My Ps3 Overheated For The First Time Today.

Can I like ask you all a question? What environments do you put your console system in? For a hard drive to frag on you usually means the sucker has got be in an area that has absolutely no airflow.

With that out of the way *sigh*, from what I've seen concerning the hard drives with PS3's it does appear to be a standard laptop hard drive... with one catch. A slightly decreased motor speed. Most laptop drives at 5400 rpm, looks like the console goes at 4600 rpm. Not sure if you want to try replacing it, but bear in mind the following...

A) As I cannot confirm that the HDD is just for storage, I cannot promise you that it would work. B) IF this console is like a laptop and has a recovery partition on it, I believe this to be the case out of the fact that the unit will let you reformat, you could lose more than what you bargained for!

Unfortunately both the PS3 and the Xbox 360 have a cooling issue, not in the fact of keeping cool, but needing wider air flow. (History lesson warning) Most Nintendo game equipment was treated like an Atari 2600... out in the open. Then came Genesis, and super NES, and PlayStation... the quid pro changed to start pimping consoles with with your home entertainment unit, and with the release of Xbox and PS2 it changed even more! I've seen folks having their units with glass cases now because of the popularity of wireless. Here's where it gets interesting, because TV's have changed so has heat disbursement! If you have a 'crt' = regular TV, the heat normally just went straight up, which is why you always had your console on the floor, and NEVER on top of the TV. With LCD and plasma units the heat can be sent in a 360 degree spread. Don't believe me, take a look at the back of your unit sometime and compare it with a regular and see how any air hole outlets there are. Because a good deal of home 'cabinet' style units have backs the heat will get sucked up by the material its using. Without any outlet for air you virtually create your own microwave and 'cook' your console to death.

*sigh* ironic how times have changed but many aspects the technology hasn't. If anyone can find their manuals; please read the part about the console 'being put in a well ventilated area'. For the record, this actually means on top of the cabinet not in it, if you use a TV stand, take out the backing and the door too (IF it has one that is). Finally one small thought, if you happen to have one of those laptop cooling trays... might not be such a bad idea to use this for either console because it will help with airflow.

 

Hi ppl,

This is my first post, but I have been lurking around this forum for a while now as a guest. I wasn't even registered until 5 mins ago! Thats because whenever i come to this forum, its when something gone wrong, and quickly progressed into an emergency. I am usually going nuts looking at your posts for solutions. After which, I will be hastily getting back at my emergency situation.

So this is my first time I actually had the time to sit down and browse through the forum at my leisure. I know should have posted this in the newbie intro section. (I have been reading and I know what happens if you put the wrong post in the wrong section), but my post is sorta like a intro but also a reply to this thread in particular.

I have owned a PS3 since day 1. I do not own a 360 or Wii. I have been a supporter of Sony PS machines all along. While I cannot say that I am terribly impressed with the first version of PS, but I must say Sony has improved a lot since the Nitendo days (Think Delta force - Remember Up Up down down left right left right B A Select Start? Yeah....)

Right back to my main point, I owned a PS3 the day it was launched in Japan (Someone queued and brought it back to me from japan) the same day. So, on the next day, within 24 hours, my set was online and I must say it can really hold well and it is amazing how robust this machine really is in reality.

Till date, I have never switched off my PS3. That is because I installed FOLDING@ Home? Its sorta like distributed computing for the sake of fiunding a cure for cancer. So, I figured while I am not playing games, I tot it might be a good idea to contribute whatever I can for a good cause, hopefully. You can see that my system is probably very active and busy for most time, but its still going well. BUt I have my glitches, of course.

The heat problem can be quite bad. If you put hands near the vents, it can get pretty hot. For me, the problem is, like Jeice28 mentioned, poor positioning and lack of ventilation. Plus, the accumulation of dust at the air vents. My solution was to use compressed gas (For cameras etc) and blast the crap out of the system. You will be amazed what you see coming out of the vents.

I had to reset the system a couple of times because it hung on me. But ever since I re-positioned it not long ago, it stopped. However, I also noticed that it only hung on 2 games (Need for Speed Carbon and Rainbow Six Las Vegas), but NEVER the rest (COD4, GT5 Prolouge, MGS4, and many others). I can understand for R6LV, because I searchewd the forums, and entered one ofthe codes that enabled one of the guns and the head shot cheat. Perhaps, the software is performing abnormally cos I used two of its backdoors to get something I am not supposed to have. But for NOS-Carbon, I am still confused up till now. Its only when I kept encountering frequent hangups, then i paid some attention to the location of the system. Thats how I came to the compressed gas thing. But the hangups for Rainbow Six were gone after the compressed gas and positioning efforts. However, the game still acted funny, especially on the graphics. Like theres some problem with the rendering. Whenever the scene has shadows, that area would be SOLID black or green, instead of being slightly darker and harder to see than areas without shadows. Thats a problem when you are playing games like R6. however, my latest adition MGS4, has been running without problems for 1 week now. Nope, no folding@home now. I have a much more greater cause now , to save the world.

Oh, I should also mention that I went out to get a 250gb Seagate 5400rpm HDD. Might as well.

When I installed the new drive, the system did not want to bootup and asked for firmware installer. So, I downloaded the latest software, which was 2.3xxx, onto a USB drive and it just did its thing based on that and whatever that is hardcoded originaly in the set.

Hope this helps at least somebody. If not, take it as a really long winded intro from a newbie and go easy on me.

Thanks a million

Roger

 

I have a first gen PS3 purchased on release date. I seldom shut it down because it's replaced our DVD player for the kids and has pretty much replaced our DVR, so between TV and gaming it's in use most of the time. Since we don't have a universal remote with bluetooth, it gets left on all night as well. I've never had a heat problem and it's sitting on top of a hot DVR unit.

The hard drive can be replaced easily. You'll lose saved games, cached game info, etc but the system will NOT be negatively impacted. The "system" is NOT stored on the hard drive and in fact the PS3 is designed to prevent executing code from the hard drive.

The hard drive is a standard 2.5" SATA (1.5Gb) "laptop" hard drive. If they are 4200 RPM, it's because lower RPM yields less heat. You can pretty much replace it with any SATA or SATA-II hard drive. It does NOT have to be a 2.5" drive. If you go to a 3.5" you will just need to put it in an external enclosure that sports its own power supply and an eSata connector. You also have to get the cable to go from internal SATA to eSATA, or there is now a caddy you can buy to put in place of the 2.5" drive. It will provide an eSATA connector on the outside of the PS3 for about $25. HOWEVER DO NO BUY THIS FROM CONSOLESHOP.COM OR MODCHIP.COM without first doing a google search on the company. You've been warned. I currently have a 750GB 3.5" SATA-II drive on mine. The PS3 only makes use of SATA 1.5Gb, but the drive is much faster than a 2.5" on access times. Doing this also takes the heat load of the HDD out of the PS3 chassis and the electrical load off the PS3 power supply. The extra capacity is also handy for storing Blu-Ray backups at 4GB-20GB each. With Sony soon to offer movie downloads, you may need that capacity soon anyway. Game load time is improved as well; I read a review of 30% increase in speed on some complex games that cache data on the drive.

If you're having heat problems, I agree with the guy who questioned where you have your system installed. It should be in a location where it can get fresh air from the front and exhaust it out the back, without the exhaust swirling back to the front (don't put it in a media center with a back on it...ridiculous.) For extra piece of mind, buy yourself a cooler. I believe the Pelican cooler was a great balance between looks, sound level and performance. It also did not pull power from the PS3 and had automatic variable speed fans. Google it.

 

this is just a guess but if your ps3 overheated are u playing it in a attic or basement? if it sin the attic many times theres no airflow as theres not alot of windows in attic rooms. and if its in the basement since its underground theres alot of moisture in the air, moisture dampening up the ps3s chips cant be good.

also at best buy or whatever u can buy a fan attachment that adds 4 extra fans to the top of your ps3 for i think 25$ it comes with its own seperate power chord and everything so it doesnt draw more power from your ps3.

mine hasnt overheated yet but man does the fan get loud! sometimes if its really zooming i take a 20 minute break every few hours just to let it cool off. i also sometimes point a regular fan at it just to be safe.

my friend has a 360 and he actually took a drill and put extra vent holes thru his whole casing, which u cant do on ps3 cuz of the plastic will prob crack but just thought it was funny to mention that he did that haha.

and lastly dont sell your messed up ps3 on ebay if it dont work right, then someone else is gonna get your problem and thats just really being a jerk.

 

No offense confuzion... but I think you need to read my rant I did on 13. July 2008. That was exactly what I asked / wondered. Now as far as removing the grill goes on an xbox 360... I'm curious if it hasn't tried to swallow a 14 year old tabby cat? That grill also acts like a dust guard, depending on the model, which means he could potentially be creating a both a fire hazard... or worse; to which the thought unfortunately puts an evil smile on my face, could possibly although unlikely, set that unit on fire due how much dust its sucked in.

You can remove the grating on both systems and create your own case because none of the components are hard soldered they appear to be screwed into place, you could easily gut a vcr, get a psu, put in a couple of case fans and arrange the components of either system inside... the question is would you want to do that for better cooling. I did it for first xbox 360... the sum bitch still fried!

 

no offense taken, i only saw the inside of his xbox 360 once and i cant remember what it looks like but hes pretty good with computers he went to networking school and stuff so im sure he prob is smart enoguh to use a duster, still good point though!

 

Well you never know what kind of loons you got out there. I just had some guy leave his console system outside... in the snow. He tried turning it on and it fried. Water and electricity don't mix. If he isn't using canned air then I hope he's using a kirby vacuum as that sucker has the mods to turn it into a blower... god where was this thing when I needed it 6 years ago?!?

I think this officially ends this forum.... but I'll be listening in.

 

my ps3 just turned into a monster and ate confuzion =(

 

Does anyone know where the temperature sensors are on the PS3? I tried to reflow the solder and killed the temperature sensors. Now the fan hardly even runs.

My PS3 was overheating and doing the fan test everytime I booted it. It also did not display video or play any sound.

I done the reflow and the fan test stopped but the audio/video is still not working.

 

I've had a smilar problem, its a new 80GB PS3, would still be in warranty if I had a receipt but i got it from one of those referral deals, so no receipt

Anyway, it's been cold this winter and the room was quite warm, turn on my PS3 and I get the flashing red light and the beeping. Press the power button let it cool and it started again. But now ever so often even in a mild room the PS3 starts flashing & beeping again requiring it to be restarted.

So is it me or does it sound like if you do ever get the flashing red light and beeping it means that it's only a matter of time before your PS3 is about to die?

 

it says in the ps3 booklet if the red and blue flashes back and forth then that means the ps3 is overheating. when i play battlefield on my ps3 the game freezes my ps3 alot, sometimes movies to but i can still go to the option of shutting down the ps3 thru the controller and it wont shut down properly it will make those 5 beeps. so sometimes the beeps just mean something on the menu was frozen or wont shut down right.