketing campaign of the xbox was made with the x360 placed vertically, not horiontaly. Even the face plates are made to be read vertically... Crazy!!

ZeroCorpse @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

The demo kiosks are working fine. This is only a problem when idiots knock over the unit while the disc is spinning.

So simple: Don't be an idiot.

funkonaut @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

I've had my PS2 vertical since I got it. The disc locks in and prevents it from sliding around in the machine. Not a single scrath on any disc so far.

Does the 360 not have a disc locking mechanism?

Lobster @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

Anecdotal "evidence" doesn't "prove" anything. I worked at EB when the PS2 came out and we got dozens back within weeks of launch because of the problems with running it vertically. Just because you might have three launch PS2s and you've had them stacked vertically on top of each other and they've been fine doesn't mean the problem didn't exist.

I suspect this guy that said running the X360 horizontally may scratch the disc had "horizontal" and "vertical" mixed up. Remember, these testers aren't always masters in any particular field. Often they're just some exec's bratty nephew.

TRega123 @ Dec 18th 2005 9:06PM

"Posted Nov 27, 2005, 5:55 PM ET by xvex321

yeah, i done this very thing yesterday. i waited about 7 hours in line to get my xbox 360. then yesterday i went and bought perfect dark zero. i stood the system upright (note i did it while it was playing though..so i guess i was asking for it..lol ) but it scratched the crappppp out of my game, i took it back to walmart and got another..man im glad...i got lucky on that one."

How did you take the xbox 360 back and get another one when they're all out of stock? I find your story hard to believe.