Sony’s Fallen Giant

Erik Kubik shares this sad moment about his PS3. My ps3 died this last Monday, right in the middle of some Red Faction Guerrilla multiplayer. The 60 GB system that loved me for the past 2 ½ years croaked. My console and I had been through thick and thin.

On that horrifying night, 30 minutes into the game my ps3 suddenly shut down, which I thought was slightly unusual. I powered the system back up, it ran for 5 minutes, beeped, and then shut down while briefly flashing a yellow light and then started flashing a red light before I powered it off completely. From my initial research on the Internet, I would say the power supply or one of the fans went bad. How can this happen? I kept my ps3 in a well ventilated area and I never used the system for more than three hours at a time.

Overall, two and a half years is a good run for a system. My regular Xbox broke after a year and a half. I sold my Dreamcast and Gamecube after a year; and they never broke down on me.

I noticed about three months ago the fans on the system were working really hard. I thought to myself at the time that I should back up my saved games. Why didn’t I do that…?

Now, I come home from work and instead of relaxing with the ps3, I attempt to watch TV or play the Wii or DS; it’s just not the same. I find myself getting bored and thinking about the ps3. Now it sits in the corner, an ominous black coffin at the edge of a slow and painful death, having gasped its last breath earlier. I have a feeling the broken console is mocking me and my despair.

I purchased my ps3 in August of 2007 so the warranty is long expired. I do have a few options though. I could pay Sony $189 dollars to fix it and receive a three-month warranty. Sony would have my black coffin for a week to two weeks. I would receive either a refurbished console or my original one. None of my data from the hard drives would be saved. I could pay a third-party repair service around $100 and they promise to save all my data and have it back to me in three days. They offer a 30-day guarantee. Based on recommendations and their feedback they appear to be legitimate and stand behind their work. Or I could save some out-of-pocket money and sell it on eBay for parts; broken 60 gb ps3’s seem to fetch $130-$150.

My biggest concern is losing the data. I have 40+ hours dumped into some of the games. Games like Fallout 3 and its DLC, Resident Evil 5, infamous and Uncharted 2. The only saving grace in losing this data is that I could clean out my game collection and trade the titles I no longer play on Goozex.

My final option is to try and pinpoint the issue and fix it myself. If it’s the fan or the power supply, those can be purchased online for $30-$50. There are plenty of videos that demonstrate the fixes. However, I run the risk of completely breaking it and wasting my time.


If I decide to get rid of it, I think it’s time I went to my local GS, use some saved up trade-in credit, and pick up a 120 gb slim.

I have a feeling my ps3 was giving me some sort of sign. Like it was telling me that I play too many video games and that I need to cut back a bit. Or maybe it was that I should have acted on the warning signs from four months ago when it started dying.

My last option is to jump on the 360 bandwagon.