I've recently been having some problems with my Xbox 360, i've got it now for 2 years with out any major problems (KNOCK ON WOOD!!), i havent modded it in anyway, all i do is use it to play Games (Obviously), watch movies (My external Terrabyte is plugged in there hope that couldnt be the cause of my issues!?), and go on Xbox live.... so anyway, heres my problem, im in S.A, so that could be a serious delay if say i have to ship it to microsoft to repair.... this is the problems i've been getting, at times when i switch it on, it takes up 5 min to boot up, but it eventually does boot up, also, the other night, i pressed eject, the tray came out, i put a game in, and pressed for it to close, it wouldnt move, i tried a couple of times, nothing i then forced it to close, and it only went halfway, so i switched it off, then only did it close, and when i restarted it took even longer. then last nite there was a game in the tray, but on the dashboard it said open tray, i did so, it opened, and i closed it again, then it said the same thing, retried, then only did it work. I forgot to mention that my house was recently tiled and that causes alot of dust, my xbox and everything was not covered and when i got home it was covered in dust, i managed to wipe it off, but i feel that there could still be some effecting it?? Any ideas or help will be much appreciated!! THANKS IN ADVANCE!
I'm almost certain its the DVD drive that is going, I had exactly the same problem. I had to keep ejecting the drive, closing it, then ejecting it again until it would eventually read the disc. If the games was installed once it read the disc i could play fine, however if the game was not installed it would just disc read error after a couple of minutes playing... even though all my discs are spotless. Sadly that does mean sending it off to Microsoft, im not sure where you will have to send yours... mine was shipped off to somewhere in Germany, I think it took me 2 weeks to get it back. If you file a repair request on xbox.com that will tell you everything you need to know.
Well if the laser is wearing out you can try one of those laser cleaner discs and hope for a bit more longevity. Try to keep the discs you use scratch and grease free too and that could also help. Of course, this is all delaying the inevitable.
Not really. My friend had this same problem (without they tray being stuck). The laser was just cloudly, so he took his 360 apart cleaned the laser with Q-tip and a small amount of Windex on the Q-tip, he hasn't had a problem with it since and its been about 8+ months. If your 360 is still under warranty then its always best to use that as if you open your 360 to fix it and can't MS won't take it no matter what. If your 360 isn't under warranty then you could try to clean the laser as MS usually charges over 100 for simple problems like these. I would also suggest cleaning out all of the dust in the system. Though i'm not really sure if the problem is just from dust if the console takes minutes to boot. If that doesn't work then maybe its an excuse to get a slim sometime.
they make dvd cleaning discs that do clean the inside of the drive . ive used them and they work great, but thats only really going to help disc readability problems. this wont do anything about the eject button not closing the tray, unless theres dust in between the contacts. use a can of compressed air to blow out everywhere you can. you may have damaged the mechanism that reads if the tray is open/closed when you forced the drive back in, but thats just speculation.
I've never had luck with DVD disc cleaners. Also I don't really think that'll help because its probably clouded and not just dusty, although if it is just dusty it may work. If you ever have any type of smoke near the 360 while the disc drive is running that usually seems to happen, although if there isn't any smoke near the 360 then its probably just dust that can be cleaned with a disc.
Ok i've tried the using a hair dryer, trying to blow the dust off last nite, but it seems to be ok now coz i had this problem last on Wednesday, and since then its being running quite smoothly, will just be monitoring it over this weekend just to see if its staying that way!!!... AND THANKS FOR EVERYBODY's HELP!!