[SOLVED] URGENT: My Xbox 360 just set on fire, what do I do?

[handsomepigeon]

Edit: This was copied and pasted from another forum that I had uploaded to. It's now been about 3 hours since this happened.

I was modding an Xbox 360. (RGH). It requires soldering a chip and a few wires and reading/writing to a nand with another chip. I had just wrote to the name and turned it on (after disconnecting the nand write/reader) and I start to smell smoke then crackling. After a few seconds, I came to my senses and turned it off by the mains and then unplugged the power supply from the Xbox (should I have kept it in to ground it?

The motherboard was lying on a CGP revision book (look it up just so you know what material it is) to stop it from contacting my carpet. I think the glossy front of the book stopped it from spreading as i didn't see any fire.

I don't know what to do. I bavent done anything since then apart from disconnecting the HDMI cable from the monitor side. Should I lift it up? How - I don't want to get shocked? Is the walk outlet ok (UK)? Is the power supply ok? Is my monitor that was connected via HDMI ok? How should I dispose of it?

I know that this was very stupid and I should've practiced better safety. I'm gonna find a new hobby lol.

I had used rubbing alcohol (which is flammable) to clean up flux but I wiped it off with a tissue after. I also had a wire that was loosely connected (i was just trying to get it barely working, once I knew it was, I would tweak it and solder the wires better) because I ducked up the point where it was meant to be soldered so I exposed the tracer and (poorly) connected it there.



Is it safe to touch it (without the power connected)? Should I plug it back into the power supply so that any current can go to the ground in the wall socket?

 

[atomicWAR]

If your unplugged its safe to touch. The wall outlet should be fine but everything Xbox 360 (main board & PSU) are likely toast. I suggest you chuck them i the garbage.

 

[popatim]

Being in the UK, I believe they have dedicated ewaste centers.

 

[iamacow]

Seems like your crossed something when soldering. After all the wires are very small and the diagrams are in Chinese. Time to toss in the garbage.

 

[InvalidError]

If your unplugged its safe to touch. The wall outlet should be fine but everything Xbox 360 (main board & PSU) are likely toast.

Most switching PSUs have over-current protection of some sort and can survive most short-circuit condition, better PSUs will flag a fault and turn off until power-cycled. For the rest of the board, that depends on what got shorted where. The two or three times I remember having fireworks and smoke show from modding something was due to putting a chip on backwards and the rest of the board survived.

 

[iamacow]

Yeah I suspect the ground and voltage was swapped when soldering. Common mistake.

 

[atomicWAR]

If your unplugged its safe to touch. The wall outlet should be fine but everything Xbox 360 (main board & PSU) are likely toast.

Most switching PSUs have over-current protection of some sort and can survive most short-circuit condition, better PSUs will flag a fault and turn off until power-cycled. For the rest of the board, that depends on what got shorted where. The two or three times I remember having fireworks and smoke show from modding something was due to putting a chip on backwards and the rest of the board survived.

I tend to be conservative when sparks fly, especially when giving advice, but this is correct. Question is how confident you are trying to suss everything out and risk plugging things in again. I love a good tech-xperiment myself but I encourage safety and restraint when doing so. Only you can gauge your skill and comfort!

 

[InvalidError]

I tend to be conservative when sparks fly, especially when giving advice, but this is correct. Question is how confident you are trying to suss everything out and risk plugging things in again.

Given how massive Microsoft's liabilities for bundling a sub-par power brick would be and how it is practically 100% certain the PSU had nothing to do with this failure, I'd say my confidence in the PSU is 100%. For the rest of the board, I'd remove the failed mod and check if smoke signals persist, indicating significant other damage. If there is no smoke or fireworks, then the board may be salvageable.

I repair electronics for friends and family as a hobby. Short of catastrophic failures, PSUs are usually the easiest thing to fix since properly designed ones, such as those integrated in most TVs and other appliances subject to relatively strict safety regulations, are so difficult to actually kill. Generic grey-market Chinese imports made to no standard whatsoever are a different story.