If you’ve owned an Xbox 360 for any length of time or know someone that has, then you are most likely familiar with the scary “three flashing red lights of death”. What are the “three flashing red lights of death?”

They are when three of the 4 lights around the power button for the Xbox 360 start flashing red when the system is turned on. This is not the only problem that will occur with the Xbox 360, but this issue is one that often needs repairs to be done on the Xbox 360 for the blinking red lights to go.

The Xbox 360 three flashing red lights of death is an indication by the Xbox 360 unit of a General Hardware Failure. Turning the system off and on or permitting the unit to cool down won’t eliminate the problem. The system will need to have repairs done. Microsoft support is able to perform these repairs, but there are some issues regarding this.

First, for Microsoft to patch up the Xbox 360, the unit must be distributed to them. This process alone can take two weeks and depending on the severity of the issue can cost around $150 to have the difficulty fixed. So after two weeks and close to $150 you get your Xbox 360 system back and with a little bit of luck it is repaired. Hopefully meaning Microsoft was able to fix the issue and the system was returned without being damaged again in transit.

The other solution is to try to fix the three flashing red lights issue yourself. To try this you need to pickup the Xbox 360 Red Lights repair guide. This guide offers step by step instructions on how to easily fix the “three flashing red lights of death” as well as other Xbox 360 issues like overheating, graphics mistakes, and freeze ups. Many people have reported using the Red Lights repair guide and getting their Xbox 360 back in working order in approximately an hour. Certainly faster than the turnaround from Microsoft and much cheaper ( $25 ).