Tales of My delve into the world of Micro$oft repair work.

I had put out requests during the day yesterday for the parts I needed to repair my X-Box, and rectify the inherited design flaw of the system.

So I had a half dozen M4 bolts (always get more than you need in case things go wrong). Ideally they should have been about 10mm long thread, mine were about an inch and a half, but no problems that’s what hacksaws were invented for.  A dozen Metal Washers, and a dozen Nylon Washers.

I had the correct tools, Thanks to the DemonP who actually owned some torx drivers, a very handy thing to own, and something I am going to get this weekend.

Step 1) Dismantle xbox to as many bits as you can… Done

Step 2) Remove the badly designed Xclamp from the back of the motherboard, and remove heat-sink… Done

Step 3) Using the m4 bolts, with washers (Remembering to use the NONE CONDUCTIVE ones next to the motherboard)

Step 4) Semi reassemble xbox, mainly to the point its safe to be plugged into the electricity supply, and making sure the DVD player is plugged in to prevent xbox live bans. Plug into power, and switch on. Leave it running for 10-15 minutes without the fan on the GPU to get it nice and hot, so the solder melts back on connection.

Step 5) Switch off and let cool down, The heat-sink will be “oww oww it burns.. .arrrggghh my fingers melted..” Hot.

Step 6) Look at the vast amount of xbox parts scattered about, scratch your head a bit, make a promise to pay more attention to the how you dismantle the next thing you take apart, and rebuild.

Step 7) Power up and Play……

Doing it Yourself

Cost: £0.00  (ok, if you don’t have the bolts that may cost you £1 maybe £2)

Time: Hour or Two tops.

Sending it off for Micro$oft to repair.

Cost: Minimum £60

Time: 3 weeks turnaround

I know which I prefer…

The Culprit