Be Excellent To Each Other

As you may or may not know, I purchased GazChap's PS3 from him last week, but that arrived with the Yellow Light of Death, so I had to send it back to him.

So, I found a 160GB Slim on Amazon Marketplace for £95 + £2.02 postage marked as 'Used - Like New'. Having arrived it looks in great nick; however, when I turn it on it won't boot to the main menu - just sticks on the green screen with the wavy lines.

I've looked up the problem and it appears to be HDD related, so advises me to try to repair the HDD. However, the method for booting into the system menu is to hold down the power button for 3-5 seconds from standby - this just gives me a blank black screen.

Is it fucked? Could I just ram any old eSata drive into it and attempt to format it? I am really loathe to send a second whole unit back again - I might just give up with the idea completely.

Any ideas? I know next to nothing about PS3s.

Yeah, I just threw a hard drive from a dead laptop into mine with no troubles

Bloody hell! I dunno, but maybe try the HDD idea if you have one handy? However I assume you'd have to have a functioning PS3 in the first place in order to format the hard drive for PS3 use. Or something? Maybe it'll just detect a blank HDD and format it up for you?

edit: Wahoo! Dave brings good news.

Sorry to hear that Myps, hop eyou get it sorted.

*awaits punchline*

If you're stuck for a hard drive, you can have my old PS3 40gb drive.

BTW: If it does turn out you need another (functioning) PS3 to format the HDD or whatever, I'd be happy to sort it out for you if you send the HDD this way.

This thread is lovely.

Handy tip.

Holding down the power button until it beeps once, then beeps again will make the PS3 recognise what connection you have to your TV and will auto configure it.

As for the hard drive, I think you can download the latest firmware from the Sony website. If you remove the drive, format it then put the firmware on it and put it back in your PS3. It should sort itself out.

There is a diagnostics menu too but I can't remember how to get into that.

Thanks guys.

I've found an old 250GB Toshiba drive from my old laptop, so I wanged that in and now it wants the latest update, so I'm downloading that on my computer and I'm going to put it on a USB stick.

Why is this so fucking complicated? All I want to do is play LittleBigPlanet.

It's shit any way!

Good luck with it Myp, you're not having much luck, are you?

In other PS3 news, I still haven't bothered getting another HDMI cable to hook my Slim up properly. But I intend to rectify this tomorrow along with a cheeky purchase of Uncharted 3.

Ok, it's formatting the new (old) drive now. Let's see what happens!

Where do I stand with regards to the seller do you think? On one hand it was advertised as a 160GB Slim, but the drive was 120GB and knackered. On the other hand I paid under a ton for it, so don't know whether I'd be a bit of an arse to ask for a partial refund.

I'd have just sent it back, saying it doesn't work, sort it. They'll say "sold as seen mate" and you'll say "it didn't work, you said it did" and then complain to amazon a bit, I guess.

I dunno. I guess if I got it working I'd probably just grumpily accept it. It's up to you I suppose! It was pretty cheap, and if this works it's a 250GB PS3!

Maybe fire an email explaining the situation (assuming you get it working) and try to get a few quid back or maybe some games if he sells those as well?

I think that's what I'll end up doing. I sent them an email before I found my old HDD asking them if they'd send me another one to test it with. If they do that then I haven't lost out.

If they don't, , I guess.

I've just been offered a £40 refund. I started typing out an email saying that would be fine, then I started to feel bad as I'm pretty sure they won't make any money on it if I accept.

What would you do?

Would £40 fix it? If it will then that's all good. If not, send it back and get 100% back.

Take the money.

Wait until you've sat there for three hours doing all the dog slow system updates that PSN expect you to do, then with steam coming from your ears you'll feel more like you've earned the money

Ha! Take the bloody money! If they were so quick to offer it, chances are they either knew about it or are just happy to write this one off and avoid the hassle.

If this is an Amazon seller, presumably it's a small business of some sort, right? If it were someone from BEEX selling his old gear, I'd think twice, but not from a business person who is actually making the offer to you.

It has probably decimated the profit margin on the particular sale, but there are always more sales!

BUT: Don't reply until it's functioning as it should! It'll only make the whole process more annoying if by 10PM tonight you have to email again and say "actually, I want to send the whole lot back".

All working now! I'm going to take the cash and run for the hills.

Yaay!

I am SilentElk on PissyNan if anyone wants to add me.

...was the right answer.

That's one bargainous PS3 you've scored!

I'm Jonarob. I'm not adding one SilentElk.

Done.

You're not buying one HDMI cable, you mean?

I could add you up in glorious 480p! But I won't.

Are game updates meant to take 30+ mins? All I want to do is play LittleBigPlanet.

It's not unexpected.

Well, this is a triumph of technology.

If the game has been out for a while, there's a chance it could be a large download. On the plus side, it's generally a one off thing.

This gets better.

I was at a New Year Party last year (on 31 December, if I recall correctly). My mate had just brought 'Singstar'. At around 22:00, we thought it'd be cool to get a karoke session going, so bunged it into the machine, and gripped the microphones expectantly, waiting for the game to load and our musical abilities to be revealed to the world.

45 minutes and god knows how many updates later we were finally able to play, though by then it took several more drinks to get sufficient enthusiasm, especially as we had to be down the road to watch the fireworks in about an hour. Great way to market party games, Sony.

Now the power has cut out twice, I guess due to overheating. I have had it on for five hours solid, but surely that isn't right?

All I want to do is play LittleBigPlanet.

Cripes. Is it particularly dusty? I remember my PS3 fat used to run very hot but never actually crapped out on me. Not enough experience with the slim.

Yeah, that doesn't sound right.

But I do seem to vaguely remember having issues with updating little big planet while I was at your house last time. May be worth a google.

Edit: Actually, it was stardust, ignore this. Sounds like your as new console is not quite as new.

Just had a look at the back and the power cord wasn't quite seated correctly. God, I'm so paranoid about this now. :-S

Why is it that there are some real PS1 classics on the marketplace, but the PS2 stuff is just bilge?

They've only recently started churning out the PS2 HD remakes. They can't just release regular PS2 stuff because there's no backwards compatibility anymore.

You can't tell me that Golden Age of Racing and International Super Karts are HD remakes. :-S

Well I dunno! They've certainly been modified to run on the system!

Tempted to download one of them for laughs. What's essential on PSN then? I'm not reading the whole thread.

NOBY NOBY BOY

Noby is fun for a bit. It's a toy box. And utterly charming. I recommend PixelJunk Racer because it's like awesome Scalextric. Also GTI Club+ is an awesome arcade racer that sadly remains PSN exclusive. Ummm. There are more I'm sure, but it's been so long since I've looked at my list!

Oh, and don't bother with Flower despite what some people will tell you. *glares at Ian*

You know, having said that, it's really hard not to recommend Flower because at the very least it's interesting, and everyone bangs on about it so much it's almost worth buying just so you can decide for yourself. Hmm.

What I mean is, you'd probably bloody like it, and then you'd blame me for putting you off it.

Plus I recall Owen really rather liked it.

Super Stardust HD is a competent twin stick shooter, but not as good as Geometry Wars probably. Definitely.

Last Guardian is coming soon, right?!