What's new

Solved What exactly is E74, and how can I fix it?

  • Thread starter The Sequel
  • Start date
  • Views 3,525
The Sequel

The Sequel

Enthusiast
Messages
78
Reaction score
5
Points
55
Sin$
7
Everytime I boot my JTAG up, it goes to a black screen that says E74, right in the middle. I've looked up the error, but I don't fully understand it. Could anyone help me out here?
 
kanyun

kanyun

Enthusiast
Messages
790
Reaction score
191
Points
125
Sin$
7
The secondary error code is indicated by the E74 to be 1022.

Alright, so there has been many discussion over the actual causes of all these errors, but I'll try to break it down for you.

I'm gonna make some assumptions in this, like you know what a computer chip and solder is. If you don't just let me know and I can try again and be more detailed.

Basically all the chips on the xbox are BGA (ball grid array), so they use tiny solder balls to make their connection to the motherboard. These tiny balls are made of lead-free solder. I believe this is the case because there is a law in place that says microsoft must not use lead in any products they market directly to children.

Lead free solder becomes very brittle after many rapid changes in temperature (aka normal Xbox operation, turning on, turning off).
Eventually it develops very small, sometimes even microscopic fault lines or cracks in the balls (usually under the GPU (graphics processing unit) because this is the chip that heats up the most on the board because it doesn't have sufficient cooling with the small heatsink (the piece of metal that is attached to the top of the chip to pull heat away from the chip and ensure normal operating temperature) it has. It's heatsink is small to make room for the DVD drive in there. Anyway, this means the GPU has the biggest gap between its lowest temperature and its highest, so the solder becomes the most brittle. When these cracks develop, they can sever or break the connection between one point on the chip and one on the board. This means the chip isn't completely connected to the board and yields you an error (RROD, E74, etc). Many people claim to fix this by replacing the x-clamps with bolts. This puts pressure on the chip to bridge to two points that cracked. This can be very bad for the chip and destroy the other solder balls over time.

The best fixes for this problem are a "reflow" or a "reball."

A reflow is essentially, when you use a reworking machine (made specifically for electronics) to remelt the solder under the chip at fault to reconnect the severed connection. You should use flux before reflowing, which is a liquid subtance you want to get underneath the chip to remove any oxidation from the old solder, as well as allow it to be soft and help for a clean reflow. This solution is seen as temporary because it doesn't actually fix the problems. There is still rapid heating and cooling of lead free solder, so eventually it may die again. Although reflows, if done right (and not with a heat gun) can last years. You'll see lots of videos on fixing xboxs with a heat gun instead of a reworking station, I would stay away from this as you can easily rupture capacitors and other surface components and destroy your xbox.

A reball is the better of the two options, but its time consuming and expensive usually. This is when you use a reworking machine to melt the solder, then completely remove the chip that is causing the error. You then flux and remove all the solder from that chip and it's contacts on the board, replace the solder balls (using a reworking jig) and remelt them to make contact with all the points on the board. If you use leaded solder balls instead of lead-free, you should have a much longer lasting chip because leaded solder is much more resistant to rapid changes in heat.

The only real way to completely prevent e74 or RROD is to replace all the solder on every chip with leaded solder, and increase the cooling, but this is not usually worth the effort, so people usually opt for just a reflow or a reball of a single chip and leave it at that. Usually it doesn't die again, if anytime soon.

This is just the most common take on the whole thing. A lot of people think that the design of the xbox, where the fans pull heat over the motherboard through the back, causes the board to warp and to disconnect points on it. There is a lot less proof to support this theory, but could be plausible in certain instances.

In your case, you have a broken solder join underneath either the GPU or the HANA chip (the HANA chip handles resolution and scaling to the TV from the GPU). You will need to rework (reflow or reball) either the GPU or HANA, probably the GPU.

There are many people on this forum who could do this for you, myself included. I can only reflow though because I don't have a reballing jig yet.

Good luck with this thing man and ask if you have any questions, or if I didn't explain something well enough.
 
KentxModz

KentxModz

Rapid Fire Mod Maker
Messages
121
Reaction score
18
Points
70
Sin$
7
The secondary error code is indicated by the E74 to be 1022.

Alright, so there has been many discussion over the actual causes of all these errors, but I'll try to break it down for you.

I'm gonna make some assumptions in this, like you know what a computer chip and solder is. If you don't just let me know and I can try again and be more detailed.

Basically all the chips on the xbox are BGA (ball grid array), so they use tiny solder balls to make their connection to the motherboard. These tiny balls are made of lead-free solder. I believe this is the case because there is a law in place that says microsoft must not use lead in any products they market directly to children.

Lead free solder becomes very brittle after many rapid changes in temperature (aka normal Xbox operation, turning on, turning off).
Eventually it develops very small, sometimes even microscopic fault lines or cracks in the balls (usually under the GPU (graphics processing unit) because this is the chip that heats up the most on the board because it doesn't have sufficient cooling with the small heatsink (the piece of metal that is attached to the top of the chip to pull heat away from the chip and ensure normal operating temperature) it has. It's heatsink is small to make room for the DVD drive in there. Anyway, this means the GPU has the biggest gap between its lowest temperature and its highest, so the solder becomes the most brittle. When these cracks develop, they can sever or break the connection between one point on the chip and one on the board. This means the chip isn't completely connected to the board and yields you an error (RROD, E74, etc). Many people claim to fix this by replacing the x-clamps with bolts. This puts pressure on the chip to bridge to two points that cracked. This can be very bad for the chip and destroy the other solder balls over time.

The best fixes for this problem are a "reflow" or a "reball."

A reflow is essentially, when you use a reworking machine (made specifically for electronics) to remelt the solder under the chip at fault to reconnect the severed connection. You should use flux before reflowing, which is a liquid subtance you want to get underneath the chip to remove any oxidation from the old solder, as well as allow it to be soft and help for a clean reflow. This solution is seen as temporary because it doesn't actually fix the problems. There is still rapid heating and cooling of lead free solder, so eventually it may die again. Although reflows, if done right (and not with a heat gun) can last years. You'll see lots of videos on fixing xboxs with a heat gun instead of a reworking station, I would stay away from this as you can easily rupture capacitors and other surface components and destroy your xbox.

A reball is the better of the two options, but its time consuming and expensive usually. This is when you use a reworking machine to melt the solder, then completely remove the chip that is causing the error. You then flux and remove all the solder from that chip and it's contacts on the board, replace the solder balls (using a reworking jig) and remelt them to make contact with all the points on the board. If you use leaded solder balls instead of lead-free, you should have a much longer lasting chip because leaded solder is much more resistant to rapid changes in heat.

The only real way to completely prevent e74 or RROD is to replace all the solder on every chip with leaded solder, and increase the cooling, but this is not usually worth the effort, so people usually opt for just a reflow or a reball of a single chip and leave it at that. Usually it doesn't die again, if anytime soon.

This is just the most common take on the whole thing. A lot of people think that the design of the xbox, where the fans pull heat over the motherboard through the back, causes the board to warp and to disconnect points on it. There is a lot less proof to support this theory, but could be plausible in certain instances.

In your case, you have a broken solder join underneath either the GPU or the HANA chip (the HANA chip handles resolution and scaling to the TV from the GPU). You will need to rework (reflow or reball) either the GPU or HANA, probably the GPU.

There are many people on this forum who could do this for you, myself included. I can only reflow though because I don't have a reballing jig yet.

Good luck with this thing man and ask if you have any questions, or if I didn't explain something well enough.
This man right here deserves a cookie. He literally explained every aspect of the error and the fixes. I tip my hat to you good sir. :wink: Well done.
 
Aslan

thehuntsman1360

Enthusiast
Messages
934
Reaction score
177
Points
125
Sin$
0
The secondary error code is indicated by the E74 to be 1022.

Alright, so there has been many discussion over the actual causes of all these errors, but I'll try to break it down for you.

I'm gonna make some assumptions in this, like you know what a computer chip and solder is. If you don't just let me know and I can try again and be more detailed.

Basically all the chips on the xbox are BGA (ball grid array), so they use tiny solder balls to make their connection to the motherboard. These tiny balls are made of lead-free solder. I believe this is the case because there is a law in place that says microsoft must not use lead in any products they market directly to children.

Lead free solder becomes very brittle after many rapid changes in temperature (aka normal Xbox operation, turning on, turning off).
Eventually it develops very small, sometimes even microscopic fault lines or cracks in the balls (usually under the GPU (graphics processing unit) because this is the chip that heats up the most on the board because it doesn't have sufficient cooling with the small heatsink (the piece of metal that is attached to the top of the chip to pull heat away from the chip and ensure normal operating temperature) it has. It's heatsink is small to make room for the DVD drive in there. Anyway, this means the GPU has the biggest gap between its lowest temperature and its highest, so the solder becomes the most brittle. When these cracks develop, they can sever or break the connection between one point on the chip and one on the board. This means the chip isn't completely connected to the board and yields you an error (RROD, E74, etc). Many people claim to fix this by replacing the x-clamps with bolts. This puts pressure on the chip to bridge to two points that cracked. This can be very bad for the chip and destroy the other solder balls over time.

The best fixes for this problem are a "reflow" or a "reball."

A reflow is essentially, when you use a reworking machine (made specifically for electronics) to remelt the solder under the chip at fault to reconnect the severed connection. You should use flux before reflowing, which is a liquid subtance you want to get underneath the chip to remove any oxidation from the old solder, as well as allow it to be soft and help for a clean reflow. This solution is seen as temporary because it doesn't actually fix the problems. There is still rapid heating and cooling of lead free solder, so eventually it may die again. Although reflows, if done right (and not with a heat gun) can last years. You'll see lots of videos on fixing xboxs with a heat gun instead of a reworking station, I would stay away from this as you can easily rupture capacitors and other surface components and destroy your xbox.

A reball is the better of the two options, but its time consuming and expensive usually. This is when you use a reworking machine to melt the solder, then completely remove the chip that is causing the error. You then flux and remove all the solder from that chip and it's contacts on the board, replace the solder balls (using a reworking jig) and remelt them to make contact with all the points on the board. If you use leaded solder balls instead of lead-free, you should have a much longer lasting chip because leaded solder is much more resistant to rapid changes in heat.

The only real way to completely prevent e74 or RROD is to replace all the solder on every chip with leaded solder, and increase the cooling, but this is not usually worth the effort, so people usually opt for just a reflow or a reball of a single chip and leave it at that. Usually it doesn't die again, if anytime soon.

This is just the most common take on the whole thing. A lot of people think that the design of the xbox, where the fans pull heat over the motherboard through the back, causes the board to warp and to disconnect points on it. There is a lot less proof to support this theory, but could be plausible in certain instances.

In your case, you have a broken solder join underneath either the GPU or the HANA chip (the HANA chip handles resolution and scaling to the TV from the GPU). You will need to rework (reflow or reball) either the GPU or HANA, probably the GPU.

There are many people on this forum who could do this for you, myself included. I can only reflow though because I don't have a reballing jig yet.

Good luck with this thing man and ask if you have any questions, or if I didn't explain something well enough.

That is the best explanation of the E74 error I have ever read.Well done! :smile:
 
The Sequel

The Sequel

Enthusiast
Messages
78
Reaction score
5
Points
55
Sin$
7
The secondary error code is indicated by the E74 to be 1022.

Alright, so there has been many discussion over the actual causes of all these errors, but I'll try to break it down for you.

I'm gonna make some assumptions in this, like you know what a computer chip and solder is. If you don't just let me know and I can try again and be more detailed.

Basically all the chips on the xbox are BGA (ball grid array), so they use tiny solder balls to make their connection to the motherboard. These tiny balls are made of lead-free solder. I believe this is the case because there is a law in place that says microsoft must not use lead in any products they market directly to children.

Lead free solder becomes very brittle after many rapid changes in temperature (aka normal Xbox operation, turning on, turning off).
Eventually it develops very small, sometimes even microscopic fault lines or cracks in the balls (usually under the GPU (graphics processing unit) because this is the chip that heats up the most on the board because it doesn't have sufficient cooling with the small heatsink (the piece of metal that is attached to the top of the chip to pull heat away from the chip and ensure normal operating temperature) it has. It's heatsink is small to make room for the DVD drive in there. Anyway, this means the GPU has the biggest gap between its lowest temperature and its highest, so the solder becomes the most brittle. When these cracks develop, they can sever or break the connection between one point on the chip and one on the board. This means the chip isn't completely connected to the board and yields you an error (RROD, E74, etc). Many people claim to fix this by replacing the x-clamps with bolts. This puts pressure on the chip to bridge to two points that cracked. This can be very bad for the chip and destroy the other solder balls over time.

The best fixes for this problem are a "reflow" or a "reball."

A reflow is essentially, when you use a reworking machine (made specifically for electronics) to remelt the solder under the chip at fault to reconnect the severed connection. You should use flux before reflowing, which is a liquid subtance you want to get underneath the chip to remove any oxidation from the old solder, as well as allow it to be soft and help for a clean reflow. This solution is seen as temporary because it doesn't actually fix the problems. There is still rapid heating and cooling of lead free solder, so eventually it may die again. Although reflows, if done right (and not with a heat gun) can last years. You'll see lots of videos on fixing xboxs with a heat gun instead of a reworking station, I would stay away from this as you can easily rupture capacitors and other surface components and destroy your xbox.

A reball is the better of the two options, but its time consuming and expensive usually. This is when you use a reworking machine to melt the solder, then completely remove the chip that is causing the error. You then flux and remove all the solder from that chip and it's contacts on the board, replace the solder balls (using a reworking jig) and remelt them to make contact with all the points on the board. If you use leaded solder balls instead of lead-free, you should have a much longer lasting chip because leaded solder is much more resistant to rapid changes in heat.

The only real way to completely prevent e74 or RROD is to replace all the solder on every chip with leaded solder, and increase the cooling, but this is not usually worth the effort, so people usually opt for just a reflow or a reball of a single chip and leave it at that. Usually it doesn't die again, if anytime soon.

This is just the most common take on the whole thing. A lot of people think that the design of the xbox, where the fans pull heat over the motherboard through the back, causes the board to warp and to disconnect points on it. There is a lot less proof to support this theory, but could be plausible in certain instances.

In your case, you have a broken solder join underneath either the GPU or the HANA chip (the HANA chip handles resolution and scaling to the TV from the GPU). You will need to rework (reflow or reball) either the GPU or HANA, probably the GPU.

There are many people on this forum who could do this for you, myself included. I can only reflow though because I don't have a reballing jig yet.

Good luck with this thing man and ask if you have any questions, or if I didn't explain something well enough.

I've had my Xbox reballed twice. Am I out of hope?
 
kanyun

kanyun

Enthusiast
Messages
790
Reaction score
191
Points
125
Sin$
7
I've had my Xbox reballed twice. Am I out of hope?
Not necessarily. Did you bring it to the same person both times? I'd be willing to bet there are many dishonest people out there who would say they were reballing, but were in fact reflowing. They know there is no way for you to tell what they did. If all they did was reflow it both times, then a reball should fix it. Maybe try taking it to someone new.

If they did indeed reball it 2 times, maybe they only reballed the GPU. E74 can also be a cold solder joint under the HANA chip, so that could've been your problem all along and it was overlooked. Try a reflow or reball of the HANA chip.

If they ripped a pad off the GPU or damaged the chip in some other way, you can replace the whole chip. I think they have preballed GPUs on ebay for around 15-20 bucks. Then you don't have to mess with putting the balls back on the old chip!

The only other case I can think of where a reball wouldn't work is if the board was warped or flexed. This can happen by doing the x-clamp "fix", heatgunning, or even a regular rework under the wrong circumstances (no preheater, board not bolted down, using too high of a temperature on the rework station).

Sometimes you can put your motherboard in an oven at a low temperature for a fairly long duration (3-6 hours) and it will help with the flexing or completely eliminate it, but don't try this unless you can visibly see flexing on your board.
 
Top Bottom
Login
Register