360 Power Supply Blamed in Strange Fire

[Rs0n1sT]

Just to show I don't have knee-jerk Microsoft hate every time an Xbox crashes, here is an utterly retarded story that involves a bricked 360, fire, and Arkansas. Dangerous combination, in all.

We start with Carl Olson of Little Rock. I would call him a gamer but I'm not sure what game he was playing, as he tells us that his 360 had already gone into Rings O' Death mode. Maybe he was enjoying 30 seconds of startup screens, I don't know.

Anyway, instead of sending his bricked 360 in to be replaced, he left it plugged in, apparently. I thought the super-scorchy power supply issues were limited to the original Xbox only. But this guy's 360 power unit melted down and barbecued his house.

Now, I don't think anyone's home burning (to the tune of $10K in damage, insert joke about Arkansas property values here) is anything to treat flip. But the fire department called this guy out for not giving his console and the power supply enough space to dissipate heat. Add to that the fact that it was, by his own admission, smoked by RRoD and — still turned on? Can a power supply connected to a machine turned off still produce that much heat? I have no idea what to make of this.

Oh, and the Arkansas TV station reporting on this helpfully links to the original Xbox power supply recall of 2003. And we know he's playing a 360, not the original by the photos of his charred 360 titles. (Looks like MLB 2K6. So that's another $1.40 on top of the damages.)

Tons of sites are reporting this, Joystiq included, but my audit trail is below:

Gamers Beware: Xbox Could Be a Fire Hazard

[New ERA]

good to know, ill take mine off the floor and put it some where else

[Dj Narcotics]

i have mine on some tv stand with alot of space nd room for it to breathe

[CRSone]

I Smell Another Power Cord Recall coming Soon...

[lburna79]

Y Does This Not Surprise Me..XBox 360 = Junk

[BonGMaN]

first it stops playing your games then it sets fire to your home

ph33r the 360