| How To Kill Your Xbox - The Towel Trick Explained |
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| Computers - Computers |
| Written by Marc Sandford |
| Sunday, 11 January 2009 08:16 |
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Quick and dirty fixes for electronic gadgets have usually involved abuse of some kind. This included smashing, hitting, shaking, or kicking to get the device to work. The abuse worked because loose connections would reconnect if you were persistent enough. But the mechanical shock weakens other connections which make the device fail at a later time.
Quick and dirty fixes for electronic gadgets have usually involved abuse of some kind. This included smashing, hitting, shaking, or kicking to get the device to work. The abuse worked because loose connections would reconnect if you were persistent enough. But the mechanical shock weakens other connections which make the device fail at a later time. One of the better known fixes for the ring of death error is the towel fix or towel trick. It readily falls into this category of fixing something by abusing it. Instead of mechanical abuse, the remedy involves heating the internal chips at extremely high temperatures so that broken solder points get reconnected and badly warped components get reshaped. The method to this madness starts with wrapping your Xbox with a few towels. Then you turn on the Xbox for about 15 minutes and you're finished. Now you're all set to enjoy some gaming sessions. When the next ring of death error happens you just reapply the trusty towel trick. If the method works, then why is the towel trick a bad idea? As mentioned above, the towel trick subjects the internal chips to damaging temperatures. Avoiding heat damage to components during manufacture is a big issue in the electronics industry. To get the soldering temperature high enough for a good solder join without causing chip damage is no trivial thing. So when you use the towel trick, you get a temporary fix at the expense of damaging the Xbox's internal components. Eventually this damage will lead to yet another heat related failure. Then when you apply the towel trick again, more damage is done which weakens your Xbox even more. You can only repeat this process so many times before the heat damage is too extensive for the towel trick to work any more. This process is a downward spiral that thoroughly destroys your Xbox. Another issue that concerns safety is that the towel fix is dangerous. The Xbox puts out an enormous amount heat (thus the need for a cooling system). Because of the insulating action of the towels, the heat doesn't go anywhere and rapidly builds up. If your Xbox starts burning, other combustibles adjacent to your Xbox (like your house) may also burn. The towel fix just isn't common sense and in this instance, counterintuitive won't work. The red ring of death is basically caused by the Xbox putting out too much heat and having an undersized cooling system. Trying to fix this problem by heating up the Xbox is like fighting fire with fire. About the Author: Marc Sandford is a gaming enthusiast and writer. Get more Xbox troubleshooting information about fixing the Red Ring of Death. |