Microsoft is sending out thousands of free Xbox 360s to replace boxes suffering from software glitch — even though most users probably didn’t even notice the problem.

Gamer Avery Penn posted on Reddit yesterday that he got a surprise email from Xbox Customer Support notifying him that he could get a new Xbox 250GB model along with a free one-year subscription to Xbox Live.

The email said that a software update was preventing some Xboxes from reading some game discs. Penn hadn’t noticed the glitch at all, and thought it the email might be a scam. So he
contacted Xbox customer support via Twitter and found out that it’s true.

Apparently Microsoft’s Xbox Live service was able to detect that he had one of the bad machines, so Microsoft sent the email out ahead of any problems. The replacement is quite a bit better than his current one — a 60GB model from 2009.

Users will have to send their current Xboxes back to Microsoft to get the replacements. Microsoft confirmed the report, but said it affected less than 10,000 consoles. Today, the company told PC Magazine that the software update was meant to prevent counterfeit games, but wouldn’t offer more details for fear that it would help pirates.

If you think you have a broken machine, get in touch with Microsoft through the Xbox customer support page.WOW! I’m going to contact Microsoft and notify them that random games are freezing my system.