Man, that's hella lame. I think that your surge protector should have its own warranty covering all of your products. My surge protector has warranty coverage up to $10,000 of electronics connected to it. I hope I still have the freakin' papers, dang.

Smile Now, Cry Later

That's messed up. Why wouldn't you use a surge protector on a PS3. My protector has a $5,000 insurance covering all the products attached to it.

---

Danjak wrote:

So I woke up yesterday morning and saw that my PS3 was not on. You know that little light letting you know it's getting power?  That morning, no light. This happened once before, but I was able to unplug it and plug it back in to get power, and then it worked. I tried that yesterday morning, but nada. Nothing would work... it was completely dead and not getting power.

So I call Sony and let them know that my less-than 4 month old PS3 was now a brick.  I tried to tell the guy that the trouble started when I first tried to play Call of Duty 3 a while back - it would just completely shut off the system and the only way to get it back on was to unplug it and replug it back in.  (an issue that's been well-documented now in threads such as these.) 

The service representative didn't care about any of that.  Instead, he starts asking me a bunch of questions to try and void my warranty. Things like, "I want you to check the sticker above the hard drive and tell me if it looks damaged."  I'm like, "no, no, no" to everything he's asking. Then he asks me if I had a power surge recently.  Again, I tell him no, that I have all my electronics protected with a high quality power surge protector. He then says "okay, great, Sony can fix it right up for you for $150."  I asked how long the warranty was, and he said a year... but then he tells me that I voided my warranty by plugging it in to a surge protector.   I asked him if he was kidding me, and he says nope, the PS3 is only allowed to be plugged into the wall directly.

I'm stunned at this point. Stunned and very irate. He then repeats the $150 "gotcha" penalty to me for my now warranty-less PS3 and says he'll set up a work order. I pause, look behind the TV, and tell him, "oh, wait, you know what?....... it *is* actually plugged into the wall." He's like "yeah, you already told me it was plugged into the power surge protector," and so I told him that that was BEFORE I had actually *looked* behind the TV.  Now that I'm looking, viola, it's plugged into the wall.  (good thing I double-checked, eh?)  He's now irritated, but says fine, and processes the repair under the warranty.

I did not lie, as it really was plugged into the wall as an oversight.... but putting someone in the position where lying is necessary to effectuate justice is deplorable on Sony's part.  If plugging this thing into a surge protector would void my warranty, Sony should have put a big red tag on the plug telling me as much.... because any person in his or her right mind is going to plug in a $600 piece of electronics into a surge protector.  As a matter of fact, I found several threads on these very forums where people are talking about what surge protectors are best for the PS3.  And several people here scoff ed at the idea of not using one. (oh... little do they know...)

The whole thing is nuts and really irritates me.  And the kicker is that I asked the guy what will happen to my hard drive - as I would like to keep all my saved games and other downloaded information. He just matter-of-factly tells me, "Oh, we'll wipe it." I said even if nothing is wrong with the hard drive?? And he just goes "yup, we always wipe them."  I would back it up... but my PS3 is getting no power and all the instructions I see call for using the PS3's built-in back up system.  So that's just great. That means I'll have zero interest in playing the games that I bought once I get it back... as I have no desire to play through countless hours of stuff I've already played in order to get back to where I was.


So the moral of the story is NEVER plug your PS3 into a surge protector lest you void your warranty... and if you do, go ahead and "double-check" to make sure it's not inadvertently plugged into the wall.

---

I would have lied even if it was plugged up.

Remember, just go along with their questions.  If they ask how you are connecting the PS3 to your TV, tell them that you are using Sony cables.  If they ask you about game saves to the PS2, then say you are using Sony's memory cards.  Everything needs to be Sony "certified" equipment.  If not, it will void your warranty. 

_____________________________________________




My Blog

I always use surge protectors...i would be crazy not to with the unreliable grids they have nowadays.

“I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.”

---

Aztec_MC wrote:

Man, that's hella lame. I think that your surge protector should have its own warranty covering all of your products. My surge protector has warranty coverage up to $10,000 of electronics connected to it. I hope I still have the freakin' papers, dang.

---

The surge protector's warranty covers the electronics in the event of a power surge.  There was no power surge.  My PS3 just bricked itself while sitting idle (or crunching numbers for Stanford with the @home project... gah - I hope saying that doesn't void my warranty either).  My PS3 was one of those ones manufactured during that time period that others are reporting will randomly reset and eventually brick itself.  So the problem was the PS3, not the surge protector and not a power surge. 

i nwo this is a lto of trouble, but how about you get another ps3 and load you HDD there jstu for the fact of saving it before you send yours off. its a hassle but it could work.

surge protectors have saved me twice. i didn't have millions connected but i had a few thousand and i will never go without one. if it bricked cuzz of the system or heat, thats a different story all together.

Get your Portable ID!