Price cuts are on the way for the Xbox 360

Many expected Microsoft to announce Xbox 360 price cuts across the board at this year's E3. After Sony's announcement of a $100 price cut for the PlayStation 3 , Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter predicted that Microsoft would slash the price of the Xbox 360 Elite, Premium and Core systems to $399, $349 and $249 respectively.

For those that labored through Microsoft's E3 keynote, there was no such announcement. So if you were disappointed with Microsoft's E3 keynote and the announcement of a Halo 3-themed Xbox 360 instead of price cuts, this bit of news may make your ears perk up.

According to Microsoft Game Studios VP Shane Kim, a price cut is in store for the Xbox 360 game console. In an interview with Bloomberg, Kim talked of competing with the Nintendo Wii and revealed that "We need to compete effectively for that customer and part of that is getting to the mass market price point for the console. We definitely are working on that area."

Kim declined to give a date for when the price cut would occur, but a holiday 2007 price cut would do wonders for the platform along with the release of Halo 3 and Grand Theft Auto 4. "The timing depends on a lot of different factors and we'll just keep evaluating those," said Microsoft's Robbie Bach.

The price cuts may be financially feasible for Microsoft once the 65nm Falcon chips start rolling off the assembly line . According to Dean Takahashi, the 65nm IBM processor and ATI graphics chip are 50 percent cheaper to produce than their 90nm counterpart and also run cooler.

Original News Link

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Added on July 13, 2007, 1:30 pmOn that same note "Xbox 360 to Get 65nm "Falcon" Makeover This Fall"

360 Falcon Info

This post has been edited by Evirober: Jul 13 2007, 01:30 PM

Another Type of Ring for the 360

Microsoft Sued in Xbox 360 Class Action Lawsuit
Microsoft sued for its Xbox 360 making rings, but not of the red variety

On the heels of reports showing up to one-third of Xbox 360 consoles suffer a hardware failure, and the Microsoft action of extending the warranty to up to three years in cases of the Red Ring of Death, it is not at all surprising to learn that a class action lawsuit has been filed against the Redmond-based console maker.

The lawsuit is not for the dreaded Red Ring of Death, but rather for the console's rare but nasty habit of scratching discs. As Joystiq reports, the lawsuit contends that the plaintiffs in the case "have been damaged in that their game discs were destroyed by the Xbox 360 during reasonable, foreseeable, normal, and intended use... The Xbox 360 was negligently designed and manufactured in that the Console's laser disc reading assembly contacts and scratches the video game discs during normal and intended operation and use."

The issue of the Xbox 360 scratching discs even when the console is unmoved first caught the attention or European consumer watchdogs after a special feature ran on Dutch TV show Kassa. At the time of the complaint, Microsoft said to 1UP, "We are working in an open dialogue with Commissioner Kuneva to clarify our position and all the efforts we are taking across the EU, and in fact globally, to address any consumer concerns. As we have said previously, there is no widespread issue regarding scratched discs as is alleged by Kassa. That said, we encourage any Xbox customer who believes that their discs have been scratched in the same manner as identified by Kassa, to contact us."

Microsoft's statement continued, "We will examine the console and make appropriate repairs if necessary in order to restore the console to full working order, as well as provide customers with information on how to obtain replacement discs should they need them."

Filed in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. by Jorge Brouwer, a Broward County resident who bought an Xbox 360 in 2006, the lawsuit seeks five million dollars in damages for the scratched game discs. Microsoft has yet to respond.


Class Action Lawsuit

More info
New Xbox 360 Cooling Hardware Found in Europe

Will a revised Xbox 360 heatsink and heatpipe fix the dreaded Red Ring of Death?

With the growing number of complaints surrounding the failures of Xbox 360 hardware, both owners and prospective buyers of the games console often wonder if Microsoft is doing anything to improve the reliability of the hardware.

Reports coming in from Europe indicate that Microsoft is adding some additional cooling measures to the Xbox 360. First seen on French website Logic-Sunrise are pictures of a revised heatsink that sits below the DVD-ROM drive.

The new heatsink, complete with a heatpipe to another heatsink, sits on top of the Xbox 360's Xenos GPU. The same hardware cooling changes were also found on MaxConsole in a Microsoft-repaired console in the Czech Republic.

It's still unclear if these revised Xbox 360 units also incorporate epoxy to bond the CPU and GPU onto the console's motherboard. It is suspected that when the console internals heat up, the connection between the BGA part and the motherboard may disconnect when the PCB warps.

Microsoft has attempted to address this problem by surrounding the CPU and GPU with epoxy on the Xbox 360 Elite, though it has yet to be seen on the Premium or Core packages.

Aside from more aggressive heatsinks, the Xbox 360's best way to cool down would be by way of a die shrink. Reports from 2006 originally targeted for the shrink from 90nm to 65nm to arrive by this time, though new information points to the new chip version to arrive later this year.



New Heat Sinks

Thats enough reporting for me for while....now back 2 work XP

Hiah, They only do price cut for U/S Version... When is our turn ... zzzzzzzzzzzzzz