realness08

so i got the ylod and i heard that if you format the hdd somewhere else and then put it back in your ps3 it will work is this true and if so can someone help with it?

Legacy8500

Unless you have a backup of your hard drive there is nothing you can do to get the data from your hard drive. Believe me my ps3 had the YLOD and I tried everything to get my game saves off my hard drive, it's just not possible. If you send your system into sony they don't repair your console they just send you a refurbished model with a different hard drive that is formatted already.

-Legacy

realness08

well ya i know that but i read somewhere im still tryin to find the site but someone said they formatted their hdd to somethin else and then put it back in their ps3 and they didnt have ylod anymore they just formatted the hdd back to their ps3 and it worked fine i was tryin to find out if that was possible or true

Sikkamore

The YLOD can be caused by a HDD failure. But if the HDD failed, there's no way another PS3 can read it because it's dead lol What were you doing when you got the YLOD?

If you were:
1. Playing a game: you probably had the CPU/GPU overheat which caused the soldering to reheat and lose connection from the CPU/GPU to the board.
2. Doing nothing: This could be HDD failure. If you can turn your PS3 on then it's HDD.
3. Doing nothing #2: If you're PS3 won't turn on then go to the YLOD then your PSU has probably failed.

Really, there are ways to fix #1 and #2 by yourself. And unless you find another PS3 that's either broken with a good PSU then you have to send it to Sony :/

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RapidFireGT

The majority of YLOD happen from soldier joints losing connection. There's a possibility that it could just be the HDD, but it's not likely.

If the HDD is the problem, I think you can remove the HDD and attempt to boot up the PS3, and something should happen. If the light just continues to go from red -> green -> yellow (I think thats the YLOD light sequence?), then it's probably not the HDD.

Chances are, it's the solder joints.

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