I'll start at the beginning (a couple of months ago)

One day I was watching a DVD on my Xbox, and it switched off. Just Bam, powered off. I attempted to turn it off and on a few times, to no avail - it looked dead. I hopped on the phone to the Upgrade-X guys, and told them of the situation. They told me it could be a faulty motherboard, chip, or power supply, and that they'd have to examine it to determine the problem. I told them I'd pay them whatever is needed.

Later that night, I moved the xbox from my loungeroom, into my bedroom to store it for the night (the next day I would be taking it to Upgrade-X). I said "oh what the hell", plugged it into the wall, and what do you know - the damn thing turned on.

I thought this was excellent, and sat down and started to watch the same DVD as I was before. About 30 minutes into it, and yep, you guessed it - the f***ing thing switched off again. The next day I took it to Upgrade-X, told them of my plight, and they said that they are going to try a process of elimination (to reproduce the problem), so that they could find a cause for it (initially it was thought that the box was overheating). They tried switching power cables, plugging it into different sockets, plugging it directly into the wall (IE: no surge protection), turning the airconditioning off for an entire 24 hours, running non-stop game demos, movies, ANYTHING to make the thing switch off again. This went on for about a week and a half, and they STILL couldn't make the damn thing turn off. They gave the box back to me, charged me NOTHING for all the testing, and kinda shrugged their shoulders of the whole issue. I took the box home, and threw it in the corner to gather dust.

Yesterday I got bored and decided to give it a go again. I took it out to the loungeroom, plugged it into the SAME socket where it originally had the power-failure, and what do you know - it worked again. I basically sat on my arse all day / night playing old snes games, watching movies etc etc, and it didn't have a single power outage at all! I left the thing on all night just to see if I woke up in the morning to see it turned off, but as luck would have it, it was still on this morning, which I used again for the majority of the day.

Come to this evening. I unplugged the xbox and brought it into my study, set it up next to my PC, and plugged it in (to transfer files across to it). No power. I changed switches, swapped out the power board, still no dice. I walked out to where my fiancee is cooking dinner with the xbox in hand, and plugged it into the kitchen socket (I figured theres a problem with my Study power socket, even though my computer and everything else has never missed a beat on it), and it worked. I then shrugged, went and set it up back to where I have been using it for the last 48 hours, and re-set it up again exactly how I have had it before (same cables, same power socket). No power again. I took it to another power socket nearby, plugged it in, and it ran smoothly for about 10 mins before it powered itself off. Again, I took it back to the original spot, plugged it in again, and it's f***ing working again.

I'm about to murder someone, I have no f***ing idea what to do. I have offered Upgrade-X as much cash as it takes to fix the problem, and they have declined, saying that after a week of solid testing, they could not get it to reproduce the problem. There is NO pattern to the thing not working - it's not like it's a particular socket, a particular cable, a specific power board, or anything. Sometimes it will work, sometimes it won't. It's completely f***ing random.

One thing that might be of use: My house blows light bulbs. A LOT. I am forever replacing lightbulbs in this house (for reasons which are not known to me). The real estate refuses to look into the issue. However I have NEVER had an issue with power for any of my other appliances at all, so I don't know if this will affect things at all.

Such a long-winded rant, I'm really sorry. For the tl;dr crowd: My xbox totally randomly powers itself off, for no reason at all. The console repair centre have tested it for over a week, and not found any fault.

Sorry for this. I know it's a long shot, but f*** I'm at the end of my tether, and anyone who has a modded xbox with a hard-drive in it can attest to the awesome-ness of it, so I'm really f***ed off with having a $300 paper-weight right now. Cheers,

such s*** emo f*****

Oh

modding is bad

edit: UPS?

last edited by Persay at 19:17:21 26/May/06

I doubt that'd have an effect, considering that it has worked by plugging directly into the wall many times before. I have, however, plugged it into two seperate power surge protection boards, and it hasn't changed things either way (it's still just as random as any other time).

Oh

lol

ya know whats funny, i had the same problem, it turned out to a be a mixture of the old wireing in the house and the powersupply, apparently the version of powersupply in the model xbox i had was pretty dodgy and had problems in general so i got a new one put in it and it never had a problem again.

now with my xbox360 i have the same problem, some areas i plug it into it wont work *never locks up though* and other places there isnt a problem.

i guess thats what ya get for living in a house thats nearly over 100 years thats still got the original wiring.

would the cold weather affect it at all?

get an Elecrtican to test all the sockets in your house, since you will to pay what ever to get the thing fixed, $80 to get an Elecrtican out shoudnt be to much, when he finds the problem tell the realestate agent with a report from the Elecrtican and get them to fix the bad wiring

might wanna buy an old snes or something and connect it at the same time and see if it's just your xbox that's being gay or it's the actual powerpoint that's homofying things

Unless you're buying light bulbs from crazy clarks then the bulbs are probably due to old wiring.

they're $150, buy another one and swap everything out.

I figured it may be the wiring in the house, but like I said, I've never had an issue at all with ANY of my other electrical things. My 360 is working tip-top though.

Greyden, where did you get your new PSU from? Who installed it? How much was it? Might be something to look into.

Thanks heaps so far guys

Rent another system from a video store for a night and try it in all the sockets?

Sensitive electronic equipment can be effected by fluctuations in the power. Your computer might not be affected because your power supply likely has dampener capacitors. I have no idea if the Xbox has inbuilt dampeners, but they can take up room so it might not.
Look into purchasing UPS (Am I right? I can't remember their correct names), it should iron out the "dirty" electricity. But seek Pro advice first, cause I'm only a beginner, to electronics.

The problem with renting a new system out is like I said earlier: the Xbox could remain running for weeks and not have an issue, and then all of a sudden kick up a stink. It's just f***ed up really. I think the wiring + s***ty PSU sounds like the most likely bet. The UPS thing would likely be more expensive than getting a new PSU installed wouldn't it? I dunno I've never had to shop for anything like that before, heh.

Lik sang sell PSUs, just make sure you get a 240v capable one. They're easy as s*** to swap out as long as you have torx.

rent out an xbox and swap the psu's over see if that fixes anything

lol phar!!!! best f***ing story ever hahaha . even if i can't help you, i got a f***in laugh out of reading it!!. lol

no idea about the problem, but i alwyas get complete BULLs*** random f***ed up the ass problems with my PC like that ,give it a boot and sometimes it fixes it

i really have nothing to add to this thread. pz

I think what s***s me most about the xbox box is when it has trouble reading original xbox games that have slight scratches over em. Maybe it's just the s***ty thompson drive....

Besides that i lub my unmoded $140 xbox with 10 games.

did it ever stop working while plugged into another powerpoint?

It sounds like your powerpoint is screwed... or what greyden said.

blade electronic gave me a new powersupply, i also got them to mod my xbox at the same time and put in a bigger hdd and all that so i dont know how much the new powersupply costs.

Hey I am an electrician

You are blowing your light bulbs too often becase you have a high voltage problem. You are probably close to the street transformer therefor you have more voltage than most people. That means that your light bulbs glow brighter and hoter so they burn out quicker. You should buy the plugin fluro ones I know there expensive but you dont leve them there when you move out. Energex supplys power at 240v +-5% so could be 252v and energex wont do anything about it because the bloke furtherst from the transformer might only be getting 228v.

Your xbox could be overheating like they sad at the shop, they tested it using there power not yours. It could also be faulty solder joints internaly or a number of things.

you could buy a mains power filter and try that
http://www.dse.com.au/cgi-bin/dse.storefront/4477eae60965e500273fc0a87f9c0715/Product/View/M7654

Ok, an update.

Last night, I turned on the xbox, only to have the power cable start sparking just above the plug that goes into the wall. It ended up burning a hole in the cable.

I'm assuming theres something desperately wrong with the power supply now, given the answers in this thread, but my issue is this:

I have heard Blade are dodgy as hell. Upgrade-X is where I normally go for this stuff, however after speaking to them on the phone today I have learnt that they have recently been bought out, and after speaking to the new owner, I don't really feel confident going through them again (he didn't seem at all interested in talking to me, didn't seem to have the faintest clue what he was talking about, and mentioned that his mum does all their administration?!).

My question is: Is there anyone else I can see to have a look at it for me apart from these two shops? I don't wanna get ripped off, heh.

your xbox's power supply is rooted. This is how you fix it: http://www.llamma.com/xbox/Repairs/xbox%20power%20supply%20repair%20tutorial.htm

Else you can buy new xbox power supplies through ebay or lik-sang.

last edited by orbitor at 22:38:32 14/Jun/06

Orbitor to the rescue!

Damn, I was hoping to see him run an extension cord into his neighbour's garage :P