If you have the Xbox 360 3 red lights or the E74 error then you have one of the worst hardware problems that you can get with your console. This means that you will need to find a way to repair it before you can get the lights back to green.

This article will tell you a bit more about both of these errors, and also give you a few tips that you can use to get your console fixed as fast as possible.

Firstly the Xbox 360 3 red lights error is the most common and also has been around for the longest. In fact people have been plagued with this error since the console launched and the reason it happens is because of overheating.

This is not normally anything to do with where you are placing your console, and how many heaters you have in your house but more to do with the design internally. As you play your games and let's face it video games have come a long way and require a lot of power to display high end graphics, well this causes the two main chips which are the GPU and the CPU to overheat.

If they continue to overheat then eventually they will shut down to try and prevent damage to the console and that is when you are left with the 3 red lights error.

If you have the E74 error then this too is a common problem and has become more common recently since the new falcon chip model was released.

This error is caused by overheating as well except the parts of the motherboard that are affected are different.

This time it is the scaler chip which deals with the display that is overheating and similar to the 3 red lights if it overheats too much it shuts down to prevent damage to your console.

You will get 1 red light with this error and normally a message on the screen saying contact customer support.

The above errors will need to be fixed and you have two ways of doing this, the first way is to contact customer support and they will ship it away and you can expect wait up to six weeks to get your new console from Microsoft.

Or you can take the matter into your own hands and stop the overheating yourself by using an Xbox 360 repair guide that basically is a collection of videos that will show you how to stop the heat build up and therefore fix the problem.

Make sure that you get a preview of the videos and also that it comes with a complete guarantee and you will be with a working Xbox in no time.

I hope this article has told you a bit more about the difference between the Xbox 360 3 red lights and the Xbox 360 E74 error and also given you a few tips that will help you fix it fast.