New larger hard drive in my PS3 - easier than expected!

[GBO Possum]

For some reason I thought this might be difficult.

The reason I'm writing this post is to encourage you if you are concerned about the idea of committing "surgery" on your PS3. Don't worry, it's designed for easy upgrade.

I have a CECHL01 PS3 which came with an 80GB drive. It's a Toshiba MK8052GSX 5400 RPM drive.

The main objective in replacing this drive is not capacity, although that's a bonus. I want better performance.

And it just happened that I have a 500GB 7200 RPM drive which spent some of its useful life in my Mac, and was looking forlorn on my desk.

So it spins faster, and since I was using less than 60GBs of the 80GB drive, when those 60GBs arrived on the 500GB drive, it is effectively "short stroked", reducing seek times. Furthermore, since the data is occupying the outer zones, the data transfer rates are faster due to there being more sectors per track in that area of the disk. Faster spin, faster seek, faster transfers.

Cutting to the chase, yes, I am perceiving a snappier performance, and now I won't have to worry about capacity for a long, long time.

Steps involved include:-

1. Format the new drive as FAT 32. This is easy on a Mac (using Disk Utility), and I read that there is an EXE for Windows computers that can be downloaded to do the job.
2. Also format something to backup your existing hard drive onto (FAT32 again). I used another spare drive.
3. Download the PS3 system software on your Mac or PC, and save onto the backup drive - see https://support.us.playstation.com/...2LzEvdGltZS8xMzg4Nzg0MTU2L3NpZC9ySzQ4SHRKbA==
4. Run PS3's backup utility to the backup drive. This took about 2 hours on my system.
5. Pop the PS3's hard drive out and insert your new hard drive - https://support.us.playstation.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/362
6. When you power it up, the system sees that the hard drive has no system software and walks you through installing it from the backup drive you saved it on.
7. After this stage you have a working PS3 and just need to restore your stuff from the backup drive. For me another 2 hour job.

Please note that not all files on your PS3 are backed up and restored by the above process. If you bought videos, I understand they will be gone for good. Along with other little things which did not bother me. Google carefully before embarking on this process!

After restoring my stuff, I found that I had to re- Activate the PS3. That was easy.

Final tip, you may find it easier if you wire your PS3 to your router during the process rather than use wifi.

Questions? Contact me via this thread.

 

[ShaZZa]

I want better performance.

Download the PS3 system software on your Mac or PC, and save onto the backup drive

Should've got an SSD then
By memory you don't have too format the new drive, the system will do it for you.
Also the PS3 "system software" is actually just the system update/FW data (eg 4.50, 4.66).

I did my drives a couple of years ago, so I'm not 100% sure on the responses.

 

[Sanji Himura]

Here is a link with plenty of free options to tackle a FAT 32 format on Windows. Go here.

 

[acascianelli]

I recently upgraded the hard drive on my PS3 Slim. Mine went fairly smooth too, the only difficulty I had was after I had the PS3 up and running again when trying to reload the backup I had taken. The PS3 was rebooting to run the recovery, but was spinning down my USB harddrive, and the drive wasn't spinning back up in time to be recognized when the PS3 rebooted. All I did was manually restart the drive a few seconds before the PS3 rebooted itself. I went from a Toshiba 120gb to a Seagate 500gb.

 

[Rage Racer]

I tried to use an SSD and it turned out defective. No more experiments since then so I use a normal HDD (swapped the stock 40 GB for 500 GB).
I've heard that SSDs are less reliable than HDDs.

 

[ShaZZa]

I tried to use an SSD and it turned out defective. No more experiments since then so I use a normal HDD (swapped the stock 40 GB for 500 GB).
I've heard that SSDs are less reliable than HDDs.

What brand of SSD was it? In the 2+ years I've had mine in they've been fine, never had any problems.

 

[Grayfox]

I tried to use an SSD and it turned out defective. No more experiments since then so I use a normal HDD (swapped the stock 40 GB for 500 GB).
I've heard that SSDs are less reliable than HDDs.

When SSDs die they just die.
When HDD start to die they show signs, so a smart person knows time to back up

 

[Rage Racer]

What brand of SSD was it?

KingMax.

 

[JogoAsobi]

Recent study that shows non-Intel SSDs do not do well under power failure.
Kingston SSD in the PS3 here, so I guess I am 🤬 out of luck as they say.

 

[BobK]

SSDs are less reliable than HDDs in the sense that HDDs can be written to an essentially unlimited number of times whereas each block of an SSD can only be written to 5000-15000 times.

I would expect an off-brand SSD to be less reliable than one from (say) Kingston or Corsair.

 

[ShaZZa]

KingMax.

Ok. Never heard of that brand.
I've got OCZ vertex 3's in mine (240GB main console, 120GB secondary console).

 

[Grayfox]

I have 2 Corsair Force 3.

One failed due to the bloody sandforce kicking the bucket but my others work fine.