Confounding Technology!

Well it finally happened. I have joined the legion of others smote down by the dreaded red ring of death. I returned home to be given the news by my friend, the shock of its sudden death only made worse by the fact I wasn't there to see it go.

How delightfully appropriate.

Of course actually it wasn't particularly surprising. The RROD has reached to such infamy that its simply part of the risk of buying an Xbox, along with the need for batteries and an ability to block out loud fan noises. This is in no way meant as a backslap against Microsoft and the Xbox: There's a reason I bought an Xbox, and will try and fix or replace it, and that's not to do with this blog post.

The fact is, it wasn't surprising because technology just dies, and it seems to do it a hell of a lot more now than it used to. Of all the people I know with game consoles, over half have had problems with them. Most of this is tied to the PS3 and the Xbox, which means Nintendo either make more reliant hardware or less people have them... or at least they are used less. Actually no bugger it, I've never had any problem with Nintendo hardware. The old Game Boys were so hardy the military should have looked into finding a use for them.

But it isn't just game consoles. Mobiles, laptops, everything now comes with a warranty that almost guarantees at some point it will die and become unusable. Admittedly, some items are more in a danger zone then others. Yes, it is unsurprising that your mobile no longer works after being dropped into a double vodka and coke, bad luck. But other than the obvious, I've just become use to the extremely vulnerable mortality of anything that eats up electricity and does cool stuff, it's just the way it is.



The thing is, should it be like this? We all expect it of our gadgets and gizmos and I can't remember the last time anyone actually showed genuine annoyance at their electronics breaking. But older items, like watched, ancient clocks - they go forever. Now it could be argued that a watch has to do a little bit less then the full multimedia computing power required for your average laptop, but the point stands: Why do we put up with technology that breaks without any outside help, usually subconsciously just outside the time the warranty ends?

Of course this has the worrying problem that to tackle this we would all have to turn into the shop crazy. You know the sort: Those people yelling at the poor clueless teenager behind the counter, demanding to see the manager. Avert thou eyes, roll them skyward and move to another part of the shop to avoid the embarrassing event. I don't think I could quite reach that point at any rate, conflict is bad enough, loud and very public conflict more so.

Then again, it could just be me. I am beginning to suspect I simply emit an EMP like aura that eventually destroys all shiny things in my presence. Not all of it has succumbed yet, otherwise there would be no blog post, and I'm going to touch major wood that my remaining lovely gadgets remain working. No, not that kind of wood. Pervert.

Until then, I need to see if Microsoft will take my Xbox to their console hospital and fix him up lovely. And if not, I have been fortunate enough to meet the wonderful breed that is computer scientist at this University. I'll give it to them, and then I'll have a games console that lights up all funny, works on voice recognition and makes tea. Always a silver lining eh?