Clean up your PS3

Posted by Kevin in Articles, Sony | 4 comments

If, like me, you have a launch version of the PS3, there’s a very good chance you’re concerned about this “Yellow light of Death” lark that’s floating around the internet. Apparently there’s no way of preventing this disastrous event from rendering your out-of-warranty device useless. However, as any PC-building enthusiastic nerd will tell you, there’s always a way to keep the innards of a device fresh and sparkling.

A user on a popular internet forum has outlined his success story in cleaning up the insides of his PS3, inevitably saving it from issues in the near future. Opening it up reveals a murky dirty world where the heat-sync (system to deflect heat away from the chips) is filled with dirt and the chips themselves have badly-applied factory thermal paste.

Heat-sync tray and upper-side with thermal paste, badly applied

RSX & Cell, without a heatsync. Notice the badly applied paste

Using this disassembly guide and some lightly-soaked-in-alcohol rags, you can attain some brilliant results. Don’t forget to re-apply some Factor5 or equivalent thermal paste when putting it all back together though.

Keep in mind this is just a quick post to show that the PS3 is a mega system that should be treated with care. Components fail, but at least you can do your best to stop that happening by cleaning the insides. Also, keeping the system in an open area where the airflow is good is ideal for the system to prevent dust clogging and component failure due to extreme temperatures. You wouldn’t shove a PC running two graphics cards and a Core i7 CPU into a cupboard, would you?

Shiny & Clean RSX. Cool font.

Cell, cleaned up and ready for pasting

Happy, and long-time, gaming!