Oh no!! Yellow Light Of Death!!
This fix is not gauranteed to work, as it only deals with Hard Drive issues. I saw a poster who did this to fix his PS3 when he got the YLOD, and did some research to find out why this would work before I posted this fix. I'll explain why this could work, after I tell you how to do the fix.
Since your PS3 is going to get formatted anyway, you might aw well try this:
Pull out your hard drive from your PS3
Connect the hard drive to your PC
Do a FULL format, not a quick one (a quick format just formats the boot section and root directory of the hard drive, and not the data on the hard drive. We want the hard drive blanked out). Make sure to do it in FAT32 (if you can). To format the HDD you'll need to go to Control Panel --> Administrative Tools --> Computer Management. This has an older windows feel to it, but on the left hand side you'll see Storage, under that (you may have to click and expand it) you'll see Disk Management. Click on that, in the middle window will come up the hard drives. You should see it there (It'll likely have a series of letters, followed by numbers). You may not be able to format it into FAT32 format with it being such a large disk drive (windows doesn't like giving you any non-MS file format for large disks). But doing a NTFS format should work. There are a few programs that will allow you to format it into FAT32 if you can't with that program.
Put the hard drive back in the PS3 (be ready with a USB thumbdrive with the system software on it, follow this link to learn how to set it up).
Hopefully, your PS3 will boot up, and prompt you to install the software on to the hard drive
Time to download all your stuff again (hoepfully you haven't purchased any movies, as you can't redownload them). Then, back to gaming
The reason this could work is actually pretty simple. If a part of the boot sector/root directory (the sections on the hard drive that tell the PS3 how to start up, and where things are on the hard drive) were corrupted so that the PS3 couldn't properly boot up, or couldn't find what it needed on the hard drive, it could give off a "hardware malfunction" error, aka Yellow Light (of Death). By formating the hard drive, you remove that bad code on the hard drive, and start over. The PS3 doesn't detect any hardware error (cause it's gone) and starts over.
Two alternate ways to see if it's the hardrive:
If you have upgraded your hard drive (especially if it's been very recent) try putting in the hard drive that came with your PS3 (hopefully you didn't toss it). If the PS3 boots up, then the issue is with the upgraded hard drive. New electronics sometimes have bugs that basic testing can't find, sometimes we have to find that out by plugging them in, I've built/rebuilt/upgraded many computers, and I've had to exchange parts on more than one occasion. Sometimes they are defective. If this is the case with your hard drive, and you are within the exchange or warranty period, take that bad boy in and get it replaced! If you figure "I'm within the warranty period, I can just send it in to Sony!" and you take out your hard drive, put in the old one (and don't test it), and send it in to them. They'll send you a nice refurbished system (or you may get yours back, as they may find nothing wrong), only to put in your upgraded hard drive and have the issue all over again, you'll be cursing Sony (likely on these forums) for THEM getting it wrong. If you don't even bother taking out the upgraded hard drive, and just send in your system with it in, they'll take it out, and toss it (or take it home if they can fix it), and no, they won't replace it with an equivalent. They'll replace it with a stock hard drive, meant for that model (or you may get a refurb, and they'll send your baby off to someone else when they send in their system).
If you have a spare hard drive that will fit your PS3 (see the first FAQ for more info) you could put it in the PS3 (it should format it for you, but you might as well put it in FAT32 first, or at least make sure nothing is on it). If it boots up and asks for system software, then you have a hard drive issue, use the fix above. Another user I spoke to had purchased a hard drive, and it crashed on him, giving him the YLOD (sorry, didn't put 2 + 2 together then). He put in his original PS3 HDD, and voila! YLOD was gone.
I hope this helps some of you YLOD sufferers. If this doesn't fix your issue however, you could have a power supply (wish sony had but that in a brick outside of the unit, easier to replace) or other problem with your hardware. It's time to contact Sony.
Note: Sorry to the posters who had stated this fix, I couldn't find your threads to give you credit. If you wish to PM me, I will add your name as contributing this fix.
Re: PS3 Console only (sold as seen) £65
Originally Posted by TheFincher
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