The Money Pit

I have an xbox console that has turned into a money pit. And it's really ticking me off.

To make a short story long, I'll start from the beginning. I bought an original Xbox 360 - console only - off of the web. Knowing the mortality rate of Xbox 360 consoles, I wanted a spare console just in case mine went belly up and had to be sent in for repairs. Paid about $80 for it at the time, freight included (Pay attention - these numbers will mean something later).

A while later, I had a disc drive issue with my original console so I switched to my spare one and decided to keep the other one - which was off warranty - as my new back-up. The console I bought online worked for a few months and then red-ringed on me. Typical. I took it to the local fix-it place where I was dinged almost $120 (with taxes) to get it fixed. Had I known that it was going to come to that, I would have scrapped the thing. What really added fuel to my flame was the fact that no sooner had I sent it in, the arcade console went on sale for $129. I had seriously thought of pulling the console out of the repair place and buying a new one with controller, memory card, and three-year warranty for only a few bucks more. I didn't do it because the repair place would have charged a hefty penalty, so I stuck with the repair. Kinda burned my a$$ when the guy at the repair place handed me my console, my bill, and asked me "Hey, aren't 360s on sale this week?"

I used this console for a couple of months with no problems. Then I bought a slim model and put the repaired console back into storage as a spare. I passed on the other console (with the disc drive issue) and all applicable components. Cost invested in this "spare" console so far: approx. $200. That was a little over a year ago.

This week, I had the itch to get this thing up and running. We had cut back on our TV service at home so I wanted the spare 360 for a media extender. Between movies on the PC and Netflix, I could hook it up and we would still be well entertained for a considerably lower monthly cost. Sounds good to me. Now all I need are all the components to hook up the console.

Upon first glance, piecing it together seemed a little expensive. But my search led me to a kid who had a complete RRoD system that he wanted to sell for $50. Came with the cables, power bar, one wired controller, and a 20 GB hard drive. That was enough to get me up and running. I pounced on the deal and proceeded to start setting things up at home. About 10 minutes into my test run, THE DAMN THING RED RINGED ON ME!!! It had barely been used since it was fixed and it was well beyond the warranty period to have any type of recourse. I still have nothing to show for the approx. $250 total shelled out so far.

But wait - it gets better. Everytime I touch this thing, hardware seems to go on sale. This week, 250 GB slim consoles can be had for the amazing price of $197 plus tax. That would be $50 less than my total investment so far, and it comes with all the goodies and a three year warranty to boot. I just can't catch a break.

I'm cutting my losses with this thing. I'm scrapping this demon console and I'm going to try and re-coup some of my expenses by selling the components piece by piece. I'm considering grabbing a bat and going all "office space" on it. If you've seen the movie then you know what I mean. And if you've ever had a RRoD issue with an Xbox 360, then you know how good it would feel.