Last month my 360's fans started going all out, and then the system shuts off with 2 flashing red lights. The secondary error code is 0013: Ram overheating. At the time of the problem I had thought it was only the CPU overheating. I did the X-clamp fix, and also used a heatgun to reflow the RAM chips. After this the system worked fine for about a week and a half. After that, the system started to overheat again. Same problem as before, 2 flashing red lights.
So I have been messing with the tightness of the bolts, and still no luck. The GPU heatsink gets hot, but the CPU heatsink is pretty cool. So I took the CPU heatsink off, cleaned off all of the AS5 I had applied earlier, polished the chip, and reapplied the AS5 (Size of a grain of rice, then spread across the chip). Still no change in the heatsink temperature. Then messed with tightening the bolts by hand in a crisscross pattern. No change still. Tightened with a wrench by a quarter turn, and still no effect. I am thinking that the CPU heatsink not transferring heat is a problem, but so is the 0013 error. The heatsink I can eventually figure out, but the RAM is another story.
Things I have done so far:
X-clamp fix: 8 bolts directly through the motherboard- 8 aluminum #5 washers, 8 #5 nylon washers. 4 bolts for the CPU, 4 for the GPU. Set up with each bolt having 1 aluminum, and 1 nylon washer.
Heat Gun Fix: Fully isolated all the capacitors and other fragile components. Heated the board on low for 1.5mins, heated on high for 3 mins, and then again on low for 2mins. Moved in circles around board to make sure I didn't fry any one part.
Penny Fix: Placed two electric tape wrapped pre-1982 pennies under RAM chips. Kept in place by using small pieces of the Microsoft RAM sticky heat pads. No noticeable change.
So, I am almost positive that there is a problem with my RAM, and that doing another reflow is one of the last options I have left. However, the results only lasted a week or two. Is there any way to extend the working time of this fix? I am thinking of fixing it long enough for it to work for at least a month, and then I may just pony up and buy a new xbox, or sell all my parts, games, controllers, and get a PS3.
Any suggestions, tips, or advice for fixing this tricky problem? I have some pictures available if that would be of help.
