Xbox360 repair time line, part 5 final

12/23/2007 Merry Christmas, the xbox has returned.  With an adventure.

So 9am today the family woke up.  I headed downstairs to get breakfast for our toddler while my wife and newborn rested a bit more.  I walk out the front door to get the paper at 9:30am and find a note from FedEx taped to the door. 

"Sorry we missed you".

Neither FedEx or UPS ever ring the doorbell at my house.  I don't think I've ever heard them knock.  I've been home and had them dump and run back to their truck. Being the day before Christmas and really wanting my Xbox back I called the 800 number of the slip.  I told the first human I talked to that I had a complaint and a request.  First the complaint that they never knock and the request to either get the driver to come back or to pick the package up.

I kept my cool and was firm but cordial with the rep, and the ground manager I talked to.  They called the driver and arranged for my to meet him at a local business he was going to do a delivery at.  I packed up myself and my daughter (because she wanted a ride in "daddy's blue car!") and received my white box in the parking lot of Bob Evans.  I felt a little ... sketchy but you know what I need to get my game on! :)

To the driver's credit, he looked a bit harried and was a real nice guy about it.  He did claim to have rang the door bell but I really didn't believe him.  Still I'll give him the benefit of the doubt for being willing to meet me to deliver the package.  I did really appreciate the extra effort.

So just under a month after my Xbox360 first showed signs a refurb is on my desk, powered on and functioning well.

I did some basic checking on the new unit and found that it does, as expected have the additional head sink for the GPU. It also has a BenQ DVD drive. I can't really attest to it being quieter yet, but it seems at least no louder than the original drive. It's kind of hard to make a comparison almost a month removed from hearing my original launch unit.

As part of setting up my new unit I opted to go back to the original rig. So instead of the hobo HDTV setup on the stereo stand I've got the box back where the first unit spent 80% of it's life. The computer desk.


Originally I was sharing the monitor between the Xbox360 and a desktop. I've since moved to a laptop only existance. Now I just need to get a docking station for home so I can go back to sharing the monitor again. At least I can't say the box is starved for air in this location. I hope that I don't have to repeat this process until the Xbox360 Arcade hits $150 or so to buy new.