Sony: "Red Line Of Death" Affects Less Than 1% of PS4s

[Kahani]

I already put in an edit saying that unacceptable was too strong a word.

You didn't, however, say anything at all about your complaint that this is a problem with consoles in particular, which is the point I was actually addressing.

 

[Saltyk]

As someone who's PS4 bricked within 30 minutes, I can tell you that it really fucking sucks. A lot.

I can also tell you that I got a new one from the retailer with absolutely zero trouble the next morning and was the Sony representative I talked to to reset my primary console was understanding and helpful. I've also heard that Sony is shipping out replacements as soon as a person reports the problem, not after receiving the defective product.

Was I upset at the time? Yes. Am I upset now? No. Nor do I feel that a less than 1% failure rate is bad. Every product has issues. Cars, electronics, computers, and other things.

Sure, it could be worse, but I see no reason to suspect as much. With over a million sold, even 10,000 is barely even a drop in the bucket.

 

[CrazyCapnMorgan]

snip

snip

snip

snip

Unacceptable was a bit strong on my part, it is quite impressive that the failure rate is low, but its still strange to see a console literally brick itself right out of the box.

Apologies for the misunderstanding.

Not a problem, mate! To err is human, to forgive is to get internet cookies.

Spoiler: OM NOM

 

[Kungfu_Teddybear]

If a million units are sold (with more selling) that is about 10'000 bricked PS4's, which is unacceptable.

Hardly unacceptable. Yeah, it sucks for the people it happens to, but less than 1% is a very small number. If a million sell and 10,000 are busted, that's still 990,000 people playing and enjoying their PS4's.

EDIT: Sorry, I didn't see your edit.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Lets see what that number looks like in 6 months. Though so far, this looks pretty promising.

 

[Strazdas]

If a million units are sold (with more selling) that is about 10'000 bricked PS4's, which is unacceptable.

I don't get it, why do modern consoles do this? I understand being damaged while shipping, but that can't be the only reason.

Yes, it is. In fact, 10.000 bricked consoles is very low amount.
Why do modern consoels do it? maybe because manufacturing technology is not magic? You do know that ALL consumer electronics have failures and most of them are larger (industry average around 10%, 5% is "very good manufacturing".

Additionally, the figure of "less than 1%" is deceptive when dealing with large number; less than 0.1% of a large number can be massive. Just do the math yourselves. If I'm testing 1,000,000 for a disease and the test I'm using is "less than 1%" inaccurate - say 0.5%, how many people get a misdiagnosis? 5000 people.

That's 5000 people either thinking they've a disease they don't or thinking they don't when they do have a disease. You can now understand why in medicine if you even proposed using a test with a less than 0.1% misdiagnosis rate you'd be laughed out of the room.

Clearly you do not know how medical testing works then because msidiagnosis does happen and there are plenty of tests with higher misdiagnosis tests. thats why doctors arent changed by drug prescribing doctors - human element eliminates at least some of the misdiagnosis.

Because 0.999% and 0.001% are also "less than 1%" it could well be higher or lower. I can imagine if it was on the lower side they would have taken pains to disclose how low it actually was and offer an impressive customer returns policy to turn it into a PR coup too ("PS4 not working on launch? Full refund. No questions asked. We absolutely stand behind the PS4, and intend to make every customer feel buying one was one of the best choices of their lives.").

Last number they gave was 0.4%, which fits in <1%. Also Sony is replacing broken consoles, in fact i heard they ship them before they even get yours back.

 

[Hazy]

Unacceptable was a bit strong on my part, it is quite impressive that the failure rate is low, but its still strange to see a console literally brick itself right out of the box.

Apologies for the misunderstanding.

You're good my dude, mistakes happen. Product developers typically project defects to be around 4%, so given the circumstances, this is actually quite good.

 

[Th37thTrump3t]

Also I'm sorry, Red Line of Death isn't as catchy as Red Ring of Death.

Sounds like an exotic form of cocaine.

OT: This is why I never buy a console at launch. Waaaaay too many issues to deal with.

 

[Something Amyss]

If a million units are sold (with more selling) that is about 10'000 bricked PS4's, which is unacceptable.

Have you told this to modern consumer electronics? Acceptable failure rate is around 3%.

This seems to be a weird place to ask about modern consoles doing something. I mean, yes, they break a lot. They seem to break more than that standard (If the 54% failure survey for the 360 is to be believed, even the Wii had double that). But asking what's up with consoles over this? Ehhhh....It's just a strange line in the sand.

The problem here is they're probably in damage control. Like when they tried to pretend the DRE didn't exist, or when Microsoft was trying to downplay the RROD.

Less than a 1% failure rate is ASTONISHING.

And in fairness to Tizzy, we're not talking overall failure rate. We're talking a specific issue.

Oh, and it's not astonishing. Better than normal, yes. Astonishing? Not even close.

If they specified something like a 0.0001% failure rate, now THAT would be astonishing.

More to the point:

Lets see what that number looks like in 6 months. Though so far, this looks pretty promising.

Additionally, the figure of "less than 1%" is deceptive when dealing with large number; less than 0.1% of a large number can be massive. Just do the math yourselves. If I'm testing 1,000,000 for a disease and the test I'm using is "less than 1%" inaccurate - say 0.5%, how many people get a misdiagnosis? 5000 people.

One of the more common HIV tests gives a false positive 20% of the time. While pregnancy tests all claim to be at least 99% accurate, they're usually not (even when used properly) in independent tests. Most birth control has a higher failure rate, too, but we still prescribe it.

Apparently, the entire medical field is quite deceptive.

 

[Something Amyss]

Sounds like an exotic form of cocaine.

I was thinking an STI, but....

OT: This is why I never buy a console at launch. Waaaaay too many issues to deal with.

This is why you'd think fewer people would line up at launch.

Especially after RROD.

Do I need to make my edit even bigger? I have been quoted on my mistake enough times already.

Might I suggest skywriting?

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

If they sold a million units already, 1% of which are red-lined, that's 10,000 units, give or take. That's an awful lot of faulties. I appreciate manufacturing defects, design flaws, launch issues, bad batches and other things that "just happen", but that's a very high failure rate for precision micro-electronics.

 

[Something Amyss]

even you!

In my defense, I predominantly addressed your second statement, which was about why consoles pull this sort of thing.

I'd also note that I loaded the page almost an hour ago, so if you made the edit bigger, I didn't have time to see it. I did see the edit, but it was largely inconsequential to what I wrote. I felt pointing out a standard acceptable failure rate was still germane to the conversation.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

A 1% failure rate for a mass-produced consumer product is actually pretty darn good; of course, this is the manufacturer giving us this number, so it may need to be taken with a grain of salt. But the real test for Sony will be how it handles the people who've gotten one of those faulty units.

 

[Something Amyss]

If they sold a million units already, 1% of which are red-lined, that's 10,000 units, give or take. That's an awful lot of faulties. I appreciate manufacturing defects, design flaws, launch issues, bad batches and other things that "just happen", but that's a very high failure rate for precision micro-electronics.

It's not very high at all. Failure rates of 3% are acceptable in manufacturing, sometimes higher. There's no true standard, but there's a reasonably expected standard for electronics, and it's much higher.

The issue is whether or not this is accurate, and whether or not this is the only kind of failure. I'd be shocked if both were true, but if they wee, then it's not comparably all that bad.

 

[spartan231490]

If a million units are sold (with more selling) that is about 10'000 bricked PS4's, which is unacceptable.

I don't get it, why do modern consoles do this? I understand being damaged while shipping, but that can't be the only reason.

[HEADING=2]EDIT: I understand the failure rate is low considering the circumstances, apologies on saying it was unacceptable, that was too strong of a word, my bad.[/HEADING]

I agree with you, anywhere near 1% is unacceptable, no matter what crap SONY spews. A tenth of a percent is on the high end of acceptable for something that costs as much as a PS4.

If they sold a million units already, 1% of which are red-lined, that's 10,000 units, give or take. That's an awful lot of faulties. I appreciate manufacturing defects, design flaws, launch issues, bad batches and other things that "just happen", but that's a very high failure rate for precision micro-electronics.

Full agreement. Also, you're avatar is awesome.

 

[freedash22]

My first question here would be is that Sony's PR and Marketing department or the Technical team giving the number of 1% to the spokesperson?

I like Sony but honesty is not something they are known for. And looking at all the DOAs and complaints in Amazon, the number is definitely greater than 1%. And looking at it, there other problems that don't kill the console completely but render it unusable--- such as blu-ray drive issues (like what happened to Totalbiscuit's PS4). I'd like to think of this as something like US unemployment figures--- full of excluding criteria designed to reduce the number as much as possible.

Sorry Sony but I am not that naive.