With a 3% failiure rate, far too many people fall into the trap of "3%? Blimey, that won't happen to me!"
Wrong.
I know this because my Playstation 3, my beloved PS3 has broken. I've had a 60gb version since the 31st August 2007, and now its broken.
And at 6 months out of warrranty, I can't get a new one without paying £145 to Sony for "transport costs" of them shipping me, and taking the old, PS3.
It all started on Thursday (12th Febuary) when I was playing Battlefield Bad Company. First, the sound went, them the screen went. Upon Quitting the game, a black screen appeared and I got three beeps in quick sucession, at which point the screen would stay back, and the only way to turn it off was to turn it off at the plug socket, or at the AC switch at the rear of the console.
After turning the system back on again, I was met by the console not recognizing my game. I ejected the disc, and tried it again, but no joy. After about 5 minutes, however, it would read discs. I tried FIFA 09 this time, but the same thing happened, the sound went, and then at any form of loading screen (on FIFA it was a substitution, on Battlefield a cutscene) it froze, with Quitting the game the only option, at which point the above problem would repeat.
This continued until on Sunday (today) morning I rang Sony. The man on the end of the phone was as helpful as he could have been, and gave me a referance number.
The only option he gave me was to keep trying or pay for the new one.
Well, I rang up again later on, quoted my referance number to a woman this time, who re-itterated that my only option was to get a new one, but she suggested at least trying a full system restore.
So I did just that, extracting all of my game saves beforehand, naturally. However this has come to no avail, and I will still have to get a new one from Sony, my only joy in being that it'll be a 60gb like-for-like trade off. But at £145, I feel wronged. Having done nothing to damage the console myself, and with 3 out of my 10 odd PS3 toting friends having had similar problems, its an odd one.
My friend got his replaced free of charge, even though he was 2 months out of warranty.
I'll try to find out if there is anything I can do, but I doubt it. In my opinion this is made all the sadder by the fact that Killzone 2 - a game which I have followed intently and concisely - will be landing onto my doormat in 11 days, invariably before my replacement arrives.
I tell you what though - I'm getting a three year extention to the warranty on this one.
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