Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

[rspencer86]

Hey guys,

I've been wanting a 360 for a long time, and Microsoft's announcement about the extended warranties helped ease my fears about the system a little.

I had planned to purchase a 360 sometime within the next few weeks at Costco (good bundle deal + great return policy), but today I found a listing on the Kansas City Craigslist that has me strongly considering a purchase.

Craigslist: XBOX 360 package

I've e-mailed the seller and asked him a number of questions. Apparently the guy is going through a tough divorce. He said that he loves his 360, but he just needs the money right now. He doesn't have the original receipt, but said that he has had no troubles with the three red rings or with disc scratching. He also offered to have me come to his apartment so I could check to see that everything worked, etc.

Overall, this sounds like a pretty good deal. 24 games, all kinds of accessories for $550. My question is, if something does go wrong with the system, can I send it in to Microsoft without a receipt and not being the original purchaser? Do they just go by the manufacture date to see if the system is still under warranty?

Also, if anyone has purchased a used 360, I'd like to hear some of your thoughts. Did you have any troubles? I'm a little tentative about buying a preowned system, but the seller sounds like a good guy and it seems like he has taken good care of the system.

Thanks for any help.

[mercalnd]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

Hey guys,

I've been wanting a 360 for a long time, and Microsoft's announcement about the extended warranties helped ease my fears about the system a little.

I had planned to purchase a 360 sometime within the next few weeks at Costco (good bundle deal + great return policy), but today I found a listing on the Kansas City Craigslist that has me strongly considering a purchase.

Craigslist: XBOX 360 package

I've e-mailed the seller and asked him a number of questions. Apparently the guy is going through a tough divorce. He said that he loves his 360, but he just needs the money right now. He doesn't have the original receipt, but said that he has had no troubles with the three red rings or with disc scratching. He also offered to have me come to his apartment so I could check to see that everything worked, etc.

Overall, this sounds like a pretty good deal. 24 games, all kinds of accessories for $550. My question is, if something does go wrong with the system, can I send it in to Microsoft without a receipt and not being the original purchaser? Do they just go by the manufacture date to see if the system is still under warranty?

Also, if anyone has purchased a used 360, I'd like to hear some of your thoughts. Did you have any troubles? I'm a little tentative about buying a preowned system, but the seller sounds like a good guy and it seems like he has taken good care of the system.

Thanks for any help.

Both times I have called them, they didn't ask for a receipt. They just ask you the serial number and they pretty much know everything they need from there in terms of when it was purchased etc. However, I don't know how they handle the warranty if the system has been sold to someone else.

As far as my thoughts go, I bought a PS3 this week because my 360 died on me last weekend and I just don't trust the system anymore. I take great care of my systems, this one in particular since I knew about all the failures. Basically, I worried for 15 months about it eventually breaking down, even though I had no issues at the time. Now that it has failed, and knowing of so many guys around here that have had more than one failure, I would just expect it to fail again once I get it back so I decided to switch. How the system is treated has nothing to do with the alarming rate of failure on these things.

But I'm not writing all this to try and sway you towards the PS3. I still feel the 360 is a great system and currently is better than the PS3 in pretty much everything but reliability. But since all the games I play are on both consoles I switched. The reliability issue should be sorted out sometime this fall once they move to the new chips. If I were you, I'd wait until then.

[KC Fire]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

I would say go for it. Sounds like a good deal. Just make sure the tamper seal is still intact. If its not the warranty is useless. Its right under the faceplate if you didn't know. And yes they just look up the serial number, you don't need a reciept.

[bkfount]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

I assume they go by purchase date, since my 2nd 360 is actually older than the dead one I returned to best buy. I'll be pissed if they go by manufacture date if it breaks, since I didn't feel like paying 59.99 for a warranty plan again.

[rspencer86]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

Thanks for your input so far, guys.

I'm leaning towards pulling the trigger on this one. I just called by local GameStop about their current deal where you can get $20 extra credit when you trade in three 360 games, and the employee said that if I brought in 6 games, I would get $40 extra, and so on. So if I traded in 18 of the 24 games that are included, I would get $120 credit on top of the trade-in value of those games. So I could potentially end up with about $250–300 worth of in-store credit!

Even if I'm not covered under Microsoft's warranty and I have to pay to fix the system if it breaks, I still think it is a pretty good deal.

[bkfount]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

what games does it come with?

[rspencer86]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

what games does it come with?

Condemned: Criminal Origins
Madden 07
Dead Rising
Earth Defense Force 2017
The Outfit
Gears of War,
N3: Ninety Nine Nights
Marvel Ultimate Alliance
Dynasty Warriors 5: Empires
Def Jam Icon
Blitz The League
Fight Night Round 3
King Kong
Just Cause
Saints Row
Hitman Blood Money
Chrome Hounds
Blazing Angels
Full Auto
Dead or Alive 4
Tomb Raider Legend,
The Burger King Games (Big Bumpin', Sneak King, & Pocket Bike Racer).

Out of these, I would definitely keep Gears and probably keep Blitz and Saints Row.

[bkfount]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

Condemned: Criminal Origins
Madden 07
Dead Rising
Earth Defense Force 2017
The Outfit
Gears of War,
N3: Ninety Nine Nights
Marvel Ultimate Alliance
Dynasty Warriors 5: Empires
Def Jam Icon
Blitz The League
Fight Night Round 3
King Kong
Just Cause
Saints Row
Hitman Blood Money
Chrome Hounds
Blazing Angels
Full Auto
Dead or Alive 4
Tomb Raider Legend,
The Burger King Games (Big Bumpin', Sneak King, & Pocket Bike Racer).

Out of these, I would definitely keep Gears and probably keep Blitz and Saints Row.

dead rising and condemned are also good.

[rspencer86]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

Well, just to complete my story, today I met up with the guy and purchased his 360. He was very nice, he even brought a checklist and showed me every item one by one just to make sure everything was there.

On the way home I swung by GameStop and lugged in 18 of the games. I sure got a few quizzical looks when I walked through the door carrying a stack of games that reached the middle of my head, lol. Anyway, I ended up keeping Just Cause, Blitz, Gears, and the 3 Burger King games. I got a little more than $250 in credit which I used to buy a VGA cable, Forza, R6: Vegas, Call of Duty 3, and put $50 towards NCAA 08.

I got home and immediately set everything up. Systems booted up fine, not as loud as I thought it would be. I immediately popped in Forza and was amazed with how good it looked on my 19" Dell LCD monitor.

Now all I need is a XBox Live Gold card, and I will be set! I'm having a hard time thinking up a good Gametag... we'll see what I can come up with. It's nice to finally have a 360 and not have to worry about price cuts, warranty changes, etc. If the system dies, well, I'll send it in. If the price drops by $100 in a month, oh well. I think $550 was a great deal for all of the stuff I got.

I'm just excited to get back into gaming again! See you on XBox Live soon!

[bkfount]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

I have a few 48 hour xbl codes if you want them..

[rspencer86]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

I have a few 48 hour xbl codes if you want them..

Hey, that would be great to be able to give it a test drive. Can you PM those to me? Thanks a lot, bk.

[bkfount]

Re: Buying a used 360: Warranty questions

Hey, that would be great to be able to give it a test drive. Can you PM those to me? Thanks a lot, bk.

sent..4 free days of live.