PS3 Yellow Light of Death

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Well if you know or can find me someplace or someone with a BGA workstation and leaded solder to fix my PS3 then I'd be much obliged.

There's a few businesses springing up in the UK who either own a BGA workstation or have easy flexible access to one. A lot of them will rework the BGA and have it back to you within 48 hours for £50-70 (depending on the machine). There's one near me in Manchester who I will be planning on sending my 60G PS3 to when it no doubt kicks the bucket.

Personally if I had the start up capital I'd go into the business myself, in the next few years there's going to be a LOT of PS3s that need fixing because the smart people will refuse to blindly give Sony £150 to do a worse job than somebody local who will actually give you your system back. For every 1 person sending a PS3 to sony for £150 I can bet you 3 will be willing to give me £50 to do the same job. Especially when Sony don't actually fix the fucking things, all they do is fob you off with a different but currently working PS3 until it breaks 91 days after you get it back.

If you do start up a business of your own or are willing to see it get fixed I'll be severely tempted to send it over the pond to you; or if you happen to somehow know of a place here in the states that does it them I am sold. In a few weeks when I have any disposable income that is.

[nick944]

I hate how people compare it to the RROD. It is nowhere near as common. Why do people think it is? The few hundred to thousand people who have the problem all jump on the internet and speculate about how everyone must have it. I had my Wii die, yet I don't think the Wii is unreliable. My DS died too. My PS3 has been fine and it's a 20GB launch system. Theres millions of threads on the playstation forums about how the YLOD MUST be as common as the RROD.

[Jrecee]

If your xbox red rings do you have to send the HDD in with it?

[corn619]

If your xbox red rings do you have to send the HDD in with it?

No you don't.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

I hate how people compare it to the RROD. It is nowhere near as common. Why do people think it is? The few hundred to thousand people who have the problem all jump on the internet and speculate about how everyone must have it. I had my Wii die, yet I don't think the Wii is unreliable. My DS died too. My PS3 has been fine and it's a 20GB launch system. Theres millions of threads on the playstation forums about how the YLOD MUST be as common as the RROD.

Well what Niode said is still a very good example of how it's a much faster inevitability of it breaking during the first few years of ownership instead of 10-15 years later than with any other generation of consoles.

[fingersmaloy]

Hell with it, I'm just gonna buy the heat gun and the other stuff and try this myself. If you're curious, look at this:

[emwearz]

I had something like this happen to me when my PS2 broke, which my brother bought on launch day (For just over $900AUD) it broke less than a year later the repairs were close to $450 at the time, which was about the same price of a new PS2. Its horse shit, Sony suck really badly with stuff like this.

[bacteria]

The PS3 and 360 are both heat machines, compared to old (pre Dreamcast) systems that many didn't even need heat sinks to work - which is why they still work fine.

One solution surely is to treat them like PC's - remove the case, put in a 12" or 8" fan to suck air in, connect to a 7.4v / 12v supply from the motherboard; job done. That would keep a lot more airflow in and keep things cool. Sure, would not look so nice on the outside, but so what - the fan can be one of those that gives off blue LED's to look nicer if wanted. Better a £5 mod than paying 30x or 50x that on repairs and the hassle involved.

Obviously suitable as soon as the warranty expires, as up to that point the place you bought the console from is responsible for failures.

[fingersmaloy]

Does it seem strange that this happened to my PS3 after just a few minutes of watching a DVD? I wonder if it's not an overheating problem at all.

[Niode]

90% of the time the ylod is caused by the GPU/CPU breaking away from the motherboard due to excess heat. 5% of the time it's the PSU and the other 5% is the laser.

Don't forget that if you are watching a DVD on the PS3 the PS3 is using the Cell to upscale the DVD which is quite a processor intensive task and will still be causing the system to generate heat (not as much as say playing a game but still enough to cause the problem.


Regarding DIY fixes, these are all temporary fix and are NO substitute for having the BGA reworked professionally. Simply heating the board up with a heatgun and causing the solder to reflow will be a temporary fix, at best (that is if you don't wreck your PS3/360 in the process). The machines need to be reballed using a high quality infrared BGA workstation. A gelbased flux is applied to the GPU and CPU and the motherboard is uniformly heated up to a set temperatures. The heat is then increased to cause the BGA to reflow, the flux does it's job by healing the dry/poor connections. The heat is then gradually lowered and the motherboard is left to cool. This will fix the problem on a much more permanent basis. As long as the system is kept in a cool and relatively dust free environment and is cleaned regularly it should see service for many years.