Question about broken PS3

[samifan24]

My buddy's PS3 went kaput late last week and now it won't read discs of any type. If the problem is that the optical drive is broken, how much do you think it would cost to have this repaired? The PS3 is out of warranty but Best Buy said they will still fix it for him but did not give him a quote.

[DanGarion]

Originally Posted by samifan24

My buddy's PS3 went kaput late last week and now it won't read discs of any type. If the problem is that the optical drive is broken, how much do you think it would cost to have this repaired? The PS3 is out of warranty but Best Buy said they will still fix it for him but did not give him a quote.

Did he buy it with a credit card?

[samifan24]

Originally Posted by DanGarion

Did he buy it with a credit card?

No he didn't but an ex-gf did. He already called her and she doesn't have the receipt and I guess he doesn't want to pursue that. I don't know. He asked me if I knew and so we went to Best Buy. I'm just wondering how much the thing would cost to fix. If it's more than $200 he's probably going to buy a new one and give the broken one to me.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by samifan24

No he didn't but an ex-gf did. He already called her and she doesn't have the receipt and I guess he doesn't want to pursue that. I don't know. He asked me if I knew and so we went to Best Buy. I'm just wondering how much the thing would cost to fix. If it's more than $200 he's probably going to buy a new one and give the broken one to me.

Pretty sure the standard repair price is $129 if I remember correctly from the website.

[Icy]

There is only one repair price no matter what is the thing broken, that price changes for each country so i don't know how much is it in USA.

In fact they do not repair your console, you send it to them, pay that set price and they send you another console, either brand new or refurbished (whatever they want).

I had that broken lens problem 3 months ago, but mine was still under warranty, so they sent me another PS3 (not mine but a refurbished one).

[samifan24]

I called Sony and found out it costs $149 so now my buddy is going to keep his PS3 and just send it in for repairs. It just sucks now because I won't get a PS3 for $149 anymore.

[Draft Dodger]

Originally Posted by Icy

I had that broken lens problem 3 months ago, but mine was still under warranty, so they sent me another PS3 (not mine but a refurbished one).

I had mine go recently too. Literally, this happened on the very last day of the warranty. I would have been really, really upset if I had missed the cutoff.

We haven't had good luck with ours. The first one went bad within a couple of months (not sure what that issue was). Then this happened right at the end of the warranty period. and the replacement unit they sent was DOA. So, I essentially had 3 PS3s die within a year.

[RainMaker]

My controller won't work all of a sudden. When I go to turn it on I just get the 4 lights blinking real fast. It'll work if I plug it in directly but I can't play that close. Tried resetting the controller and turning on/off the system. It's only a few months old. Any suggestions?

[Icy]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

My controller won't work all of a sudden. When I go to turn it on I just get the 4 lights blinking real fast. It'll work if I plug it in directly but I can't play that close. Tried resetting the controller and turning on/off the system. It's only a few months old. Any suggestions?

If it works plugged, it could be just that it's out of sync. Search in google as there must be a way to re-sync/pair the bluetooth controller.

[RainMaker]

Thanks, I finally got it to work somehow. Just kept resetting the controller and turning the power off completely from the PS3. I don't like the Bluetooth thing at all.

[samifan24]

I'm thinking about upgrading the PS3's HD when I receive it back from Sony. It is a 40 GB unit and I'm thinking of installing either a 320 GB or 500 GB HD. I've seen good deals on some Western Digital drives at New Egg. Can anyone recommend a specific drive for this kind of thing?

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by samifan24

I'm thinking about upgrading the PS3's HD when I receive it back from Sony. It is a 40 GB unit and I'm thinking of installing either a 320 GB or 500 GB HD. I've seen good deals on some Western Digital drives at New Egg. Can anyone recommend a specific drive for this kind of thing?

Any good laptop drive will do. I'd suggest just going off of the user reviews at Newegg. I upgraded to a 7200rpm Western Digital (320gb) and I've had no problems at all and installation took less than 5 minutes.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Any good laptop drive will do. I'd suggest just going off of the user reviews at Newegg. I upgraded to a 7200rpm Western Digital (320gb) and I've had no problems at all and installation took less than 5 minutes.

+1

Have the same drive with similar experience.

[samifan24]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Any good laptop drive will do. I'd suggest just going off of the user reviews at Newegg. I upgraded to a 7200rpm Western Digital (320gb) and I've had no problems at all and installation took less than 5 minutes.

Thanks I was looking at the Western Digital Scorpio 320 GB 5400 RPM drive. It has a lot of good reviews and many reviewers state that they installed it in their PS3 as a HD upgrade drive. I guess the hardest part of the whole process is getting the screws off the HD housing.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by samifan24

Thanks I was looking at the Western Digital Scorpio 320 GB 5400 RPM drive. It has a lot of good reviews and many reviewers state that they installed it in their PS3 as a HD upgrade drive. I guess the hardest part of the whole process is getting the screws off the HD housing.

Take the time to make sure your screwdriver properly fits the screws. They come out pretty easy if you have the right size. If it's too big or too small, you can strip them.

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by samifan24

Thanks I was looking at the Western Digital Scorpio 320 GB 5400 RPM drive. It has a lot of good reviews and many reviewers state that they installed it in their PS3 as a HD upgrade drive. I guess the hardest part of the whole process is getting the screws off the HD housing.

Hey, I was just looking at the same drive to upgrade my release 20 gig ps3

Someone posted in their review that the screws are actually Robertson screws.
You can use a phillips to take them out but have to be careful of stripping. He went on to say if you use a "0 size" Robertson screwdriver they will not slip or strip. It's the first I'd heard of this but is something I'm going to check into when I order a new drive.

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Any good laptop drive will do. I'd suggest just going off of the user reviews at Newegg. I upgraded to a 7200rpm Western Digital (320gb) and I've had no problems at all and installation took less than 5 minutes.

So then, no issues with going to the higher speed 7200 rpm drive? I remember checking into doing this awhile back and some were thinking you had to stay with a 5400 rpm. Did you notice a big difference in performance?

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by Sweed

So then, no issues with going to the higher speed 7200 rpm drive? I remember checking into doing this awhile back and some were thinking you had to stay with a 5400 rpm. Did you notice a big difference in performance?

Feature : 7200rpm Vs. 5400rpm: Does PS3 hard drive speed matter? [PS3] - from GamePro.com

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

dola

Here's a link with instructions and video of how to install the HDD........

The PS3 Hard Drive is Easy to Upgrade

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by Mizzou B-ball fan

Feature : 7200rpm Vs. 5400rpm: Does PS3 hard drive speed matter? [PS3] - from GamePro.com

Thanks, very helpful. With that info a 5400 will be just fine for me.

It's amazing how fast the "little" 20 gig fills up. I only have The Show, nba2k9, Head Coach, Fight Night 4, Rock Band 2 with RB1 songs and probably 20-30 d'loaded songs, and of course save files. My daughter has Oblivian and a couple of games that only use kbs of space.

Trouble came when I got Metal Gear. The only way to make room for it was to delete Oblivian. So "thinking about replacing the drive" has become "HAVE to replace the drive" Not a bad thing and something I should have done long ago.

Makes me think back to 1989 when I got my first PC. My neighbor worked for Unisys, and then went on to work for Crays (sp)" was amazed that it had a 20 MB drive and was jealous of all the space I had.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by Sweed

Thanks, very helpful. With that info a 5400 will be just fine for me.

It's amazing how fast the "little" 20 gig fills up. I only have The Show, nba2k9, Head Coach, Fight Night 4, Rock Band 2 with RB1 songs and probably 20-30 d'loaded songs, and of course save files. My daughter has Oblivian and a couple of games that only use kbs of space.

Trouble came when I got Metal Gear. The only way to make room for it was to delete Oblivian. So "thinking about replacing the drive" has become "HAVE to replace the drive" Not a bad thing and something I should have done long ago.

Makes me think back to 1989 when I got my first PC. My neighbor worked for Unisys, and then went on to work for Crays (sp)" was amazed that it had a 20 MB drive and was jealous of all the space I had.

The standard HDD slot is easily one of the best things about the PS3. I'd expect all consoles in the next generation to have that feature.

[samifan24]

Originally Posted by Sweed

Hey, I was just looking at the same drive to upgrade my release 20 gig ps3

Someone posted in their review that the screws are actually Robertson screws.
You can use a phillips to take them out but have to be careful of stripping. He went on to say if you use a "0 size" Robertson screwdriver they will not slip or strip. It's the first I'd heard of this but is something I'm going to check into when I order a new drive.

This site has a collection of information about removing the hard drive.

It says:

Also, the #0 screwdriver size is actually too small. You can get the job done in a pinch with that size, but you really risk stripping the screw more than if you use the PROPER SIZE, which is a #1. (#1 x 2-1/2" to be precise)

So does anyone know if a size 0 or size 1 screwdriver is correct?

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by samifan24

This site has a collection of information about removing the hard drive.

It says:


So does anyone know if a size 0 or size 1 screwdriver is correct?

Yeah, there's a lot of differing information out there. I ordered the 320 gb HD from newegg last night. I guess when I go to put it in I'll just have a good assortment of tools handy. Seems on most sites someone mentions loosening the screws first with a pliers.

I'll just take my time and baby it along. Shouldn't be too big of a deal.

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by samifan24

This site has a collection of information about removing the hard drive.

It says:


So does anyone know if a size 0 or size 1 screwdriver is correct?

I just finished putting in my new 320 gig drive from newegg

I had no problems using a #1 phillips. With all of the reports about how tight they were and how easy the stripped I was surprised how easy they came loose. I babied the screws with slow steady pressure and they came loose quite easily.

Plugged every thing back in and ps3 went right to a screen telling me I would have to format the drive with yes or no option. Took a minute or less for the drive to format and I was up and running.

As others report you end up with quite a bit less space than the original 320 gig. I have something like 269 gig free of 296 gig after format. Glad I didn't buy a 80 or 120 gig drive, only $15 more to go to the 320gig.

FWIW I used a #0 phillips to take out the blue screw that holds in the hd housing. Not sure if the #1 would have worked but it just looked so small eyeballing it. I can't see how anyone could use a needle-nose pliers to get any of the screws loose. I tried it at first because of all of the stripping reports and gave up after about 2 seconds. Just nothing to get a hold of and felt like this would be more likely to cause damage than trying to baby out the screws with the phillips.

Only saved game I moved over was "The Show", worked fine. Pissed me off that games like Rock Band and Fight Night can't be copied using a usb stick.
I guess it works if you have a external drive and use the ps3 backup utility but I don't have one and didn't see it being worth the expense.

So off to reinstall my games, d'load pathces and songs for RB and I'm good to go

[samifan24]

Originally Posted by Sweed

I just finished putting in my new 320 gig drive from newegg

I had no problems using a #1 phillips. With all of the reports about how tight they were and how easy the stripped I was surprised how easy they came loose. I babied the screws with slow steady pressure and they came loose quite easily.

Good to know you have a relatively easy experience doing this. I'll probably buy the same HD in the next week or so. Gotta make sure I get the right size screwdrivers, too, since I don't think I have anything that small now.