360 can't read Gears?

GriffDizzle

So I recently purchased a 360, and was pretty happy with how easily I managed to get everything set up. Then I put in the first game I bought with my new system (Gears of War, of course! :P), only to find the menu screen giving me this obnoxious sound. Kind of like a grating-ish noise. But I persevered and launched the single player campaign. During the first level, the game freezes when I either fire my rifle, or that first helicopter flies overhead. Every time. And when I try to play multiplayer, I freeze three seconds into the round, every time. Now, I had also downloaded the GRAW 2 and Crackdown demos, and they both ran perfectly. So it's not an issue of my 360 being overheated or anything. And I tried some original XBox games, and they work fine. So I got a defective game, right? Well, I take it back to the store, get a new one, and the same problem occurs. Does my 360 hate Gears of War? Is there an update I'm missing? Or something obvious I'm forgetting (although off the top of my head, I don't know what "obvious" error causes a game to freeze :P).

redimpulse

a horrible grating noise? Check that CD. Are there circular score marks on it?

If so, then you have a defective DVD-ROM unit, right out of the box. Or you're playing the unit at an angle; not quite upright but not horizontal either.

GriffDizzle

Well, it's not really a horrible grating noise. It's like, whenever I hit up or down (to select campaign or multiplayer or whatever), aside from the usual noise the cursor makes when it moves, there's another...weird noise. Hard to explain. And there aren't any marks on the disk, as far as I can tell. And it's laying horizontally on a solid platform. So I guess the disk reader is broken, huh?

MrOletta

Wait, I just bought a 360 and checked all my discs. They all have a very thin circular line about 1/4" from where the data section begins. Does that mean I have a defective unit?

GriffDizzle

MrOletta wrote:

Wait, I just bought a 360 and checked all my discs. They all have a very thin circular line about 1/4" from where the data section begins. Does that mean I have a defective unit?

If it's playing the games without trouble, I'd have to assume it's alright.

redimpulse

MrOletta wrote:

Wait, I just bought a 360 and checked all my discs. They all have a very thin circular line about 1/4" from where the data section begins. Does that mean I have a defective unit?

1/4 before the data section, or 1/4 after? Because if it's 1/4 after, and it's between 1/12" and 1/8" thick, then something is grinding on the DVDs.

t Griff: I'd suggest calling Xbox support and giving them the issue. Sounds like warranty replacement to me.

Yar

Clear your cache.

Hold X while the disc loads, until the dev's logo appears. (i.e., turn on the 360 and the controller and immediately hold X until you get whatever logo first appears when the Gears disc loads up. Or, if you boot to the Dashboad, select "play game" and then hold X.)

Alternatively, put in at least 3 - 5 different, other 360 discs and play each one for a few minutes. That will flush out the Gears cache, achieving the same result.

When the problem is a single game and it isn't the disc, this is usually the problem.