It almost sounds like a disc drive issue to me. A friend of mine had issues with MW2 on his non hdmi console, oddly enough it was the only game having these issues, even when they were 100% installed to the hard drive. I took the 360 apart, lightly cleaned the laser and he didn't have the issue anymore. Seems odd that it would happen this way but it did seem to resolve the issue.
How did you clean the laser? I know how to open the xbox and dvd drive btw. Just a few minutes ago i got the message disk unreadable after playing for more than 10 minutes.
A very small amount of Windex a q-tip and then lightly rub the dry side to dry it off, make sure it's dry or else it could just make it worse and very lightly rub the laser as they seem to be pretty fragile.
There is some type of wax type thing that you can use that would probably work better, I think I seen a video on youtube of what they were using, unfortunately I can't quite remember what it was.
You should never use ANY waxy substance on a laser. Windex is suitable if you don't have any 99% (or higher) pure isopropyl rubbing alcohol on hand. Rubbing alcohol is definitely preferred though. Try installing some of those games (1 at a time if need be) to the hard drive on the 360. If when you play the games, you get the same dirty disk error, it's definitely not the laser or dvd drive. It's more likely to be cold solder joints on the GPU, CPU or Ram in that case. But based upon your description, I would agree with Dark Scyth that it is just a dirty, or weak laser. First try the cleaning, if that doesn't help you can try tweaking the laser which is about 50/50 on making it work better, or killing it depending partly on your skills with small electronics. You could also try replacing the laser entirely for $20 or less, or the entire drive for $30-40ish if you can't replace the laser.
It wasn't a wax per-say it was a polisher type substance, couldn't really be more in detail because I don't remember what it was but I can also say Rubbing Alcohol is more then preferred as it does dry way faster.
Any kind of polish will leave a residue on the laser lens, which will distort incoming light and possibly change the focal point. The only reason you would ever want a polish or rebuilding substance (like for car window cracks) on your laser, is if it was scratched. At that point though, it's probably easier to just replace the laser.
I'm having another issue,the xbox 360 will freeze while playing gears of war 3 beta and will freeze sometimes on rdr.I have the 12v fan mod applied also.Does anyone know if this will fix it. 3 RedLights XBOX 360 X CLAMP Repair Kit RROD Fix XCLAMP | eBay
I got a old 360 that had the same symptoms , i used a similar x clamp kit and got a new dvd drive , ive not had a problem with it since Just take care when your taking your heat sinks off and dont use too much thermal paste. And i had gears freeze on my main console once not sure why Also are you playing Red dead on disc or HD
When playing the Gears beta, take out the disc before you boot it up and then see if you still have freezing issues If that doesn't work then if you have an extra flash drive or hard drive copy it to one of those devices and try it from there.
This fixed my freezing issue but i think i need a different thermal paste.It looks cheap but works. 3 RedLights XBOX 360 X CLAMP Repair Kit RROD Fix XCLAMP | eBay
I do RRoD Repairs all the time I go to Home Depot for the metal washers and screws comes to for me about 5 bucks (but I buy enough to do 3 or 4 at a time) and Frys for the nylon washers I do Total 32 metal washers all 1mm thick and 16 nylon washers all 1mm thick and (about another 5 bucks lol) but the best way I have found to do it is Drill the Metal Case were the screws are and run the new ones through the Holes with 3 metal washers and 1 nylon each screw Total 24 metal and 8 nylon on the bottom side of the board and the CPU/GPU (heatsink side) use 1 nylon with a metal on top in between the heatsink and board, I've found doing it this way last the longest because it won't allow the board as much flex. And with some other peoples repairs I've noticed they do the screws in between the metal case and the board and the systems die fast from over flex
This seems to work good.I have a fan over the heatsink that bridges to the gpu heatsink.Its wired up to a battery charger.I also cut the back grid.(see images)