With all the news about breached security, homebrew and Sony taking hackers to court, the underlying allure of installing custom firmware on the PS3 is still something a lot of people are interested in. Whether they simply want to return OtherOS to their machines, mess around with emulators or pirate games is beside the point. We here at TheSixthAxis do not recommend dabbling about in the custom pond for one simple reason: you could irreparably damage your console.
Case in point, the recently released CFW 3.55 which, according to the very community that are driving custom firmware development, appears to have bricked a number of consoles. Hacker Waninkoko (hackinblack on Twitter) announced today:
Yay! It’s coming! Custom Firmware v3.55 for PS3 released!
Only to be followed 19 minutes later with:
Do NOT install in Slim consoles! Looks like users are reporting bricking issues. That’s weird as the CFW was tested on both models. Well… I don’t know if those problems are real or just jokes. As I said, some testers tried this and worked in both models.
Brickage was confirmed a few minutes later when an apology was also issued:
I’m sorry for all the consoles that have died, this was unexpected :S
The coding elite over at NeoGaf, watching from the sidelines as the nightmare of PS3s dying around the hacking world unfolded, have chimed in, warning interested parties of the inherent perils of going rogue.
Apparently the guy who made this messed with lvl2 to make it accept a bigger payload, this is why random consoles are killing themselves. lesson = let the guinea pigs go first.
Sure, it’s early days yet and, who knows, it’s very likely the hacking community will iron out these issues and create a safe, robust custom firmware. Then all you have to worry about is Uncle Sony nuking your PS3 from orbit. Seriously, there will always be those who get a kick out of circumventing security measures; the challenge of cracking what is perceived as the uncrackable sublimely attractive.
For the rest of us, be aware that you not only risk losing your PS3 altogether (either now or in the future when your CFW may be detected) but will likely spend more time updating and tweaking your console rather than what it’s actually intended for: playing games.
TheSixthAxis does not condone piracy and does not recommend the modification of your console – doing so is against the Terms of Use of the console and is possibly illegal.
citizeninsane45
Loving that picture.
I last machine I had chipped was the PS1. I have had a lot of consoles since and will not be starting again now. I haven’t even jailbroken my iphone
Kovacs
Did you like the mouseover text, too?
citizeninsane45
Didn’t notice it before in honesty. Having checked now – Classic!
Foxhound_Solid
Piracy is for mugs man. If that sat and thought about what they were doing and the real consequences they would realise what they are doing is wrong.
Hate it and dont have any intention of entertaining it…
l C0D3 M0NK3Y l
Yeah… really dumb.
3shirts
This is one of the big arguments about this kinda thing. Custom firmware enables features that the console should support on official versions.
If your DS could already play mp3, movies and firmware you wouldn’t have gone that route and it’s functionality the console is obviously capable of providing.
If the only thing hacking the system gains you is piracy, it makes it a much clearer moral line and there would be much more support for Sony cracking down on it.
3shirts
*movies and homebrew
BIGAL-1992
I didn’t hack my console, so I can point at them and laugh for turning their PS3s into paperweights.
MornelitheVT
I don’t really need any reasons, I have no interest in Linux (and if I did, I’d either install it on my PC, or rollback my 60g PS3’s FW to Sony’s original FW that allows Other OS). Custom FW is literally for that reason.
Beyond that, I pay for the games I want to play. Hotz & Company knew they were opening the lid on game piracy, and shame on them for just giving out security keys.
gazzagb
All you can do is lol.
Charmed_Fanatic
MWAHAHAHA serves them right
cam the man
They’ve only got themselves to blame.
Harinero
Seems to me that the headline should read “Why You Shouldn’t Install Custom Firmware on Your PS3 IMMEDIATELY”.
Not that I’m particularly for, or against, the practice, but I’m really not as offended by the use of CFW as I am by the utter lack of common sense of rushing to install such an experimental software in an expensive bit of kit and not considering the high probabilities of it backfiring.