StarDestroyer.Net BBS

So after about 2.5 years of faithful service, my XBOX 360 finally succumbed to the curse of Microsoft and gave me the "E74" error message. I checked with Microsoft and my 360 is still covered by the extended 3 year warranty for this, so I have to wait for Monday to get that mailed off for the free repair.

I have been debating upgrading to the "ELITE" version of the 360 because I keep hearing that it has a drive that is much more quiet and has superior components than the white version of the 360's. So I am curious if anyone here knows anything about this.... is there a difference? or if I buy a new "Arcade" version of the 360 (the one without the hard drive) is it the same as the "ELITE"? (aside from the hard drive/memory space). Meaning can I take my spare hard drive and use it on an "Arcade" 360 and save myself the $200 instead of buying the ELITE?

Prior to now, I'd figured they were all the same thing, jut the top teir being a different color, and coming stock with a few nice add ons. (The chief of which being that 120gig.)

As for sending her in. Mine died a last month, and it took about a week and a half after I mailed it to them for them to get me a replacement. So all in all, they've got it down to a smooth system.

I'm not an expert but there are sites out there that give you the serial numbers (which you can see through the packaging) of the different production batches so you know which version you are buying - which becomes slightly relevant considering the number of different iterations, which IIRC have vastly different failure rates as well as significant heat and noise differences.

Death from the Sea wrote:I have been debating upgrading to the "ELITE" version of the 360 because I keep hearing that it has a drive that is much more quiet and has superior components than the white version of the 360's. So I am curious if anyone here knows anything about this.... is there a difference? or if I buy a new "Arcade" version of the 360 (the one without the hard drive) is it the same as the "ELITE"? (aside from the hard drive/memory space). Meaning can I take my spare hard drive and use it on an "Arcade" 360 and save myself the $200 instead of buying the ELITE?

If I were you I'd probably wait for a bit, until the warranty on the repairs runs out and then look at getting a new console. I can't comment on the differing quality of the Arcades and Elites, but apart from that the main thing to keep in mind is the HDD, I mean I'm considering upgrading to an Elite at the moment too (I got an old refurbished Pro after my original box red ringed, it's got no HDMI port and I've only got the 20GB HDD) mainly because of the 120GB HDD for installing games, which reduces load times, noise and heat generation apparently. To buy one on it's own here costs around £100, so I'm thinking I might as well pay an additional £100 and get an Elite with a game, or wait till winter and see what bundles are around.

Death from the Sea wrote:I have been debating upgrading to the "ELITE" version of the 360 because I keep hearing that it has a drive that is much more quiet and has superior components than the white version of the 360's.

I don't think the Elite has a different drive; Microsoft uses several different drive suppliers and which one you get is pretty random. I have an Elite and it doesn't seem any louder or quieter than my friend's standard Xbox. It is nice being able to HD install all of the games I might want to go back and play at random.

If you just get one of the new arcade models (w/HDMI etc) and a 120gb drive it might be cheaper than getting an Elite (as I don't believe that the Elite's feature some of hte new chipsets).

And installing games on the 360 is awesome. It means you can hear the massive explosions on your 5.1 system now because the drive isn't making noise.

I can't really comment much on the Elite version, but the drive should be relatively unimportant, the HDD eliminates drive noise completely other than when you're installing, albeit you still have the fan running. Do you have lots of DLC, videos, etc. that you keep? I have the 20GB drive on mine and while it might be nicer to be able to keep more games installed, I find that since I usually only play one or two games at a time, just install the ones that I am currently playing and delete the install when I'm done. It takes maybe 5-10 minutes to install a game, so go make a sandwhich or something while you wait. I personally am just finding the $100+ USD for a 120GB not to be worth the cost.

On a side note speaking of the HDD, does anyone know how the 360s compares to standard PC HDDs? I gotta wander, as I just purchased a cheap 500GB external drive for data backup a few months ago at Wal-Mart for $100 USD. (A Maxtor OneTouch I believe, certainly not high quality but sufficient for backing up data/storing game mods).

weemadando wrote:I'm not an expert but there are sites out there that give you the serial numbers (which you can see through the packaging) of the different production batches so you know which version you are buying - which becomes slightly relevant considering the number of different iterations, which IIRC have vastly different failure rates as well as significant heat and noise differences.

Pretty much all 60gb and up 360s should now be on the same hardware as the Elite; Flash even has a 20gb with the Elite hardware including HDMI. I'm pretty sure it's easiest to check the power rating; the elite-hardware uses like 175W instead of 210W power bricks.

Non-elite hardware xboxs are basically useless; Zak asked EB how much his is worth trade, and they said FIFTEEN BUCKS. Everyone knows they're just timebombs.

Stark wrote:Pretty much all 60gb and up 360s should now be on the same hardware as the Elite; Flash even has a 20gb with the Elite hardware including HDMI. I'm pretty sure it's easiest to check the power rating; the elite-hardware uses like 175W instead of 210W power bricks.

All new 360s are now the Jasper revision with the 150W PSU, unless you find a box that's been sitting in a warehouse for six months plus. This is a further improvement on the 175W Falcon revision, at least in power/noise/reliability terms. Early Elites used a motherboard called 'Zephyr' which was actually no better than the original Xenon.

Or 'are in Australia'.

Stark wrote:Non-elite hardware xboxs are basically useless; Zak asked EB how much his is worth trade, and they said FIFTEEN BUCKS. Everyone knows they're just timebombs.

It isn't QUITE that bad. My 2007 20gb is
worth $150 trade-in, only the pre-07 ones are $15