The Xbox 360 may have the best game library so far in this generation of consoles, but its record of hardware stability is somewhat less impressive.  Since its launch, Microsoft’s console has been plagued by catastrophic hardware failures, signified by the harbinger of death known to gamers as the “Red Ring of Death”.  This week, Jake Metcalf over at 8bitjoystick.com had the opportunity to chat with a former MS employee who claims to have worked extensively on the 360, and he offers some answers about the RRoD.  I have to preface this by saying that since he did not give his name, I can’t take his word 100%, but he definitely seems to have an intimate knowledge of some of the inner workings of Microsoft R&D, so it’s worth a read.  Just be sure to have a grain of salt handy.

For those who don't have the attention span for the whole artcle, basically, the John Doe cites a strong push from MS to beat the PS3 to market, resulting in faulty application of heat sinks, poor soldering work and generally shoddy construction throughout.  Sadly, he doesn’t offer any info on stopping these failures from occurring.  There does seem to be a faint scent of sour grapes to the interview, but his explanations make enough sense for me to trust him at least until someone discredits him.

To be perfectly honest, none of this really matters to me.  I’ve had my Xbox 360 since February and I’ve never had a problem, so I’m one of the 8-or-so people that this hasn’t affected.  I do know lots of folks who have experienced 360 brickage, though, so I thought I’d pass it along.

The issue at hand