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PS3 blueray drive broken. Will USB Blueray drive work instead.

post #1 of 14
6/7/12 at 11:29am
Thread Starter 
I have a PS3 Slim for my 2 teenage sons and the drive doesnt work anymore. When you put in a disk it just seems to loop and nothing plays. I am on a limited budget and hesitate to buy a replacement.

I know someone selling an external USB Blueray drive for only $40. It works great on his laptop. Its worth more than $40 however he is just "getting rid of it".

Can this work via the USB port on my PS3.

Will it basically provide the same functionality of the internal PS3 drive ?

Thanks.
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post #2 of 14
6/7/12 at 11:42am
Nope. Sorry, that will not work.
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post #3 of 14
6/7/12 at 12:03pm
Thread Starter 
Please elaborate just a little. Thanks.
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post #4 of 14
6/7/12 at 12:21pm

You can buy another drive for like $60 on ebay, just look up your serial number.

 

Its not too hard to replace but it does take some mechanical skills.

 

I've done two, mine and my son's fat PS3 and they have hundreds of hours on them since the replacement.

 

The problem is most likely the diode in the drive, but you just replace the entire drive assembly, which is a rack with a couple motors and the light(diode) on a gantry.

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post #5 of 14
6/7/12 at 12:55pm
Thread Starter 
Yeah I might have to go that route if this idea is not a workable one.

It would be great to be able to buy this slim usb blueray player though and move it around the house from laptop to PS3 to whatever else need blueray. It would be nice if I do not have to also buy an internal PS3 blueray player. For the price it may be nice to buy both though.
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post #6 of 14
6/7/12 at 12:58pm

There will not be a driver available that will drive the BR drive over USB.  Sorry.

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post #7 of 14
6/7/12 at 6:42pm
I only wish Sony would allow an external USB BR drive! Seems like a reasonable allowance given the gimpy BR diodes they seem to use and repair PS3's with. It is ridiculous that we have to pay $175 or so to have a console repaired with a part that not even they are willing to warranty beyond 90 days. 2 yrs is how long the BR diode in my original PS3 lasted. PS2 backwards compatibility is now lost since it cannot be had in the slim PS3 model. This generation of Sony's console seems to be layers laid upon layers of clusterf*ck. [/rant]
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post #8 of 14
6/7/12 at 9:08pm
There were issues with bad batch of diode's when they first came out. Failure of drives from them going shouldn't be happening, and was fixed when better materials were manufactured.

Just another thing consumers can expect as their stuff is exclusively made in China.
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post #9 of 14
6/7/12 at 11:17pm
I wouldn't be complaining. I have friends who have 360's who have had 8+ repairs/replacements in ~5 years.
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post #10 of 14
6/8/12 at 7:25am
Thread Starter 
Okay it looks like this route is not viable.

Can you all just comment on what may be the fix for my problem.

I put a game into the unit last night so I could report back what happened.

It kept making a looping, thrashing noise however it never kicked out the disk. Pressing the eject button results in it being kicked out successfully.

Does this sound like something that will be fixed with one of the dvd drives on ebay for approx $60 ?
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post #11 of 14
6/8/12 at 8:27am

A bad blue ray drive normally gives the following symptoms:

 

  • disk spinning sounds when insert disk
  • spinning circle in upper right corner of screen(loading indicator)
  • disk quits spinning and not recognized in menu

 

There is extensive info out there on PS3 BR drive diagnostics.  I used a Youtube video How-To to replace mine. 

 

Here is a link to a drive on ebay.  Make sure to match your model number to make sure you get right drive.  Slims have dual lasers

 

This is what the guts look like while your replacing the drive, if this scares you, you might look into shipping it to someone else to do the work.

 

bb4bc85c.jpg

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post #12 of 14
6/8/12 at 8:41am
Thread Starter 
Wow, you are fantastic NicksHatachi.

This looks a little intimidating but not too bad. I'm sure I can do this I just have to keep my 2 1/2 year old from grabbing this stuff.

There seems to be another route that seems easier but also more expensive where you replace the entire drive box.

Here is a link: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Blu-ray-DVD-Drive-for-SONY-PS3-KEM-410ACA-KES-410A-without-Board-US-/350553511889?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item519e9e17d1

Why didnt you take this route. I guess because you were not intimidated with taking yours apart huh ?

I'm I correct about this or from this listing is it the same as the way you did it ?
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post #13 of 14
1/27/13 at 10:46am
im having the same problem with my ps3... it sucks because some games you cant buy on the ps store but i hope it does work
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post #14 of 14
1/28/13 at 6:03am
I bought my new mechanism for $30, shipped to my door.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/170843803086?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649

It was really an easy job.
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