The fifth installment of the Microsoft documentary Power On: The Story of Xbox, which illustrates the good and the bad of the console’s history, is titled The Red Ring of Death. Now, the company has begun selling posters of the infamous Red Ring of Death for $24.99. It’s not every day a company pokes fun at its mistakes, let alone creates a way for people to hang them up on a wall for all to see.
The Xbox 360 red ring of death indicated a failure of the console which affected a great number of the devices. As seen in the photo above, the red ring of death consisted of three out of four LEDs on the Xbox 360 turning red. This red ring signified a hardware failure for the console and meant players had to send their Xbox 360 into Microsoft for repairs.
In the fifth episode of Power On, Xbox’s former chief Peter Moor revealed that the mistake cost Microsoft more than $1 billion in repairs. He said, “By the time we looked at the cost of repairs, the loss sales that we factored in, we had a $1.15 billion problem.” The new poster’s sales are unlikely to make up much of the loss but it’s nice to see a company able to laugh at themselves for mistakes of the past. Microsoft probably never thought they would be selling posters of an issue that cost them over $1 billion.
The recently released Power On is available in its entirety on YouTube. It illustrates the Xbox’s origins, covering a variety of subjects throughout its six episodes. Although it was developed by Microsoft, it doesn’t avoid speaking on the company’s failures and its stiff competition with Sony. It’s well worth a watch and can also be seen on Redbox, IMDbTV, The Roku Channel, Microsoft Movies & TV, and more.
Check out the source below if you want to purchase your very own Red Ring of Death poster.
