A used and cheap Playstation 3, overheating and blinking Red Led, my solution

It seems I'm always 10 years behind with game consoles. Found a couple a weeks a go from a local ecorecycling store a used Playstation 3, a old big fat model one. And got it under 40€ thanks to eject button not working (that was an easy fix)

Of course, no controller and no games so that was another 70€... (I got GTA 5, the only reason to get a PS3 ;)

Anyway, it worked fine for a week or so, then started crashing to a blinking red led. Seems to be a typical error condition after a quick google on the issue.

I didn't yet get the dreaded yellow led so all was not lost. Opening it up my first impression: Whoever designed the case and cooling should be publicly humiliated, flogged and anything else that makes him/her feel the pain that they have caused to thousands of Playstation 3 owners.

Yes, there is a big heatpipe system and a enormous fan, but the there is absolutely no source for fresh and cool air. Espcially the holes on the right side are just for show, as they are more-or-less blocked on the inside. What the fuck where they thinking ? And the holes at the front, not much better, the circuit board blocks most of them.

Still, I did open everything up and the thermal pasting was also a crap job.

Thermal paste, a crap job by Sony

First I fixed that with fresh and properly applied paste. The next was to get some fresh air into the case. That easy enough, just needed to find my drill first.

Drilled holes just under the fan to get some air flow

The same with the side, drilled some hole in air blockers

This seems to have helped, no crashes after many hours of playing. Before it was around 2 minutes from game load to a crash.