*Spoiler alert, this is a long story highlighting my vast stupidity and ingenuity.
If anyones broken a PS3, I think I have in about five ways and know how to fix all of them, so if you have any questions, feel free to ask.


For those of you that've seen me running around trying to find discless games that launch, fret no more! My PS3 through what can only be considered a minor miracle runs again. I just want to detail the horrible process for you kind folks, to show why I'm so deserved of this medal.

I got a 2.5 form factor 1TB internal hd from Newegg. Everything said either "Does not fit" or "Will fit if you cram it". Now, I'm a professional crammer (Ha!), but this guy just wouldn't get onto the adapters. And then I couldn't get it out.

So I decided to open it. Now, I've opened consoles before, but nothing has ever gone this messily in my life. First, you have to take EVERY, SINGLE, THING off to get at the HD tray. Blue ray drive, power supply, F***ing processor fans. Then when you get at it, the god damned thing is apparently soldered to the tray. And the HD won't fit with it there.

So armed with my pliers and a vast amount of rage, I ripped the thing apart. Not off: it wouldn't come off. I ripped it into shreds, and installed the HD. Huzzah.

Reassembled, no wireless, bluetooth, or ethernet. Hmmm. After a day or two of researching, I found the board that controlled all these functions, found the error and fixed it. Huzzah!

Powered on. Blu ray drive wouldn't read. Upon closer inspection, two of the wires was nicked in this whole process (None of which were the data cable). And this is where I sat for a month, desperately trying to play a game discless.

So then I decided to open up my blue ray drive. Let me tell you; poor decision with a disc in. As soon as I lifted the top off (with no force) you could hear gears and springs pulling things into weird places. ****.

Well, at least I could remove the cables. I replaced one from eBay (For three dollars!), and the other one, I seriously ended up cutting in half, and sanding down the ribbon until the connectors showed. This took hoooouuuurrrrssss to get just right.

Then, I embarked on putting everything back together. I followed a tutorial online that had directions such as 1) Spin the third gear counterclockwise 30 degrees, and at this point I was like, well, this thing is fudged. But I managed to put it back together, clamp everything in, and low and behold, my PS3 works.

This whole process took two months, and only saved me about 15$ because I wanted the cheaper hard drive. I'm currently knee-deep in Dead Space 2 and Borderlands. And everything works.

Now I'm off to carve a victory medal out of the remains of my enemies (The HD tray). Hope anyone reading was vaguely entertained, and remember even if you think your PS3 is busted, these ****ers are surprisingly tough. It sat in pieces for months, got treated terribly, and everything still works 100%.