Reasons Why I hate Microsoft

There are many, but the one that is currently bugging me the most is their Xbox customer support (or lack thereof).

The story goes like this, Delta and I enjoy the SSX snowboarding series of games. We already have tricky & 3. We were in the Warehouse and spotted SSX on tour, so we bought it. Got it home and put it in the Xbox, doesn't work. "Your Xbox cannot recognise this disc....." If you've got an Xbox I'm sure you've seen this screen at least once. Now I know my Xbox is old and can be fussy sometimes so I play around for a bit to try and make it work, doesn't go. So I take the game back to the Warehouse, hoping to get an exchange or a refund. The girl on the counter takes a look at the disc, says it doesn't look damaged and rings somebody, who tells her that I need to ring Xbox and explain the problem to them. After she writes down the number for me I come home and ring them, and this is where it gets interesting.

Bearing in mind that I've already been a good customer and registered my Xbox as instructed to do (actually, I wasn't going to register it but I had a faulty DVD remote and I HAD to register it before I could return it and get an exchange) it appears that there is no record of my Xbox on the system (not that he said that but he asked all the questions anyway) and so we have to go through the whole, name address, phone number etc.

"Dunedin, what region is that? It's near Auckland right?"
At this point I want to throw the phone (& the Xbox) out the window.
"No, opposite end of the country." I can tell that this is going to go REALLY well.
I tell him that Dunedin is one of the 5 major cities in New Zealand.
"Yes that's the city but what is the region, Auckland, Bay of Plenty, Canterbury?"
I should've said Canterbury it's close enough after all.
"Otago." He asked me the spelling "O-T-A-G-O"
"W-A-I-K-A-T-O" He replies
"Waikato?? No Otago, O-T-A-G-O"

After putting me on hold a couple of times he gives up and then just when I thought we might get somewhere, his computer crashed!! I resisted the urge to say it must be running Windows XP, undoubtably it would've been running some iteration of Windows, this is after all a Microsoft helpdesk.

When his computer comes back online he asks for the serial number of the Xbox, yet again! Fortunately the data had been saved and is all there.

After several diagnostic tests (clean the DVD, put it in, take it out etc, stuff I'd done already several times) he informs me that the problem is with the Xbox console.

"You'll have to send your Xbox to Xbox customer care in Auckland to be serviced."
"How much will that cost me?"
"Well, unfortunately your Xbox is out of warranty so it'll be $195"
"$195??" I felt like smacking somebody by this point. "You realise I can get a brand new one for $250??"
"The pricing is out of our hands, it is set by Microsoft themselves"
"Well, there not getting any more money out of me, especially not that much. I could probably fix it myself for less than the"
"You probably could"
"Right well I've got a diploma in electronics so I'll have a look on the net to see if I can find some instructions on how to repair it and have a go myself"


Who are they trying to kid??? $195 to fix an Xbox that is, um.... I think nearly 5 years old. I got it the night (yes night, I had to go into Central Park in the middle of the night and pick it up) they were released in NZ.

I'm still fuming about it. I now have a brand new game that I can't play & I can't get my money back for!!!!!!


And to top it all off, the new Xbox 360's (still to be released in NZ as far as I know) use power PC chips instead of Intel ones, (ie it's a Mac in a box, instead of a PC) so they have to use emulation in order to run games from the original Xbox. For this functionality you have to buy the 360 with the Hard Drive (which is around $200 more) and then you have to download the emulation software, and only a certain list of games will work with the emulator. I had a look on the list and 1 game that I have will work with the emulator. 1!! I can't believe that either!! So now I have an old Xbox that won't play my games (it's getting worse, some of my other games have started giving grief as well) and if I were to shell out for a 360 (if they ever come out) that won't play my games either!!!!!