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What is the towel trick?

What is the science of the Xbox 360 towel trick?

  • Does anybody know what this actually does to an Xbox? I understand it forces it to overheat. But what's happening inside the actual console?

  • Answer:

    they believe that the temp inside will get hot enough to re solder the connections in the cpu. if your getting the three red lights dont do the towel trick it wont work and if out of some fluke it dose it wont last long.the real fix is to open it up all the way and remove the heat sync retention clip(its a big x on the bottom of the motherboard and use machine screws and a washer on each screw to replace the retention clip . theirs a few websites with the process in detail.the problem with the retention clip is it pulls on the 4 corners of the cpu and pushes down on the middle of it.basically it warps the motherboard from the heat and pressure and messes with the cpu's connection to the mobo. EDIT: for the guy down below theirs no solder on the cpu at all its like any other cpu it has pins that fit into a socket.also cold solder is Silver Conductive Epoxy it docent melt it drys like a glue,if anything heat would make it harder(dryer)and as far as solder that melts at a lower temp they rate solder by its lead/silver/tin content the more lead to lower the temps needed to melt not the other way around.also the lowest melting solder melts at 430'f thats low temp solder.if you got your box to this temp the plastic would melt long before the solder.trust me(i went to collage for electronics)dont put you xbox through the towel deal your just going to make things worst.

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OMG....... such bad answers for this! Jazon1: COMPLETELY wrong! Never been inside a 360. It has x-clamps NOT bolts. Also the CPU is a BGA chip (ball grid array) so has lots of tiny balls of solder sticking to the motherboard (NOT pins!) If it had pins the chips wouldn't peel off the motherboard when it overheats. Arminator: WRONG! You don't get a 'redesigned GPU heatsink'. What you get with an MS refurb (and this is a fairly new thing) is an Opus motherboard which has a 65nm CPU like the Falcon chipset but without the HDMI port. So the refurbs have the same chance of overheating as Falcons (around 10% as opposed to 33% of original 360s). The Towel Trick: works because it melts the solder under the chips and then they stick to the motherboard again. Fails a day/week later when your console overheats again since the x-clamps are still rubbish! Added bonus that you will blow the capacitors or shorten their life to 2-3 months (and then your console is a doorstop) and you void the warranty cos MS know about the trick and will easily see the damage it does inside when you send the console to them. You are better off replacing the x-clamps with one of my fix kits which will (99.5% of the time) sort the problem permanently... and it only costs you £5 or $11. http://shop.ebay.co.uk/merchant/xbox_expert

Stewie

the it does work however it will not last for a long time the problem is there is alot of force being exerted onto the GPU or one of the main components (not sure which part its been a long time since i dealt with 360's) and this is pulling the soldered points off contact from the motherboard and with these parts moving out of place it is not cooled correctly and it overheats. you can try the towel trick but it wont last a long time theres a video of it on the psphacking101 site it was done a very long time ago and it didnt last they then found their own solution using some different bolts. look it up on the site psphacking101.com

Raj O

Actually, it does work, but it isn't near as effective as opening it up and doing the work yourself. How the towel trick works, it melts the Solder joint, which melts easily. It melts easily cause it is a lead-free solder joint, also known as a Cold-Solder. As the towel traps all the heat inside it like in insulator, or a blanket, it re-melts the solder joint that was melted from overheating. This doesn't work every time, but most the time it will work depending on how overheated it got. To prevent the solder joints from melting, take a few steps. 1. Keep the Xbox 360 system away from other electronics that gives off heat. Examples are T.V.s, Computers, Monitors, Other Game systems etc. 2. Keep the Xbox 360 away from heaters, or anything that basically gives off heat. 3. Keep your xbox preferably on or near the floor. Science says, Heat rises, Cold Air Sinks. Keeping it on the floor means that all its hot air rises, and its actually a little cooler, not really enough to notice but it is on the ground level. If you ever see a data center, you will see that they use raised floors or keep servers as low to the ground as possible to keep them cooler.

Jarrod S

Why would you purposely cause your xbox to overheat?

it doesn't work it actually makes it worse lol. and don't buy the extra cooler that actually makes 360 overheat faster because the 360 takes out hot air while the cooler put cool air in it allowing the hot air not to get out. and just don't play 360 minimize your playing hours to 2-3 hours a day

pure_1

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