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My Xbox 360 instantly shows two red lights when I turn it on—almost like it’s overheating. Is this the case? I just repaired the three ring on it, and it showed up green from the start. I put it back together, and now it goes straight to two red lights.

oldturkey03, I fix xbox 360s as a side job. Please refrain from telling users to do the the “overheating fix.” Letting the xbox 360 overheat does more damage to it. The 2 red lights can be caused by various things: 1). CPU is overheating 2). GPU is overheating 3). RAM has cold solder joints under them, mostly the 2 RAM blocks left of the GPU. I can’t tell you how many customers have brought me their xbox 360 for repair after unsuccessfully doing the “overheating fix.” I usually reflow the GPU with a professional rework station (the GPU is the culprit most of the time). Xbox 360s which have been overheated repeated usually require that I swap out the GPU, which requires a reball (expensive). You can find out which issue the console is really having. When you see the 2 flashing red lights, hold the sync button on the console and press the eject button. This will give you some rapidly flashing red lights. Make note of how many quadrants are doing this. Repeat this 3 more times to obtain a 4 digit sequence. Four rapidly flashing quadrants = a numerical 0 Three rapidly flashing quadrants = a numerical 3 Two rapidly flashing quadrants = a numerical 2 One rapidly flashing quadrant = a numerical 1 With the 2 flashing red lights, you will most likely get 0011 (CPU), 0012 (GPU), or 0013 (RAM). If it’s 0013, you’ll most likely need a reflow on the two RAM blocks left of the GPU. The other two error codes might call for a reflow of the CPU or GPU also, but is probably due to the dried up OEM thermal paste. If you have the 3 flashing red lights, you do the same sequence as above to get an error code sequence (most likely 0102, 0020, 0022, 0110, 0021, 0031, or 0103). Once again, never, EVER do the overheating trick where you don’t plug the fans in.

If the red lights come on right away and the heat sinks are not really hot, then the heat sinks are not making proper contact with the chips. Either tighten the screws a little more or get the right height washers. you may have to remove 1 washer if you used two before. Remember it does not take long for any electronic item to overheat if the heatsink or fan are not working right. it took my xbox about a minute for the 2 red lights to start flashing if it is not done right remove the x-clamps clean off the old past add new paste replace the heatsinks with new screws but don’t tighten them all the way yet reassemble the drive but not the fans or case plug it in and turn it on until the lights start flashing (about 10-15 minutes) then once it is cool enough to handle tighten down the new screws The screw should be fairly tight, but no tight enough to strip them. Make sure that all your cables are properly re-connected. Clean out your XBox and make sure that all air entry slots are open and no obstruction is caused. also, make sure the optical drive is clean and connected right. Also, pay good attention to the two copper connectors that control the CD drive tray….good luck BTW this is the same answer as I gave to roger on xbox360 first flashes 3 red lights then stuts down and 2 red see if it works and if not, let us know.

Okay so I got the code 0013(2red rings overheating) month after I did the xclamp fix. Now what I did was I both rubbing alcohol cleaned the old thermal paste from the GPU CPU and the heatsinks and then reflow the ram with heatgun put back together and try it out for 1 hour on BF 3 and the Xbox was tuning quiet like a champ.

I had the same problem when i did the red ring of death fix but i was able to resolve it by taking off the x clamps off and getting as much stuff off the black chips under the cooling devices as i could. then i put some thermal heat sinc on the chips and now it runs perfectly

I find just by blowing the dust out of your system very helpful. This will also prevent the red ring if you clean out your Xbox 360 at least once a month. This should be the first thing to try because that’s probably the only thing wrong with the Xbox 360. I know from personal experience, its troublesome to buy a new system. so give this a shot, I hope I was helpful.

There are open / High resistance contacts under the Att GPU , these contacts are on the top left corner of the GPU . a simple reflow will correct this . but some after 1-3 month it will be repeat problem . Just replacing the heat sink compound will fix the problem 20% of the time , But the console is on the edge of instability. So it’s best to just reflow the GPU only and replace all heat sink compound . If you want to get 12-24 mouths out of a standard reflow , then you will need special hardware C.C.A (Conformal Compression Assembly ) it’s like a X clamp on steroids , and evenly compress the GPU die to the board and supports the board , so ZERO pc board stress . I’ll post some links if anyone is interested .

Good day, all can anyone, help me with my Xbox 360, when I switch it on, the green light, come on after a second, red light, flashing for 10 times, then it switch it’s off. How can I fix this problem ?? Update (08/11/2017) Hi, i just want to start off saying that i did spend time googling these problems and so far i have found no solution yet. So i left my xbox 360 slim laying around without it being used for a couple of months (i dont use it very much) and it was working completely fine before that. Yesturday, i needed to use it so i reconnected everything and turned it on but it did not turn on. The light turns green then turns off and fans start to spin with the sound being very loud (i assume its spinning at its max speed), then the console light flashes red with a beeping sound for a bit then everything turns off. Anyone know whats up or have similar problems? Thanks