Game Console Failure Rates:
Wii 9 times more reliable than Xbox 360, 4 times more than PS3

Synopsis: SquareTrade analyzed failure rates for over 16,000 new game consoles covered by
SquareTrade Care Plans and found that the Wii experienced one-fourth of the common failures that theother systems have.

Highlights of the study include:- Looking at the first 2 years of ownership, 2.7% of Wii owners reported a system failure to
SquareTrade, compared with 10.0% of PlayStation 3 owners, and 23.7% for Xbox 360 owners.
-Excluding “Red Ring of Death” failures, which are covered by Microsoft’s 3-year warranty, 11.7%
of Xbox 360 owners reported a failure.

-While the RROD problem continued to be the major issue for Xbox 360s purchased through2008, early indications point to the problem abating in 2009.

-The most common types of problems seen with the PS3 and Xbox 360 were disc read errors andoutput issues. The Wii had more power and remote control issues than the other 2 systems.

Citations and quotations of this paper’s contents require proper attribution to the source at
http://www.squaretrade.com/pages/xbox360-ps3-wii-reliability-08-2009/. Commercial use of this paper’s
contents are prohibited without prior written consent from SquareTrade, Inc.

For media inquiries, write or call Shelley Risk at srisk@horngroup.com or 415-905-4037.

Prepared by:
Austin Sands & Vince Tseng
SquareTrade, Inc.
www.squaretrade.com
Aug. 28, 2009

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1Introduction: Comparing the Wii, Xbox 360 and PS3
SquareTrade first examined and reported on failure rate data for the Microsoft Xbox 360 back in February
2008. Since then, SquareTrade has collected significant additional data on both Xbox 360s as well as theother two popular 7th generation game consoles, the Nintendo Wii and Sony PlayStation 3.
In this study, we explore their failure rates relative to one another and the common problems associatedwith each of these systems.
This analysis examines customer reported failure data on over 16,000 game consoles purchased by
SquareTrade customers over the past two years (see Appendix for details on sample). We only include
malfunctions from normal usage (“malfunctions”), and exclude any claims for damage caused byaccidents (such as dropping the unit).
Looking at the first 2 years of use, we found that Wii consoles had a reported failure rate of 2.7%,
significantly lower than both the Xbox 360 and PS3 consoles. When including the infamous “Red Ring ofDeath” (RROD) problem that has plagued Xbox 360 systems, the Xbox 360 had a reported failure rate of
23.7%, nearly 9 times that of the Wii. PS3 consoles ranked in the middle of our study, with a reported
failure rate of 10.0% over the course of 2 years.
Beyond the aggregate Xbox 360 failure rate, we also looked at new Xbox 360 hardware variants todetermine if the RROD issue had been fixed. Finally, we compared common failures seen with allsystems, including disc read errors, display problems, and power issues.
Now let’s delve into the data and take a look at the numbers.

Figure 1. The Red Ring of Death© SquareTrade, Inc. | All Rights Reserved. | www.squaretrade.com

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“Wii are the champions, my friends”
To determine failure rates, we included all malfunctions reported in the first 24 months after the system
was purchased. We further examined Xbox 360 RROD failures separately from all other failures, as
Microsoft has guaranteed to replace or repair any Xbox 360s experiencing the RROD failure for 3 years.
Figure 2. Console failure rates after 2 years of ownership

Malfunction rate, after 2 years
25%

20%
RROD
15%

10%

5%

All OtherFailures

0%Xbox 360

PS3WiiFigure 2 shows the relative failure rates of the 3 game systems. The Wii emerged as the reliability
champion, exhibiting only a 2.7% failure rate over the course of the first 2 years of ownership. The PS3
had a 10% reported failure rate, nearly 4 times the Wii’s, and the Xbox 360 saw a 23.7% failure rate,nearly 9 times the Wii’s. At 2.7%, the Wii’s failure rate is better than most consumer electronics products,
not just game consoles.
With nearly 1 in 4 systems experiencing a reported failure over 24 months, we found the Xbox 360 to behistorically the least reliable of the 3 game systems. Just over half of these failures were a result of thewidely reported RROD issue. However, given Microsoft’s extension of their manufacturer’s warranty as
stated above, we note two consequences for the analysis.
First, it’s worthwhile considering that Xbox 360’s failure rate drops to 11.7% when you exclude RROD,
which then puts it on par with the PS3. If the RROD issue were resolved, we would anticipate futureXbox 360’s to be only slightly less reliable than the PS3.

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3Second, Microsoft’s policy may result in an underreporting of failures by Xbox 360 owners to
SquareTrade, relative to the other two consoles. Because the RROD problem is so widely known to becovered by Microsoft’s warranty, we believe that more customers bypass SquareTrade and reported
failures directly to the Microsoft. In a survey of SquareTrade customers with Xbox 360s conducted byemail, SquareTrade found that over half of our customers who experienced a RROD error reported theirproblem directly to Microsoft without contacting SquareTrade. Email survey respondents tend to be aself-selecting group, so the data should be used directionally rather than definitively, particularly because
we did not survey PS3 and Wii owners with the same question. With that caveat in mind, applying thesurvey data to the analysis shows that the Xbox 360 failure rate could be as high as 35%.
While Microsoft initially claimed in February 2007 i that the “return” rate on Xbox 360s did not exceed 35%, they later published an open apology on July 5th, 2007 and announced a $1.15 billion fund to be set
aside for Xbox 360 repair and replacement. ii The money would fund repairs for up to 2.5 million
consoles, and thus they implicitly anticipated a far higher rate of failure than their stated 3-5%.

Usage is a factor – but the Wii is still more reliable
SquareTrade also examined the factor of usage in our analysis of game consoles. The Xbox 360 andPS3 are widely regarded as the consoles of choice for hardcore gamers, and the Wii skews towards amore casual, family-based demographic. It is therefore worthwhile analyzing the data relative to console
usage, and not just in absolute terms.
According to a report by Nielsen published in April 2009, the average Wii user uses their console roughly
half as frequently as Xbox 360 and PS3 users. iii Nielsen provided three separate pieces of informationabout the amount of time each console is used:
1) Average Session Minutes: The number of minutes the console is used during a session2) Average Usage Days: The number of days out of the month that the console is used
3) Sessions per day: The number of times the console is turned on during days it is used
By multiplying these 3 numbers, we got the number of minutes used per month:Figure 3. Console Usage

System Avg Session Minutes Avg Usage Days / mo Sessions per day Mins used per monthXbox 360
78
7.1
2.151191
PS364
6.8
2.421053
Wii58
5.01.78516
Source: The Nielsen Company – GamePlay Metrics

We converted this minutes per month usage metric to days used in 24 months. When we divide the 24month failure rate by the 24 month usage, we get the failure rate per 24 hours of use:

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Figure 4. Console failure rates after 24 months of ownership – usage adjusted

SystemXbox 360
PS3
WiiDays used in 24 mo 24 mo failure rate Failure rate / 24 hours Without RROD
19.9
23.7%
1.19%
0.59%
17.6
10.0%
0.57%
8.62.7%0.31%

So even after accounting for usage, the Wii still ranked as the least likely to fail, with a 0.31% failure rate
per day of use. Put another way, roughly 1 in every 300 Wiis failed every 24 hours of use.
After adjusting for usage, both the PS3 and Xbox 360 without RROD compared less unfavorably with theWii, “only” failing roughly 80% more frequently. When RROD is factored in, the Xbox 360 still failed almost
4 times as often as the Wii.
Even accounting for the Wii’s lower frequency and intensity of use, our conclusion remains the same: theWii is the most reliable of the three 7th generation consoles, as seen in Figure 5.

Figure 5. Probability of console failing during every day of use

Malfunction Rate per 24 hours or usage
1.4%
1.2%
1.0%
RROD
0.8%
0.6%
0.4%
0.2%

All OtherFailures

0.0%Xbox 360

PS3Wii© SquareTrade, Inc. | All Rights Reserved. | www.squaretrade.com

5Understanding the incidence of Red Ring of DeathWe next turn our attention to look at the RROD issue in a little more detail. As shown in figure 6, RROD
dwarfs all other Xbox 360 problem types.
Figure 6. Probability of a unit failing, by problem type

Probability of problem type in 2 years
14%
12%
10%
8%
6%

Xbox 360

4%

PS32%

Wii0%

But is RROD really that bad a problem anymore? Ever since Microsoft publicly acknowledged the RRODin 2007, online speculation has been rampant about when and how Microsoft would be able to fix theissue. In September 2007, Microsoft began shipping Xbox 360 systems containing the 2nd generation“Falcon” chipset. This chipset utilized a CPU manufactured with a 65nm process instead of the original
90nm process. With the smaller process, the Falcon CPU in theory produced less heat during operationand presumably fewer heat-related RROD failures. However, Falcon’s GPU was still manufactured using
the old 90nm process, and it wasn’t until the 3rd generation “Jasper” chipset that the Xbox 360 contained
both a CPU and GPU manufactured on the 65nm process., Xbox 360 watchers initially expected Jasperfor delivery in August 2008, though reports of Jaspers in consumer hands only started appearing inNovember 2008.
In order to evaluate the effect of these two chipset releases on the frequency of RROD failures, we split
our Xbox 360 warranty data into quarterly buckets based on purchase date. For example, if a warranty
was bought for an Xbox 360 purchased between Oct. 1, 2007 and Dec. 31. 2007, then the item would bein the “Q407” bucket. In Figure 7 we show what percent of units in each bucket failed over the next 12months after the item was purchased.

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Figure 7. Number of reported RRODs (in year 1) divided by total units covered by SquareTrade – by item
purchase quarter.

As a full 12 months has not yet passed for consoles purchased in Q308 and later, we have projected thefailure rates based on incidents reported in the time elapsed.
We believe consumers purchasing Xbox 360s in Q4 2007 bought a mix of Falcons and original models,
due to retailers selling off their old inventory first. From then until Q3 2008, we believe that the majority ofunits arriving in customer hands were Xbox 360 Falcons. Looking at the pre- and post-Falcon data, there
is no discernable drop in RROD frequency. If anything, the data shows a sharp spike in reported failures
for units purchased in Q2 2008.
In Q4 2008, Jasper units started arriving, although we believe units purchased during this period
continued to be a mix of Falcon and Jasper models. Even with this mix, we projected the 1-year failure
rate to drop below 4%. Furthermore, when looking at over 500 units purchased in 2009, fewer than 1% ofcustomers have reported a RROD error as of Aug 2009. It is still too early to definitively assert thatJasper has given RROD a knockout punch, but such an argument may be pronounceable in the comingmonths.

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7Other common problems:Finally, we turned our attention to describe some of the common problems associated with all game
consoles. We bucketed reported malfunctions into the following problem categories:-Disc Read. Unable to recognize discs, or data only being partially read off of the disc.

-Disc Tray. Disc trays unable to open or close, or broken disc motors.

-Display / Output. No A/V output, Garbled/Fuzzy display-Freezes. Game/DVD plays normally at first, then crashes during play.

-Power. Unable to power on or off, unable to stay on.

-Control Device. Problems with the device’s game controllers. Accessories such as guitars ordrums are included with “Other”-E74. A recently publicized Xbox 360 specific issue, first reported to SquareTrade in March 2008.
Microsoft subsequently acknowledged this problem in April 2009 and noted that this error wouldiv
be covered by their 3-year warranty extension designed to cover RROD.

-Other. Other miscellaneous issues, including overheating, hard drive, and accessory failures.

Figure 8. Probability of a unit failing, by problem type, excluding RROD

Probability of problem type in 2 years excluding RROD
5.0%
4.5%
4.0%
3.5%
3.0%
2.5%
Xbox 360

2.0%

PS3

1.5%

Wii

1.0%
0.5%
0.0%

© SquareTrade, Inc. | All Rights Reserved. | www.squaretrade.com

8Not surprisingly, the Wii performed better than the Xbox 360 along nearly every dimension. It has fewer
disc read errors, hardly any problems with audio and video output, and very few problems with freeze ups
during game play. The Wii also experienced fewer errors with its hard drive, overheating, or othermiscellaneous issues. The only areas where the Wii had problem rates comparable to the other twosystems were with power and game controller issues. As the most advanced control device, theWiimote’s slightly higher failure rate is not surprising.
In Figure 9, we highlight the relative frequency of each failure type.
Figure 9. Probability of problem type per malfunction

Number of Malfunctions

Problem type distribution, per 100 malfunctions‐ excluding the RROD
50454035302520151050

Xbox 360
PS3WiiExcluding RROD malfunctions the most frequent problem type for Xbox 360s are disc read errors. Thiswas also the case for the PS3, with disc read issues accounting for nearly half of all PS3 failures. For theWii, power issues were the most commonly reported malfunction.
Figure 10. The E74 Error© SquareTrade, Inc. | All Rights Reserved. | www.squaretrade.com

9Conclusions:Of the three major 7th generation game consoles, we can safely say that the Wii is the most reliable
system on the market, with just one-fourth the malfunctions of the PS3 and Xbox 360. Even when
adjusted for the lower rate of usage, the Wii leads the pack by a comfortable margin.
Our study also found the Xbox 360 to have the highest rate of failure by far, largely due to the Red Ringof Death. While our data indicates that RROD continued to persist as a major problem through 2008, it
showed signs of finally abating with the introduction of the latest “Jasper” chipset in late 2008.
SquareTrade will continue to monitor the progress and publish an update on the incidence of RROD in2010.

© 2009 SquareTrade, Inc. All rights reserved. SquareTrade and the SquareTrade logo are registeredtrademarks of SquareTrade, Inc. All other trademarks and service marks are the property of theirrespective owners.

© SquareTrade, Inc. | All Rights Reserved. | www.squaretrade.com

10Appendix: Notes about the Data and Methodology Used
SquareTrade randomly selected over 16,000 units for analysis. We included only items that werepurchased brand new (i.e. not refurbished or used).
The following disclaimers apply to our data and analysis:-Only malfunctions reported directly to SquareTrade are included in the data. Other malfunctions,
including software issues handled directly by the retailer, problems associated with productrecalls, and those fixed by software/firmware updates, may not be represented in this data.

-We did not take into consideration purchase location

Limitations:This document and all of its contents are provided as-is. SquareTrade has made efforts to ensure thatthe data and conclusions we present are correct, but makes no warranty, express or implied, about theaccuracy of this data. If any material errors or inaccuracies should occur in this document, SquareTradewill, if feasible, furnish appropriate correctional notices which Users will accept as the sole and exclusive
remedy at law or in equity. Users of the information in this document acknowledge that SquareTradecannot be held liable for any loss, injury or damage of any kind, present or prospective, including without
limitation any direct, special, incidental or consequential damages (including without limitation lost profits
and loss of damage to goodwill) whether suffered by recipient or third party or from any action or inaction
whether or not negligent, in the compiling or publishing this analysis or in delivering or communicating orpublishing this document.

Referencesi“Microsoft responds to Watchdog” Gamesindustry.biz. February 14, 2007.
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/microsoft-responds-to-watchdog

ii“Microsoft to Incur Xbox Cost of Up to $1.15 Billion (Update 3)” Bloomberg. July 5, 2007.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aOrvYZ2gPwZk&refer=homeiii“The State of the Video Gamer” Nielsen. April 6, 2009.
http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/stateofvgamer_040609_fnl1.pdf

iv“Microsoft extends warranty to cover E74” Gamezine UK. April 14, 2009http://www.gamezine.co.uk/news/microsoft-extends-warranty-cover-e74-$1287835.htm© SquareTrade, Inc. | All Rights Reserved. | www.squaretrade.com

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