Received YLOD several times and attempted to fix it myself... Need advice...

Hi all

This may just be another YLOD thread but please continue reading, because I'm pretty sure my suituation is a little unusual.

I've had this 60GB PS3 since launch and has been sent away for repair 4 times with the same issue - the YLOD. I got fed up of it break over and over and decided to fix it myself because I thought the repair company wasn't doing a good job. Every time it would die again within give or take a month or two during very high fan speeds even while just watching a HD film.

I followed the process of reflowing the machine, and when I checked inside there wasn't much dust or over use of thermal paste, so I wasn't too sure what was going on.

We put new thermal paste on anyway, reheated the board (with flux), made replacements of some of the thermal pads (because the memory ones had just bubbled and welded themselves to the chips) and put it back together again.

Right now, just running on idle, the fans are much higher than they used to be years ago, just like how it's been pretty much every time it's come back from repair (slowly getting worse if anything).

I'm not sure if this machine is just pretty much trash now or I'm missing out on something. Sounds like the repair company was doing an ok job and this console just keeps overheating over and over again. It was fine for the first 2 1/2 years.

Are there any solutions anyone has heard of (ways to help cool it etc) or do I need a new console? It's just so annoying I can't backup my GT5 save. :/

I have reflowed my "Launch" 60GB 12 times already. I use the Silver Thermal Paste when I do the repair, just to get the maximum heat transfer I can. My fan too kicks on High speed when playing games, etc. The problem with the "Launch" PS3's is they use Solder without Lead and the connections fail over time, hence the reflow technique fuses these connections till they break again due to heat build up. Since I can do my "Reflow" in about an Hour from Start to Finish I will keep doing it until the old "Fatty" won't turn on anymore. I Would say keep fixing it if you don't mind doing the repair over and over, unfortunately the "Reflow" technique is not a permanent fix and the YLOD will keep coming back. The only logical option is to buy a new PS3.

If you keep having to crack it open and "fix it", then there's something else going on that the reflowing isn't fixing. If it's "overheating constantly" you have to ask yourself if there's anything unusual about the circumstances? Is it in a confined space? Is there enough ventilation? Are the vents blocked. If you had to send it out once, I can see that. But FOUR times? There's got to be something else going on.

The other thing is this; the "YLOD" (and I really do hate that term) is not a specific failure itself. It's a code for a "general hardware failure", which could be any number of things. It could be that you're fixing the wrong thing.

CaptainHarlock

If you keep having to crack it open and "fix it", then there's something else going on that the reflowing isn't fixing. If it's "overheating constantly" you have to ask yourself if there's anything unusual about the circumstances? Is it in a confined space? Is there enough ventilation? Are the vents blocked. If you had to send it out once, I can see that. But FOUR times? There's got to be something else going on.

The other thing is this; the "YLOD" (and I really do hate that term) is not a specific failure itself. It's a code for a "general hardware failure", which could be any number of things. It could be that you're fixing the wrong thing.

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Maybe, but the 2 places it's in hasn't been changed since the day I bought it and was fine for the first years. The fan only used to go up to stage 2 or maybe 3 while playing a game, now it's stage 4 or 5... much louder than my original Xbox ever was. It's just sitting on the edge of my glass stand with my xbox sitting next to it about 5 inches away (never have both on at the same time), and with my brother just sitting upright on his desk.

Something else is probably wrong here... Just now I've had it turned off for 10 minutes and turned it back on and it went up 2 stages of the fan already and I'm doing nothing. My room gets fairly warm but not much so at the moment because it's the winter.

Maybe I should just buy a new one...

If you have GT5 you may want to buy a new one now as you cant transfer saves to USB. If you keep playing it you will have to restart even further into the game...

If you don't have GT5, well, back up your stuff and keep on playing till it gets too annoying to keep reflowing it.

If you have GT5 you may want to buy a new one now as you cant transfer saves to USB. If you keep playing it you will have to restart even further into the game...

If you don't have GT5, well, back up your stuff and keep on playing till it gets too annoying to keep reflowing it.

The high fan speed really only mean one thing, that there is still an issue with heat transfer between the chips and the heatsink. There can be quite a sizable gap between them (not flush) so I would apply slightly more paste than usual plus go for the highest quality stuff like AC5.

Reflowing a PS3 is not really fixing it, in a way its the equivalent of a 'hitting it with a hammer' solution and it only really supposed to give you enough time to get all the stuff off your hard drive. All these independent people which offer a 'repair' arn't really doing much as ideally you need a new mainboard.

I personally wouldn't buy a new PS3 as I don't see why people should when they made such a sizeable initial investment.

Robin.

G.T

Maybe, but the 2 places it's in hasn't been changed since the day I bought it and was fine for the first years. The fan only used to go up to stage 2 or maybe 3 while playing a game, now it's stage 4 or 5... much louder than my original Xbox ever was. It's just sitting on the edge of my glass stand with my xbox sitting next to it about 5 inches away (never have both on at the same time), and with my brother just sitting upright on his desk.

Something else is probably wrong here... Just now I've had it turned off for 10 minutes and turned it back on and it went up 2 stages of the fan already and I'm doing nothing. My room gets fairly warm but not much so at the moment because it's the winter.

Maybe I should just buy a new one...

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Eventually it might have to come to that. If this is the pattern you're going to get to a point where you'll either become completely frustrated, or it will give out.

The reason why I'm trying to stick with this one is because my brother has a new Slim (due to the issues this one has) and we have to share the console if this one doesn't work. I just want to play GT5 a LOT but can't when it's his as well. But I'm not taking the risk, so I'm putting the savefile back on his console (the full system transfer seems to be the only method to move) after backing up all savefiles I can so I don't erase my brothers stuff.

Thanks for the info though.

Oh well...