This guide will show how I fixed this.
In the blog post yesterday, I went over how I acquired said 360. Once I acquired it, I started doing some research on how to fix it. There are a ton of kits and D.I.Y. guides out there to draw information from, so I don't expect this guide to be the authoritative method for home 360 repair.
Obviously I need to preface this by stating:
If your 360 is under warranty with Microsoft, stop reading and send it in. If you're unsure of it's status, register it at http://support.xbox.com and find out there. The red ring of death is a very common issue in earlier models of the 360. My understanding is that within the past 1-1.5 years, they've fixed the primary issue that causes the machines to red ring (overheating). I've never owned or disassembled a 360 before, but I think I can sum up how most people feel about the RRoD by saying:
Also keep in mind that there are a few different patterns to the red ring. This guide addresses the 3/4 red ring of death.
Now that that's out of the way, here's what I did:
Part 1: What you'll need.
This is the easy part. Most of this stuff is probably already around your house. If it isn't, well this project probably got a little more expensive than what you expected.
The Tools
- Jeweler's Screwdriver (Flat): This is for poking things.
- Torque 6 Screwdriver: This is to remove the screws on the XBox.
- 1/4" Socket Wrench or a Pair of Pliers: This is to remove the standoffs on the heatsinks. Take your pick here, both are equally a pain in the ass to use.
- A Drill with a 3/16" drill bit: Needs to be capable of chewing up a little metal.
- Normal Philips or Flat Screwdriver: Depends on which flavor of panhead screws you choose.
The Oddities
- 4x 3/16" x 1/2" Panhead screws: These will be for the GPU heatsink (the flat one). These are a.k.a. 5MMx15MM for you metric system aficionados out there.
- 4x 3/16" x 1" Panhead screws: These will be for the CPU heatsink (the tall one). Again, for you metric system tools out there, that would be 5MMx20MM.
- 24x 3/16" Washers for the above screws: You will be stacking these as a bit of a stand off.
- 8x 3/16" Nylon Standoffs: These can be any size really as long as they sit flushly on top. These are there to prevent the potential for metal-on-mainboard issues.
- Tape: Can be any type, but the type that's easy to remove would be ideal.
- Thermal Compound: Can be picked up usually at most computer shops. Try to stick with Arctic Silver or some form of this.
- "Anti-static foam": Present in most mainboard boxes to cushion shipping blows. Good thing about this stuff is that most of it resists static and is commonly used as a bit of a "pillow" for diagnosing mainboards out of their cases. When you go to get your thermal compund, ask your computer guy if he has any of this laying around. Odds are he does. You can also get a "rubber foot" of sorts for this part of the project as well.
- Cleaning supplies: Pick up some Q-tips, Toothpicks, Rubbing Alcohol and some regular old toilet paper. More on this later.
Part 2: Disassemble?
Microsoft doesn't want you getting into these contraptions, or they at least want to see that you did if you send it back in for repair. Between flimsy plastic and release points that just don't want to release, getting this thing apart is a huge pain in the ass without breaking or cracking some plastic along the way. So where do you start? Here:
Poking at that point with your jeweler's screwdriver will release part of the faceplate. You still have to pull with a little bit of force to get it to pop the rest of the way off, but it comes off much easier with that little point released.
Next up, you'll be removing the ends of the case.
If you look closely at the patterns on the sides there, you'll see some filled in holes. This usually means there's a push point. If you lift up slightly on the front of the end piece, you can push the tabs on the inside as you work your way back. These come off rather easily if you identify where to push, but those push tabs are a little on the brittle side, so have patience. Get both of the endcaps removed and it'll be time to start taking off the clamshell.
I found it easier to start on the left and work my way to the right. This was due to the sheer number of release points. If you look at what I have circled above, those are your release/poke points. You'll see a really little tab in there to aim for in each of those tiny black spots. As you work your way to the right, you'll need to be pulling constantly on the edge to prevent the plastic from reclamping itself.
Once you get to the far left, it gets decidedly more difficult to get the tabs to release. Have patience here, this is the 2nd most trying part of the process. Once removed, your 360 should look like this:
Bust out that torque screwdriver and remove the six screws I have circled. This will release the other half of the clamshell. The screws will be very long (about 3"...I didn't measure).
When you remove the cap, the inside looks like this:
Remove the Airflow Sheath and the DVD Drive. Pay attention to the eject button as the real eject button is located on the mainboard itself and the button you press has a piece of plastic that goes down to it that likes to get hung. Once removed, flip the chassis back over.
The little black screws around the blatant X's in the middle of the case need to be removed. We won't actually be using these again, so feel free to dispose of them after the project is finished.
The 9 screws that are circled hold the mainboard to the chassis. Remove those with your torque screwdriver. The mainboard shouldn't actually fall out as there's very little wiggle room in the chassis itself and it's still held in by the front panel. Flip the case back over when all screws are removed from the bottom and look at the front of the chassis.
Contain your anger at removing this piece. It's simply a clip on piece of plastic.
Remove the three screws that are circled and pull piece forward. It's connected to the mainboard in the lower left corner, so apply a little more pressure there if it feels stuck.
Disconnect the fan from the mainboard and lift up on the metal lip that's covering it slightly. This will allow you to angle the fans slightly and pull them out. Careful of bending them forward too far as the little plastic "feet" on the bottom aren't exactly made of the sturdiest material in the world. Now it's just you and the very likely source of your red ring.
Work the mainboard out of the chassis. As mentioned before, there isn't much wiggle room. Getting the mainboard at too much of an angle causes it to get stuck, so work in small lifts at a time. Once it's out, flip it over and mutter every cuss word you can think of at the X-Clamps on the bottom because you're about to get even more pissed off than you thought you could.
I'm going to try to explain this in a manner that doesn't involve me taking a picture of a screwdriver that's in various positions around the X-clamp itself. First you have to understand what's at work here.
The standoffs on the bottom of the heatsink have notches in them.
The X-Clamps have "hooks" that attach to said notches. Using whatever method you can think of that doesn't involve hitting the mainboard (might want to consider some cardboard to put around the X-Clamps to avoid potential tool-stabbings), pry two adjacent corners of the X-Clamp off their notches. Once this is done, the clamp pretty much just comes off. With those removed, you can simply lift the heatsinks off the mainboard and remove the standoffs using the socket wrench or the pliers I mentioned earlier. You won't be using them again, so put them in the same place as the 8 black screws you removed from the bottom of the chassis.
Your disassembly is complete.
Part 3: The Modification
Time to get a little dirty.
Bust out the cleaning supplies I mentioned earlier. Clean off the bottom of the heatsinks. It may take a little effort. Do the same to the tops of the CPU and GPU, but if you run into some areas that seem dried out, use a toothpick to poke at it a bit to try to break the gunk up. You'll only want to use Q-tips dipped in rubbing alcohol on top of the mainboard, but you can pretty much use whatever type of scrubbing tool you want for the bottom of the heat sinks.
Once those are clean, bust out the drill with the 3/16" drill bit on it.
It's a repeat of a picture I already posted, but it's good to remind you which holes to widen. You're not going to want to go full-bore into the holes and you might even want to make sure you have a piece of wood or something on the other end of it in case the drill slips. Take a few minutes to clear off any jagged metal edges and metal shavings you have in there. Last thing you'll need is to have some stray shaving shorting something out accidentally on your mainboard.
Part 4: The Partial Re-assembly
Almost done!
Pick up the screws you bought for this project. I hope you're good with shapes because you'll need to know which end of the chassis is the front and which is the back. It makes a difference as to which screws you will use.
Place the longer screws in the holes where the CPU Heatsink (tall one with copper pipe) will be located and the shorter screws in the holes where the GPU heatsink (short flat one) will be located. Tape the heads of these screws to the chassis. This is to prevent them from falling out until you're ready to screw them into the heatsinks.
Trust me, nothing is more infuriating than getting a screw through the mainboard with everything in place only to have it fall out and hear those washers rattling around underneath the mainboard.
Place 3 washers on each screw. Place a single nylon washer on top of the stack of 3 washers. The end result looks like this (almost):
Major note here:
The 4 screws in the middle of that picture are close enough in proximity that washers could bump into each other or not sit entirely flush. Pay close attention to this fact before you proceed. The idea with the washers are for them to be approx. the same height as the molded "bubble" standoff just north of the middle two screws in the above picture.
Set the chassis aside for a minute and pick up your thermal paste/arctic silver/heatsink compound. Squirt a little bit on top of the dyes of the CPU and GPU. It doesn't take much. Pretty much just enough that, when spread out, it covers the surface of the dye itself. Too much can potentially cause spillage and subsequent shortages of the mainboard (although rare, but far more likely with a silver-based thermal paste).
Start trying to work your mainboard back into the now-modified chassis. This will be a pain, especially when trying to get the 8 new screws lined up. I found using my jeweler's screwdriver to poke the ends of the screws in the direction they needed to go helped out a ton and left me really with just the edges of the case to manipulate in terms of getting the mainboard settled back down to the bottom of the chassis.
Once in, pick a heatsink to work with first (read the GPU heatsink note in the next paragraph if you choose that one first). The heatsinks will not just slide down on the screws. You will need to turn the chassis over on it's side and work with one screw at a time. Work on opposite corners as best you can trying to keep the heatsink level all the way down. If it comes down at too much of an angle, your screw will tell you by becoming a lot harder to turn. Be mindful of stripping the threads when you feel more resistance than you think you should on the screw itself.
When putting the GPU heatsink in, there are a couple of memory modules next to the GPU itself. If you're looking at the GPU from the front of the mainboard, the modules I'm referring to are the black squares directly to the left. Cover these with a sliver of anti-static foam or a thin rubber foot before getting the GPU heatsink too far down. My end result looked like this:
Again, the idea here is to prevent the GPU heatsink from actually touching the modules. I'll explain more on how I came to this conclusion a little later.
Once your heatsinks are all the way down, reattach the front bezel (since it's your only means of turning the unit on) and it's time for some testing.
Part 5: The Test Phase
Odds are, everything you just went through did not actually fix your 360. This is the part that does. With your mainboard and heatsinks in your chassis, hook up your A\V and A\C cables. Push that little tiny button in the middle of the front bezel.
Red lights right?
Good. Leave the machine on and touch your heatsinks after about a minute. If they feel warm, you're in good shape most likely. If they don't warm up, turn off the unit, plug in the power cable to your fans and see if they spin constantly. If they do, then your CPU/GPU should be warming up. If they don't, then you'll probably need to loosen up your heatsinks until you see the fans spinning constantly.
(A shorted mainboard will result in the fans spinning for a second, then stopping followed up by 4 flashing red lights.)
If you're heatsinks are good and hot, but you're not getting a signal out of your 360, turn the unit off and apply pressure to the top of the GPU heatsink. Try to make sure it's even.
Remember, the main reason you're in this predicament in the first place is because your machine overheated and loosened up some solder joints. In order to re-establish a good, working solder joint involves melting the solder to the point where it can be manipulated. Pushing down on the top of the heatsink performs said manipulation when the solder is heated up. The process from here forward essentially goes:
1. Turn on.
2. If no vid signal, let run for a couple minutes until heatsinks are warm, then turn off.
3. Push down on or tighten/loosen the screws to the GPU heatsink.
4. Turn on.
5. If no vid signal, repeat steps 3 and 4. If vid signal then proceed.
6. Mess around in the 360 Console Software for a bit, but not too long. (No fans = bad).
7. Replace one piece at a time in the order of fans, airflow sheath, and dvd drive. Turn off the machine before attaching a new part. Turn on between each added part to make sure it completely boots. Once it boots with the DVD drive, play a game or two for a couple hours and see if it screws up. If not, you're in really good shape.
It may take several attempts to get it working steadily again. It took me about 30-45 minutes of "tweaking" the screws and pushing down on the heatsinks before I finally realized I was probably shorting something under the GPU heatsink. That's when I placed the Anti-Static foam there and I haven't looked back since.
Part 6: The Final Assembly.
Putting this thing back together isn't anywhere near as hard as taking it apart. Usually it's the complete opposite of that. You can pretty much follow the disassembly part of this guide in reverse to put it back together. But if you want the cliff notes, here you go:
(This is assuming you're starting from just the mainboard being in the chassis)
1. Install Fans and plug in.
2. Install Airflow Sheath (tab goes into fan).
3. Attach LED faceplate to front bezel.
4. Flip over and screw in mainboard screws (the set of 9, short, silver torque head screws).
5. Flip back over and pop the DVD drive back in. Be mindful of that stupid piece of plastic that actually reaches down to the real eject button. Takes a little wiggling to get it all the way in. The back right "foot" of the drive goes through the Airflow Sheath.
6. Place clamshell "lid" on top of chassis. Again, takes a little working, especially around the DVD drive.
7. Flip over and screw in the chassis screws (the set of 6 long ones).
8. Replace other half of clamshell and snap into place.
9. Place endcaps back on.
10. Place faceplate back on.
Hopefully it still works by the time you finish this or you're gonna be taking it apart again.
Conclusion
Pretty safe to say this won't work for everyone, but given the apparent commonality of this issue, this seemed like a good, cheap way to fix it if it's out of warranty. Once I buy a hard drive for it, I'll probably pick up a couple games and whatnot. I want to get a few days worth of burn in on it before I go spend that money however to make sure it's completely fixed.
After the initial fix last night, I ran a movie for a couple hours with no hiccups. I turned it off and did dynamis. When I turned it back on after dynamis, I got red-ringed again. So it was back to tweaking things (anti-static foam).
Just a few notes:
Before anyone comments on the pile of stuff in the background of my middle finger picture, that would be everything I hauled back from Kay's family for Christmas. I haven't found a place to put it yet.
Also, yes the Transformers figures are in disarray at the moment because of my niece's visitation earlier this week.
At any rate, hope this helps. If any of you want me to do this for you, I found this to be a fun project, so contact me for shipping information. Send me your broken 360 and all the stuff I listed above and I'll try to fix it. :)
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