Topic: 3 Flashing Red Lights (Read 39 times)

DarkJedi · « **on:** November 22, 2006, 07:49:00 AM »

Hi all,
I have had my 360 for about two weeks now. I flashed it with Xtreme 4.2a on a MS-25 drive. All of a sudden, I'm getting a 0021 error. I tried to reset the power and AV cable, but no luck. Do I need to flash the drive back to stock firmware?

This 360 is not connected to the internet or XBL, so I haven't gotten any updates, aside from the ones that came with Gears of War and NFS Carbon.

Why would the drive stop working all of a sudden? The unit is not even a month old! Any ideas would help, thanks!

DarkJedi · « **Reply #1 on:** November 22, 2006, 10:00:00 AM »

One thing I should mention is that I've had no troubles with the flashed drive for 2 weeks, this just started randomly one night. I'm going to take the 360 apart and see if the SATA cables are loose. Any other suggestions?

DarkJedi · « **Reply #2 on:** November 22, 2006, 10:40:00 AM »

I checked the Sata/Power cables for the DVD drive... all are OK. I guess I will try to re-flash to original firmware and see if that fixes it.

bigd0991 · « **Reply #3 on:** November 22, 2006, 10:42:00 AM »

get the error code by holding the sync button in and then pressing the eject button 4 times, after each press record the number of lights and then look up the error code here scroll down a bit to see the error codes

DarkJedi · « **Reply #4 on:** November 22, 2006, 11:15:00 AM »

Bigd, I posted in the first message that I'm getting a 0021 error - 0021 DVD Drive Time out - Can be caused by problems with a firmware flash. This is also speculated to sometime be caused by a problem with the southbridge chipset on the motherboard.

I hooked the 360 back up to my computer, and now I am not able to read from or write to the drive firmware. I was going to try and restore my original firmware.

Does this mean my DVD drive is dead?

The funny thing is, it was working perfectly for about 2 weeks, and then I was playing GoW for about 30 minutes, turned the console off, turned it back on an hour later, and the 3 red lights came on.

Any ideas??

slimgrip · « **Reply #5 on:** November 22, 2006, 11:19:00 AM »

3 red lights is hardware failure.
Normally caused by the use of lead free solder in the manufacture process.
As you have pinpointed that yr drive was fine for a while & isnt live connected if it were my 360 i would have a good look at the solderpoints of the mobo sata connection. maybe touch them up with a hot solder iron.

Only a suggestion & worth a look

DarkJedi · « **Reply #6 on:** November 22, 2006, 11:51:00 AM »

Thanks Slim, I will take a look at the mobo SATA connection. One question though... if it was the mobo connection, why would the drive not be recognized when I connected it to my PC's SATA controller?

The drive has power (tray ejects and closes) so its not a power issue.

bigd0991 · « **Reply #7 on:** November 22, 2006, 01:01:00 PM »

i had the exact same problem happen to mine but i just bought a new 360 and i am getting tho old one fixed for free. bout that error code that was my careless mistake of just not reading the full post.

DarkJedi · « **Reply #8 on:** November 22, 2006, 01:25:00 PM »

Well at this point im pretty much stumped.... I even tried the method of flashing where you turn the xbox off before pressing "1" in MTKflash....

Unless someone can give me a better suggestion, this POS is going back to the store.

DarkJedi · « **Reply #9 on:** November 22, 2006, 03:31:00 PM »

Anybody else have any suggestions? I'd rather fix this than have to take it back to the store.

DarkJedi · « **Reply #10 on:** November 22, 2006, 04:08:00 PM »

Found out a little more info:
After aborting writing the original firmware back to the drive, i get the error message: "Status = 51, should be 70"

Does this mean I should be able to re-flash the drive with the recovery method using a VIA add-in card?

Also, do I need an 0800 disc to unlock the drive, or is that just for the MS28 drives?

Thanks for all the help, I'd feel better if I can fix this thing!

DarkJedi · « **Reply #11 on:** November 22, 2006, 04:41:00 PM »

Sorry I didn't realize 0800 mode was just for ripping games. So at this point, is using the VIA card my only option to restore this firmware? I'm not even sure if it is the firmware causing a problem... The drive worked for 2 weeks with the flashed firmware in it. Thanks in advance for any help!

myfranco · « **Reply #12 on:** November 22, 2006, 04:53:00 PM »

You need to burn 0800 disc onto a DL DVD.Disconnect sata cable of 360's drive.Put that disc wait for 15 sec then take it off.Plug the sata of pc and go on flashing.Let's see if this one helps

DarkJedi · « **Reply #13 on:** November 25, 2006, 02:20:00 PM »

Thanks myfranco for the tip!

Once I enabled 0800 mode I was able to re-flash the drive with the original firmware. Unfortunately the box still gives me a 3 red light error, so at this point it seems the only thing I can do is re-solder the motherboard sata connection. I'm not willing to do that, so I'm taking this thing back. It seems to me pretty crappy that MS can't even solder the mobo connections correctly on this thing.

Before I take this thing back, anyone have any other suggestions?

baskient · « **Reply #14 on:** December 04, 2006, 08:55:00 AM »

Well hello,

i am new to this forum but since yesterday i have exactly the same problem as you dark jedi. My error code is 0020 b.t.w. My drive is flash too with fw 4.2. it worked perfectly until yesterday night. I did a microsoft update. everything went fine. the xbox even restarted by it self and booted up in the dashboard. I connected to my media center and it gave an error so i retryed a few times and the xbox just stopped working. i got a blue screen. after that i rebooted and got the 3 red lights. My xbox is modded so i don't have any guaranty(i think). if anyone could solve this problem or knows what error code 0020 means I would be very gratefull. thx in advance.

Boris

Author Topic: 3 Flashing Red Lights (Read 39 times)