Our XBox is a Death Trap and We Need Help

[perfectly toasted]

so, as the title suggest, i'm now afraid to use our xbox.

on christmas, my sister and i got our dad's xbox as a gift. he never used it because he doesn't
like gaming which is weird because he was the one who bought it off of my brother a long time
ago. i'm not really sure how old it is precisely, but i can assure you my father has had it in his
possession for at least two years before giving it to us.

anyway, we got a few games for it, got it set up and played. it worked just fine, nothing about it
seemed slow or off. it was like it was brand new and we thoroughly enjoyed it.

and then about two weeks ago, my mother decided she wanted to teach it how to fly. she and
my sister got into this huge argument that i had nothing to do with and she was somehow
provoked to grab the xbox while it was on with a game running in it and chuck it on the couch.
the power cord was ripped out along with the video cord. from what it looked like, the console
survived it's trip because the couch was soft and there was no outside damage to it. however,
my Assassin's Creed Brotherhood game inside it suffered a huge a** ring of scratches on the
disc. we tried playing it again and it ended up just glitching and freezing.

my mother still owes me a new copy, or at least the money to get the game fixed.
and maybe ac: revelations as compensation but that is still under negotiation

alright, so that was a while ago. we assumed the game was just scratched because the power
cord was suddenly ripped out and/or the xbox was thrown and hit something when it wasn't
supposed to do that. after that we continued playing games on it and they worked just fine. and
then last night i decided to play the xbox with it standing up, which we've never done. but i had
moved it to my room and assumed nothing was going to happen if it was like that on the floor. i
was happy playing left 4 dead like i usually am and then my brother decided he wanted to play
the game too. while he was playing however, his foot hit the xbox and knocked it over on the
side. i of course freaked out, but nothing changed during gameplay. the game continued running
like nothing had happened. he ended up winning, it was awesome and then we called it a night.
this morning i tried playing left 4 dead and the xbox wouldn't load the game. it recognized the
disc, but then would simply go to a black screen when i clicked the play button. i opened the
cd holder to discover the disc had the same damn ring of scratches around it just like the first
one. so my question is this :

1. is the xbox possibly broken from it's previous encounter with my mother ?

or

2. is it normal for it to be so fragile that the slightest movement from it will destroy the disc
inside ? please keep in mind that the second time it fell, it was already on the ground and it
actually just landed on a few game cases so it didn't even make it's full 90 degree trip to death.

and of course, is there anything we can do to prevent this from happening ?

IF YOU WERE TOO LAZY TO READ THAT, HERE'S THE SUMMARY :

we have an xbox
my mother tossed the xbox on the couch
it ruined the game inside it because it was on while it happened
xbox still worked fine
my brother accidentally knocked it over a few weeks later
another disc has been murdered

i guess my ultimate question is, why did it scratch up my games ? and you know, maybe some
suggestion on how to repair them would be lovely as well. they don't seem too deep.

please be nice, no spamming, no name calling. i'm definitely not a gaming nerd so i can't pull
out answers for myself in thin air. i just want to go back to what made me happiest, whether it's
fixing the console or reviving the discs. thank you. ; w;

[iDatenshi]

I am not entirely sure why, but I do know that [in my experience] pretty much any xbox will ruin games if you move the xbox around even semi-roughly with the game inside.

As for fixing it, some game/cd stores offer the service to try and get rid of scratches or whatever for much cheaper then buying a new game, it's only a few dollars, so that would be what I would suggest.

[Mandurrr]

The disk tray in the xbox is not made to withstand movements while the console is on.
Feel free to move it all you want while the console is off. But if you have it turned on and move it, it will ruin any disk that is in there permanently. You will probably have to buy new copies of those games.

I would suggest not leaving your console on the floor and probably not standing it up on its side, as that leaves it vunerable to clumsy brothers.

[Raven Xavier Kitari]

Just throw away those games. Xbox 360 isn't like PS3 where you can move it or let it fall over while its on and expect the disc to be ok. Just keep it away from the clumsy, abusive type... this isn't a cartridge/gamecube system where its built like a rock

[Juxtaposed In America]

you're literally not supposed to move any console while there is a game in it.

[Im Rinny]

ℜinny says: Why the ******** would your mom do such a ******** stupid thing? She should never touch any form of technology again.

[Vecna the Maimed]

o.O

why did she toss it?

makes no sense at all.

[Submissive Virgin]

The ring of scratches is quiet common in Xbox's, you are never EVER supposed to move them around WHILE a game is inside it. The xbox will EAT THAT s**t UP. I've never moved mine around with a game inside it.

Its not anyones fault, and your xbox is fine. Its just when you have a disk spinning while the xbox is being tossed/kicked over, the xbox will chew your disk apart, cause the ring of scratches.

I've only ever heard of this thing happening when the xbox is on, and nothing should happen when the xbox is off with a disk inside it. (although, I could be wrong)

[rizuhbull]

Jesus Christ. Lay the Xbox down horizontally and tell your mom to not touch your s**t or you'll beat her like dad does.

"HUrr shaking my Xbawks ruims da games wen spin. how c**!?"

[phillipo]

Quote:

...the slightest movement...

Haha, I wouldn't call the XBox being thrown and knocked over a "slight movement."

I once tripped over a Guitar Hero guitar, which unplugged promptly, but the 360 jerked about a quarter of an inch forward, and the disc got scratched so bad that even the inner clear-plastic ring looked like a dog had chewed on it. If that would do it, throwing it or letting it fall will too. It doesn't have to be a hard landing, the laws of motion permit things inside the XBox to continue moving even when the console makes its landing.

The discs are inside the XBox spinning at a very high rate of speed (assuming the game isn't saved onto your hard drive), and moving the console while it's powered on could cause the disc to wobble off course, and begin to get scratched to all hell.


Your XBox is fine, unless the disc inside managed to hurt something. To prevent such an incident in the future, you could save the game you're playing to your XBox's Hard Drive and delete it when you're done with it. This will take quite a bit of Hard Drive space, but it will let the XBox to run the game without spinning the disc.

As for your games, I've heard ways to repair scratches by rubbing the games with white toothpaste (Google a tutorial) or plastic polish (again, Google if you want to try this.) It depends on how deep the scratches go, however. So not all games will be fixable.

[SaviorSeven]

Magical disk faeries came along and scratched the disk.

Why do you think it happened? The disk was rotating, the console moved, the disk spun, and it hit the inside of the disk drive.

To fix it, find a video or video game store with a disk repairer. They'll sand-paper the protective layer and re-apply plastic.

I also suggest you stop moving your console when it's on. You could permanently ruin your hard drive.

[mr warp v2]

There's a reason why there's a warning to NOT move the xbox while a disk is running. The CD reader will end up scratching the disk horribly as it adjusts to the movement.

Nothing wrong with it, just user error.