I really appreciate Microsoft's extended 3-year warranty as much as the next 360 owner, but this is ridiculous. Seems like there's been a rise in sales for the console over in Australia, so much sold to say that every EB Games were sold out of 360's, most likely due to the warranty.

Problem is, they were asked to be recalled recently, not being specific on what the problem was...if it was the design fault, RRoD, or something different. Since EB Games appearantly sold them all, it will take some time to track those particular consoles and even more time to get them repaired and shipped again. Bad news for Australians...and Microsoft.

According to an inside source, about two weeks ago all EB Games stores in Australia were told to return every Xbox 360 they had in stock. Indeed a look on the EB Games Web site shows that the Xbox 360 is "sold out" at every store we checked.

It's another setback for Microsoft's console, with buyers worldwide being given an extended warranty just over a week ago due to a "design fault". Coping with the increased number of repairs is expected to cost the company in excess of $1 billion.

There is no word yet whether the alleged return of Xbox 360s in Australia is a result of this same design fault, or another problem entirely.

A salesman at one of the EB Games stores in Sydney told GameSpot AU that all the stock received within the last two weeks is being recalled, but also speculated that "it could go back as far as a month".

Both Harvey Norman and Dick Smith have the product in stock as of the morning of July 16. EB Games refused to return our calls and a spokesperson for Microsoft declined to comment, telling Gamespot AU that, "we're not going to comment on that".

Storm via gamespot.com »