Details below the cut.
1) Turns out the old XBox is still under warranty (until 10/2010). That means the repair is free (including shipping – the only thing not covered is shipping materials). I stand by my decision to upgrade hardware, though – the timing was too short between now and the release of Beatles Rock Band and I emphatically do not want to miss the release date. It’s my great fortune that I can afford this option (as opposed to getting the present one repaired and waiting for it), which I credit to my own good luck and my parents’ great generosity (they paid for my birthday gutters which meant I had some liquid assets to do this ridiculous thing).
2) Found a new home for the old XBox when it gets back on its feet. I’ll be able to convey a significant add-on (the 120 GB drive) and some old games that I’ve played through and am not interested in unlocking again (the one thing totally lost is any old save data and unlocks from previous gaming sessions). The new owner had offered to pay, but I declined. As far as I’m concerned if you get splashy like this, the ethical thing is to not incur cost on anyone else. The shipping label is printed for the old XBox. All that remains is to get it to UPS, packed and sent off. Then I’ll just track process and get in touch with the new owner when it’s ready.
3) The new XBox was finally able to calibrate both audio AND video delays with Rock Band 2. Turned out not to be the peripheral (which I’d assumed was faulty) but the XBox (the old one was only able to calibrate audio). Settings for audio are a little quicker, so it must have to do partially with the XBox hardware and partly to do with how the rest of your setup is configured. Since Rock Band 2 automatically calibrates when using a Rock Band 2 peripheral (which has a microphone and photodetector built in specifically for the purpose), the sync data is not widely written about on the Internet – folks just set up and go and think no more about it. This was intensely frustrating for me as a someone who had trouble with the calibration process, so I intend to try to help fix that here by thoroughly describing my setup and hardware and letting folks know at least for that setup what the calibration settings are.
To whit:
Both of my XBoxes are/were connected directly to the TV (A Sony Bravia XBR5 40″ LCD HDTV) via an HDMI cable, which carries both audio and video signal. No amplifiers or outside speakers are involved. On the Bravia, the HDMI cable is connected to the Bravia’s HDMI1 port.
The old XBox, a Halo Limited Edition XBox using the Zephyr Motherboard Revision (which I ID with the combination of knowledge that the power supply is 16.5A and it had a built-in HDMI port via this table), was unable to automatically calibrate Video (which I never got quite right), did calibrate Audio at a delay of 76 ms.
The new XBox, an Elite Edition XBox with the Jasper Motherboard Revision (power supply: 12.1 A, HDMI port) was able to calibrate both Video (46 ms) and Audio (67 ms).
20100323 UPDATE: The info above seems to still hold for Beatles Rock Band but I recalibrated last night (finding that the calibration for video didn’t work at all for me without standing about 6 feet away from the TV and that audio didn’t work for me without standing very close or turning the sound way up) and both Video and Audio were around 80 ms.