PS3 is following in 360's footsteps
by Justin Murray 
{ Nov 18th 2006 at 2:55PM }
We're all familiar with the Ring of Death on the 360. If you see it, you know it is time to pull out the extended warranty slip -- or shell out another $400 -- because you're going to need it. Sony couldn't have any of that and are countering with their own: the Red Button and Beep of Death.
A newly purchased PS3 (and owner) had played Tony Hawk's Project 8 for a grand total of 30 minutes when the PS3 decided it didn't want any more of that. Maybe THP8 made the unit sick, the game doesn't exactly have a great image (pun intended). In any case, this is one unhappy PS3 consumer.
Sony is certainly starting to push their luck with these PS3 problems. Yes, the 360 had its own set of issues, but we figure Sony should have learned from Microsoft's mistakes; instead we get this mess. We wish they'd put just a smidgen of quality assurance behind their product. Let's hope Nintendo doesn't break its streak of quality hardware; a triple play may turn consumers off console gaming. Check after the break for the video.
[Thanks, Kumar Shah]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Andrew Yoon @ Nov 18th 2006 11:03AM
Damn. Why are consoles becoming so much less reliable, now that they cost hundreds of dollars?
Chris @ Nov 18th 2006 2:58PM
@1 You forget its Sony they make shitty console.
John @ Nov 18th 2006 5:47PM
waow!
hope they iron out the problems before it launches in europe coz i want one
http://www.petitiononline.com/ps3/petition.html
ncxcstud @ Nov 18th 2006 5:44PM
Curious - What is Sony's warranty on the PS3? Easily traded out back to the company or is there some hoops you have to jump through? When my 360 fubared within 30 minutes of playing last december, I was w/out it for a total of 5 days. Mailed it out on Monday, had it back on Friday. It was top notch, what's some stuff being said for those calling Sony Tech Support?
John @ Nov 18th 2006 5:47PM
my 360 died after a month and i took it down to gamestop and they gave me a brand new one out of the box, along with another free month of xbox live
was well impressed
http://www.petitiononline.com/ps3/petition.html
Jeff @ Nov 19th 2006 3:06AM
I got a PS3 yesterday, ran it for 6 hours straight with no problems at all. Then, I gave it a rest for about an hour, and ran it again for another 4 hours. 10 hours of use yesterday without a single issue. I wouldnt start dogging Sony and assuming they will all crap out after 30 minutes, just yet. Let's let some more reports come out first.
otakucode @ Nov 18th 2006 5:54PM
And so it begins... it'll be a month before we can actually determine if a large percentage of PS3s had problems since nearly every single owner who has a problem will be able and likely to report it online.
Andrew Yoon: That computers, console systems, and other modern hardware works at all is nearly miraculous. Computers and computer-based products are the most complex devices ever created by mankind. Think about it. Billions of components on tiny chips running at mind-boggling speeds. Dozens of clusters of those components interconnected. Software written at 10 layers of abstraction or more flipping thousands of circuits with a single instruction in the space of nanoseconds.
Anon#000007 @ Nov 18th 2006 5:55PM
Is this an isolated incident, or are there hundreds (thousands?) like the 360s launch?
Pikachief @ Nov 18th 2006 6:08PM
Whats the 360's ring of death? I dont think i have a warranty but the red ring did come on my 360 while i was playing PSU. But i think that had something to do with my power flickering off and on.
jimmuy bay @ Nov 18th 2006 6:16PM
joystiq u are on MS' payroll where weak minded indiviudals will rejoice. stop buying the 360's power. course you will love this because you want to show PS3 is weak like 360, but i know it does less wrong than you make it seem.
tools?
-jimmuy bay
Dave @ Nov 18th 2006 6:18PM
Is this an issue with just Tony Hawk or the system itself? My system is playing just fine!
oldschoolgamer @ Nov 18th 2006 7:48PM
#8 you really should have gotten a warranty. #60s do break down and if you've seen the 3 rings of death then its possible your system could crash at a later time. If you have a system that was built before 2006 you can still get it replaced for free with no warranty by MS.
Tony @ Nov 18th 2006 6:41PM
Multiple systems are locking up too. Doesn't matter which games because It happened to me a few times at two different stores running two different games. All it took was a simple reboot, but having to reboot it every 15-30 minutes would really blow. Also, anyone remember the problems the PS2 had when it came out? Anyone remember how long it took for sony to admit there were even problems? That's probably how this will go down too.
Jecrell @ Nov 18th 2006 6:49PM
One of the many disadvantages of buying a game console on release day...
Triforceowner @ Nov 18th 2006 6:54PM
*cough*Sony'sDVDDriveSucked*cough*
Ten bucks says their Blu-ray drive is just as bad.
Carl @ Nov 18th 2006 6:56PM
did he read the manual for his set up, cause i heard a few of last years rings of death were a result of plugging into extension cords rather than the wall. IDK how that keeps the console from functioning properly, maybe doesnt have enough power to run the processor and cool the syetem, some crap like that. this is just a thought
Kyo @ Nov 18th 2006 7:14PM
Sony's warranty on the PS3 far exceeds the crappy warranty on the 360.
Sony offers a 1 year warranty.
Microsoft... Where are you?
Honestly, you have to expect problems from new systems. You're talking about complex hardware being rushed to a market who is ready to harshly scrutinize their product.
The systems are tested by numerous people and programmers, but not by hundreds of thousands of customers. It's an unavoidable thing.
Joker @ Nov 18th 2006 7:21PM
Whoa, talk about Karma, my friend has a PS3 that he waited in line for a couple of days, He watched the above video and laughed at the guys, guess what happened to his PS3 within the last hour.
RGD86 @ Nov 18th 2006 8:53PM
This is why i'm waiting until after the first price drop...
Jeff @ Nov 18th 2006 7:33PM
So one guy out of 400,000 gets a defective PS3 and somehow that makes the news? Man, people are just digging at straws these days.
You know, the industry average for defects *is* 5% of all units produced. I didn't jump on the Xbox 360 defect bandwagon either, because that was likely pretty much the same story. Not everything you buy is always going to work right. Them's the breaks.
Matt @ Nov 18th 2006 10:37PM
Sony and unreliability in the same sentence? You don't say!
Raz 4 life @ Nov 18th 2006 9:46PM
Pikachief, your ring of death was just from the power flicker. It's happened to me and my friend during a windy day, causing the power to flicker a few times. All you had to do was press the power button again, right? You're fine =)
Jonathan Greene @ Nov 18th 2006 9:51PM
I have a ps3 have tried all the launch titles, and beside a few minor glitches nothing like this has happened to me, and i have played for extended periods as well. Isolated incidents do not break a console, this sensationalist writing is pretty depressing, even from joystiq.
ipodfanboy @ Nov 18th 2006 10:44PM
I feel sorry for any hardcore gamer who waited outside for days or any high income earning casual gamer who bought the ps3 off of ebay for 2,500 dollars and thier consoles stop working. Yeah sony does make shitty consoles though, Id be surprise if anybody drops another 600 bones just to buy another ps3 just like how the millions of casuals gamers and hardcore sony fans who bought another ps2 for 300 dollars because of the ps2s DRE scenario. Playshitty3 i call it!
Roll3r @ Nov 18th 2006 11:13PM
Expect many more of these stories to pop up soon. A very good friend of mine who works at Sony (SOE) has been telling me for months *not* to buy a PS3, as overheating was the cause of the launch delay as well as the shortages (it is not the Blu-Ray drive as Sony has claimed). Going with an internal power supply was a mistake, but I guess Sony didn't want any "lol teh brick" criticism that the 360 received.
alister @ Nov 18th 2006 11:23PM
I was in Target and they had a display unit setup showing a demo and it locked up while I was watching it.
Pipper @ Nov 19th 2006 5:05AM
Been noticing PS3s dying on other message boards. It seems Sony is telling people to return it at the store they bought it from, or you can send it in and wait SIX WEEKS for it to come back.
In comparison, it takes right around 14 days for the 360 to be repaired.
What is going on??
ryan @ Nov 19th 2006 6:30AM
look the ps3 just launched ok... its bound to happen that there will be a few bad consoles..
the only company that actually pulled of a successful console launch (as in no bad consoles) was nintendo
hell i remember even the ps2 had problems when it first launched
GazzyC @ Nov 19th 2006 8:20AM
Ohh no! Poor guys I hope it doesn't take Sony long to replace it for them
Rob @ Nov 19th 2006 9:26AM
2 local best buys, 1 circuit city, 1 gamestop (of 3) and 2 targets (of 4) all have dead ps3's.
The 2 other gamestops, 2 eb's and 2 other target's ps3's are still working as of this morning.
Something seems... bad.
nikowolf @ Nov 19th 2006 10:44AM
i was one of those guys that waited inline for the playstation 2 and im on my second playstation 2 only because i sold my fist to a friend 2 years after i bought it. i have never had one problem with with either of my consoles. i think all you guys that are hard core sony or hard core ms should grow up. if you enjoy the games it doesnt matter what console they are on. hell i play on my computer more than anything anyways. i havent seen any of you fan boys of anything create anything worth looking at to complain about anything.
endekks @ Nov 19th 2006 10:50PM
Let's give it a few weeks to a month to see how many of them die – and then find out why it happened. A few crashes on ANY hardware are always to be expected and not necessarily a reflection of bad manufacturing on the whole.
I do clearly remember MANY 360's dying within the first couple of months of the system's launch. In fact, I personally know no fewer than five people who had to return their systems: one in Osaka, one in Tokyo and several friends who live just north of DC (who probably got faulty units from the same batch). I managed to escape any hardware malfunctions.
But I wasn't so lucky with my original Xbox. I was working at a game development company in Rockville / Bethsoft Maryland at the time and received one at the annual Christmas party. Apparently, quite a few units had shoddy optical drives in them – the Thompson drive. Many many MANY people who had this particular drive had their Xboxes become giant black bricks because the drive gave up the ghost within 6 months of use, enough to where there was a class action suit against MS.
And even if a system crashes regularly, that doesn't mean there is a hardware issue - or necessarily even user error. I treat my 360 with kid gloves, but that doesn't stop the R& demo from crashing often just after I start playing a level. That doesn't stop Gears of War from freezing or locking up my system at random times. Sometimes it can be a game's fault when the hardware crashes.
The fact of the matter is, if a person here or a person there meet with hardware failures, it should be expected – at launch or ANY time. This is not a remark to excuse poor manufacturing, but merely a realistic assessment that just because a few people have issues doesn't mean we need to equate it with some pandemic issue a huge batch of users will face.
But I guess fear and negative conjecture are more fun, right?
BMWM3P @ Nov 19th 2006 10:52AM
This is just a case of ms bitches trying to make the PS3 look bad. My PS3 was on from 10:00am friday to 11:00pm I played project 8 for about 5 hours, downloaded the sytem update, played resistance for about 3 hours and messed around with the network. On saturday I got home about 6:00pm played THP8 until 9:30 then played Resistance till 11:00pm and stopped to watch the Erik Morales fight. Not a single problem no overheating, no freezing, the damn thing doesn't even make noise. There might be a defective one here or there but to the extend of the 360 no way. All you ms bitches want to make our console look as bad as yours and that is simply not the truth. The PS3 is a well engineered, extremely well built console that will stand the test of time.
RaiderX @ Nov 19th 2006 10:55AM
Nintendo won't fail us. The Wii will own, low price, awesome games, great system, great company with amazing customer support. Unlike Sony and Microsoft who rush their systems out and ignore obvious flaws.
Your God @ Nov 19th 2006 11:42AM
The problem here is that only people who have problems actually post on the net to complain about them. 95% of customers are perfectly happy with their product and go on happily oblivious to the crap on the net. It's gonna happen with every console, stop jumping on the hate bandwagon. Though to be honest, I hate Sony ever since they said it's cool to install root kits on people's computers if they don't know what the word means.
hgh @ Nov 19th 2006 1:53PM
Well Sony well have to fix this issue, but most of the people have no problems with the ps3.
Zeichrat @ Nov 19th 2006 12:19PM
I bought my 360° seven months after launch date and after four months it stopped working. Before this, not one of my other consoles did this (Atari, ColecoVision, NES, Gameboy, Genesis, SNES, PSOne, PS2, GBA, PSP, DS), so I´m very dissapointed about this next gen-failure rate... If this is also happening to the PS3, I´ll wait a long time before getting one, I don´t need anymore headaches.
Wii @ Nov 19th 2006 1:38PM
Lol, quite funny
Justin Hale @ Nov 19th 2006 1:23PM
It's because they are made in Communist China
WikiWii @ Nov 21st 2006 12:22PM
I hope the Wii ain't like this...
John @ Nov 19th 2006 2:12PM
So what did Sony say about it? Did you look it up or ask them yet what the beep means?
Thomas @ Nov 19th 2006 2:42PM
I went to the local Wal-Mart yesterday where they had two PS3 systems set up for gameplay. Guess what? They were *both* dead. Totally locked up.
Seriously, what's going on here?
goldcd @ Nov 19th 2006 2:46PM
Wasn't just the PS2 that had problems. First gen PS1 was riddled with them as well. Every single one of the 1st gen (I'm aware of) ended up being run on it's side or upside down.
Wasn't just flakey build/testing. There was the bug with the shading (stripes rather than a smooth gradient) on polygons. As far as I'm aware Sony never even 'fessed up to the existence of that one, but it got fixed in 2ng gen onwards.
Not really picking on Sony, MS had their problems with the 360 as has been pointed out and I guess the original Xbox only came out so stable as it was based on tried and tested PC bits.
Looking at the picks of the PS3 taken apart it appears to be a giant heatsink with a big fan, with all the other components stuck around it. Probably works well, but only needs a dusty fan/heatsink or a bit too much, too little thermal grease in a single place and it's going to flake.
SuperFly @ Nov 19th 2006 2:49PM
How the hell is one report worthy of a news blog? Seriously. Until this becomes an issue, I don't want to read about how one measily consumer had a faulty system. I'm sure we'll get some reports in, but until it's worth noting, don't bother with these.
KrazyKoala @ Nov 19th 2006 3:04PM
To be fair to those who bitch about the conspiracy against sony on joystiq, i suggest you go to the blog records for the weeks following the 360 launch...This is just making things even. Many of you have no problem saying "OMG 360 is CRAP" and so on and claiming that no less that 75% of 360s were defective when it fact its MUCH less than that. This just makes things even so stop being bitter about it. BTW: Microsoft did in fact extend the warranty for 360s made in 2005 to 1 year...
Kazol @ Nov 19th 2006 3:53PM
All of the outsourcing to China has made part and product quality lower. Manufacturers are trying to make their product appealling to customers by using white plastic, blue LEDs, etc. while using nonstandard ways to hold the unit together such as OEM-specific screws, etc. to prevent people from seeing what's inside. Most electronics made today are basically "throw-away", meaning that they break down easily, and it is impossible to open it to try to even see what the problem is, not mentioning repairing it. Then the customer is intended to just throw away the device in a landfill, which contaminates the environment with lead, etc. that the parts, pcb's, etc. use-remember, they utilize PC boards nowadays, instead of predrilled prototyping circuit boards. The assembly of this requires the use of CFC's. Of couse, I don't mind having cheap products that I buy for cheap, throwing it away after a few months and getting an updated version. I just don't think all products should be like this. Sometimes, I want better quality. For example, I once was working on a computer when it just restarted. Turns out the caps on the motherboard failed, because they were made in China, and had to throw it away since it is impossible to unsolder a 6-layer mobo. I had multiple instances of psu's failing just because the manufacturer saved a few cents on a lower-grade cooling fan, resistor, cap, etc. Higher integration among modern products may actually be a bad thing. If a nuclear or EMP bomb detonated in the US, it could affect all products that use semiconductor technology. Imagine all computers, cellphones, TVs, cars, etc. in the whole continent just mysteriously breaking down, and vacuum tube technology working. Sounds like an oxymoron, but it's true. I am not saying that we should use tube radios, etc. because its just unrealistic. We have no other option except using lower-integration semiconductor parts such as bipolar npn\pnp transistors, IC's etc. which will only lower the risk. I don't know about you, but I'm saving my old electronics. My old LW\MW\SW\FM\VHF radio works for 30 years now, receives hundreds of stations around the world (including military, ship, aeronautical conversations, etc.) and works better than my satellite radio receiver that I have to pay each month for the subscription. Probably one of the reasons they stopped selling shortwave receivers in the US is due to politics, etc., not to mention eavesdropping on government services. Modern electronics such as cellphones, etc. are traceable and less secure than other forms of conversation. And I just hate it when the battery is low and it turns off. I mean, there is still 3.2V of power!!! Why turn the whole phone off? Are they afraid the decorative blue LED lighting a shade darker? Just some things to think about...
Tre @ Nov 19th 2006 6:51PM
Some one said that they feel sorry for this happening to any hardcore gamer that stood in line for days for this system. Am I the only one that don't feel sorry those people. When will people learn not to rush and buy these type of systems on launch day?
JAYDOGGY @ Nov 20th 2006 12:24AM
This is the reason I will not buy a gaming system until it has been out at least a year....There are always bugs to be fixed, and I hate being the test dummy!
murc @ Nov 20th 2006 11:31PM
I've never bought a launch system(and never will)...They always have bugs...MS, Sony, Nintendo...you name it, its had launch bugs.
I'm goona get a 360 come black friday...Which is over a year wince the 360 came out...After a full year of being out, its said that 98.5% of all the kinks are worked out.
wii @ Nov 27th 2006 11:13AM
Nah, the wii is great!!