A month ago I decided it was time to upgrade the HDD in my PS3. TROGDOR (My PS3.) was starting to get a "low" on space (7Gb left.) and something had to be done. At the time I decided I would do this in two stages so I didn't have to spend $250 all in one pop, and scooped up an external HDD.
Now, since TROGDOR was a 60Gb PS3 model, and I figured I'd want the external HDD for other things than just backing up the PS3 I went with a 160Gb model. The one I found was the My Passport WDME1600TN 160Gb USB 2.0 drive. The drive itself is about the size of a first generation iPod, and I'll admit looks kind of slick. When I first got the drive I tested out the back up process on the PS3 so I wouldn't have any surprises when I actually started the upgrade. Back up process doesn't allow me to select what I want backed up, and took just over an hour to complete. I have not done any research to determine if this time frame was because I had filled almost 90% of the drive, so your back up time may vary.
Back in January when I was posted links to the PlayStation.Blog to share some PS3 tips I found people commenting on how poor the back up process was. I haven't been able to find any information about the back up utility in any of the release notes for any updates so my update should go identical to how theirs went. Just to be safe I made sure to copy all the MP3s and videos stored on the PS3 to the external HDD so I wouldn't have to download them again or load MP3s to a SD card.
Fast forward to Friday July 18th. Time to order the HDD for the actual PS3 replacement. Over the past month I'd been looking for drives, comparing prices, and what not and decided to go with the Seagate Momentus 5400.4 250Gb HDD.
Another thing Ren and I discussed was what the PS3 was capable of doing. At the time I thought I'd read some where in the PS3 manual that the HDD could not exceed 250Gb, and personally recommended against a 7200 RPM drive because of heat worries. After further research I was unable to find anything my PS3 manual or the one I found online that even had the 250 in it, let alone limiting HDD size. About the same time I also found an article talking about disc size and speed in conjunction with the PS3.
One article I found stated that they could not find any evidence that the PS3's current ventilation system could not handle a 7200 RPM drive and therefore did not notice any increase in tempurature. So there went the main part of my theory right there. For me the issue of the heat was decreased longevity for the unit itself because the extra heat would cause more "wear and tear" on the unit. So I had to dig up some more info before I came to my decision.
So if the PS3 would handle a 7200 RPM drive and show little signs of possible wear in the short term, I was not set to find the advantages. How much of a performance boost would I notice with a faster drive over a 5400 RPM drive like the one it ships with. An article found over at GamePro.com shows that there seems to be a 4 second different at max for most HDD based operations on the PS3. Check the article for full details, but here are a few of the highlights.
PlayStation 3 Start time: Time it takes to go from OFF to XMB
- 5400 RPM: 15.7 seconds
- 7200 RPM: 13.5 seconds
Time to install Firmware v1.82
- 5400 RPM: 1:58.6
- 7200 RPM: 1:54.2
Now it's hard to argue with speed, but I'm still concerned about longevity and decided to stick with a 5400 RPM drive. 2 to 4 second difference just couldn't quite sway my position. I also found some research on these Momentus drives stating how well they perform despite being slower drives. 5400 RPMs it is!
Now that we've covered that, let's get down to the work at hand. You can find information all over the place on how to replace the HDD in your PS3, but none of them seemed to involve the kind of adventure I had.
Let's set the scene, shall we? Wednesday and Thursday off this week so since I didn't have to get up at any set time on Thursday I stayed up all night Wednesday. And I do mean all night. I think I finally crawled into bed around 7:15 AM Thursday morning. At 11:05AM, a mere three hours and 50 minutes after I got
in bed, the FedEX, UPS, whoever delivery guy was banging and ringing my door like it was the Rapture. I was still asleep and it was way too bright behind this guy to fully check his credentials. Either way I scribbled a signature on something and took a box from him. Later it turned out to have what I ordered so he had to be the right delivery guy.
Since I was awake I figured I might as well get to work, but I needed a space to work. Spent about a half hour "cleaning" off my desk before I plugged the PS3 completely and truly got started.
First things first I had to clean the PS3. It had been a while since I last took a vacuum to TROGDOR to get all the dust bunnies off it, but shortly there after he was nice and shiny again. So let's get to the HDD.
As you can see in the image, after you pop off the panel on the side of the PS3 it's a simple matter of removing the blue screw, pulling up the metal "arm" and pulling the tray out of the locked position to slide it out. Once you have the tray pulled out of the PS3 you will notice 4 flat screws that secure the HDD into the tray, and this is where my adventure truly begins.
At this point it's probably about 11:45 to 11:50 AM, I have the HDD drive out, I have my new HDD mostly unpackaged and I'm ready to go. Grab the drive, my usual computer case screw driver in hand try the first screw. This screw might as well have been welded into place. I try to be firm but not too firm as I don't want to destroy the screw or damage the drive still in the tray. Screw is starting to show some serious wear so I move onto the next one. Maybe it's just one screw that was forged with the HDD already in the tray. Next screw is just the same as the first and I'm starting to see just how soft these screws are.
After multiple attempts, trying different utinsels trying to get these screws removed I "cry Uncle" and decided it's time for a trip to the hardware store. Ren said that was blasphemy and that as a man I should have power tools I could use to some how make this all work if only by sheer manly will. Well I do have power tools they would completely destroy the screws, and I didn't want to do that at the time.
So it was time for a trip to the hardware store. Put on some shoes, grabbed my keys and wallet and started walking. Local hardware store is about 2 and quarter blocks away but parking on the one way street is annoying so walking was actually easier. On the way there I'm looking at the screws and coming to grips with the notion that these are screws have to be removed by any means necisary and I'll need new screws.
Get to the hardware store, explain the situation and the old dude in there looks at screws over top of his glasses and takes off around the corner. Took me a second to find where he went and he was trying different sized screw drivers and came to the conclusion I hadn't gotten to while at home. If I'm going to replace the screws anyway, who cares if I destroy these? Take the power tools to the damn things like Ren suggested. He grabbed a larger screwdriver and forced it into the eye and muscled it out. Got all 4 of them out for me and then told me he wasn't going to be able to help me with screws that size. However he was able to inform me that a new computer store had just opened up about a mile down the road. Thank goodness for local businesses.
So I head back home on foot as I'll need four wheels for the trip to the computer store. Head over to where the guy at the hardware store said it would be, and sure enough there the place was. Doors wide open with parking across the street.
As soon as I walk in I could tell these guys weren't the brightest bulbs in the bunch but they were local and I hated the idea of going to another larger store. After taking 5 minutes to explain to them I just needed to replace the screws, and I didn't care if the HDD was stripped the guy finally starts looking for flat HDD screws. Because of the way the HDD is screwed into the tray and slides in the screws have to be flat as there just isn't any extra room. Especially on the back side of the drive.
So a total of 10 minutes in this place, I get 4 new screws and it all cost me was 25 cents for parking on the street. Still love local businesses but these 3 had a screw loose some where. (Sorry, couldn't resist.)
So, I get back home and it's time to wrap this up. Put in the new drive, screwed it into place securely but not arch welder secure, slide it in the bay and put the blue screw back in place. Door snaps back on nice and easy and we're ready to plug ole TROGDOR back in.
After all the cables were reattached, I powered him up and was greeted with the image above. System had to format the HDD and push the OS over to like I expected. Format was nice and quick and after about 3 to 5 minutes I was booted into XMB.
So 27Gb for the OS that is all stored on the PS3 some where seems crazy huge, but 205Gb of available space I can fill allows me to quickly forget about it. Now time for the dreaded back up process.
The whole process took just about 2 minutes, but I cut the video up because there were parts where you basically keep looking at the exact same screen. After the restore was done it rebooted and the PS3 looked just like it did when I turned it off with the 60Gb drive in there. Same theme, game saves, MP3s, videos, game data, and everything. Well the only thing I did have to do was compare Trophies with somebody else for it to show me my Super Stardust HD Trophies, but everything else was right on the money.
Finally tally says 169Gb out of 232Gb, and that should leave me with quite a bit of space for some time to come. Now this should have been a 10 to 15 minute ordeal but it turned into 4 hours or so for me. Of course the night before I watched a YouTube video of some guy who did his in 10 minutes. That bastard!
