the risks of moving a dodgy PSX

[Lance]

.
i am happy to say that now that i've been able to move my PSX back into its usual place, it still works. [turned up on edge, of course]. last time i moved it, it stopped working, not reading the disc. until a slight cleaning and shaking and mucking about with the laser carrier was done, it just continually tried to move the carriage, but somehow couldn't see the data. i still don't know what causes this common problem with the old machines, but anyway, i am once more ready, now that the hurricane has passed and i have electricity again, to try to fight off you challengers for Qirex supremacy. i may have to occasionally pause to think how i am going to get rid of the tree that fell in my side yard instead of on the house, but other than that, i am set to go.

[if you want some details on my experience of the hurricane, check out the link to my 'website' which is actually just my livejournal. the most recent entry tells the tale. please ignore the somewhat earlier horrible, banal, and stinky 'poetic' entry that came immediately before the first of the two mentions of Hurricane Charley. i shall delete the damned thing at my earliest convenience]
.

[Shem]

That's what is incredible about the good 'ol Playstation. How can you hate this machine? You just cannot! I remember when I modded my PSX a few years ago. A shakey hand, and some luck, and I made it with no sweat (apart the one that was caused by the stress of modding a PSX with no instructions but the ones printed on some lazy picture, with numbers and wires). And what's incredible it was stll working when I was selling it (it was a 6 year old oldie, but still worked). It's like.....we know it's all electronic and all that.....but ...Playstation will be always a friendly piece of hardware, just like an old TV set which sometimes you need to punch with a fist to make it work again.....

[science]

I have had several people tell me that the heat that builds up inside of the old playstations was enough to warp the laser arm over time, but I've never completely bought that. I think its just as likely, if not moreso, that the old playstations simply had cheap lasers or cheap laser actuators that fatigued easily. Turning the playstation on its side or upside down could potentially ease any of those three conditions.
Just my two cents.

[Lance]

.
i have to run it on its side or it won't work at all.
it has the problem when it's first switched on and had no time to warm up even a little bit.
.

[Task]

The heat inside a PSX can most certainly build up and do damage.

I guarantee you every single person it's ever happened to has had their PSX on a carpet. Which covers the vents and leads to poor ventilation and heat buildup. It probably even says in the manual "keep off of carpet as that may hinder cooling", but you can guess how many people had to melt their PSX before they figured it out. If even then. 8 P

I'm sure my PSX will still be working fine 10 years from now. Just like my 386, Atari 800 XL, N64, Sega MS...

[infoxicated]

Last contact from Lance : I may not be online for a few days because the hurricane which is destroying everything in its path is on its way towards my house! :o :cry:

Next contact from Lance I moved my PlayStation and it's still working - yay! :D

:lol:

I take it the hurricane passed without too much trouble then? :-? :D

[xEik]

There's no need to care for 100mph winds when you are used to flying above 300mph. :P

Glad to hear nothing happened to you or your house. :)

[Lance]

.
there seem to be no effective vents on the bottom of the PSX in any case. the only open parts of the case are on the sides. not a very effective way to produce airflow. most electronic devices with built-in power supplies are raised a fair bit above the surface they would sit on by having substantial 'feet'. they are also given vents on the bottom and the top to promote intake of cool air by convection. the PSX isn't built that way; the metal chassis completely blocks such bottom holes as there are, so if the laser carriage is vulnerable to heat warping, i can certainly see how there could be enough heat to do it.

Rob, i merely have a sense of what's truly important! ;)

xEik, thanks; the current activity pattern of the Universe was helping me out on this one
.

[Task]

I believe the metal piece of the chassis acts as a heat sink for the main board.
With airflow underneath the PSX (aven as little as afforded by the little feet on it) the "critical level" of heat is avoided. Since there's no fan on the machine, it relies on simple convection and conduction.

Every time I find someone with a dodgy PSX that they've had since it was new, I ask them if they used to sit it on the carpet. Invariably I get "yeah, but then the laser stopped working so I put it on its side and now it's okay".

Funny how that works. 8 )

[Lance]

.
i got mine in a pawn shop. the machine was about two years old when i got it, but i seem to recall that it worked in ordinary horizontal position at the time. so it is presumably my fault. at least part of the time before it went screwy, i had it sitting on a box at nearly the same level above the floor as the television, but i must have changed that later.

the old design allows some small air exchange, but does not promote flow through the chassis since the openings are identical in size, shape, and vertical position while being symmetrically arranged. even a bit of asymmetry would have encouraged a bit of flow. i don't use air-conditioning even though i live in Florida; this would not help the machine. i've had no problem with the Dreamcast, but it has its own cooling fan and unidirectional flow.

currently i keep the PSX sitting on the vented side nearest the power switch, and have it propped a bit aslant against a vertical surface in such a way that air can flow by convection from the now bottom vent vertically to what is now the top vent, the side next the lid release. this has worked well for probably a couple of years. more than that, actually.
.

[piranha wiper]

the heat from what i can tell is made by the transformer which is about 1cm away from the power lead socket and the metal parts which task has said, but above the bottom bit of metal which you can see has the circuit boards placed on top of it and then a piece of goldish coloured metal on top of that (making a circuit sandwich) and then another piece of metal on top of that which has the laser on it and then the top casing,

[Lance]

.
the heat is made by both the transformer and the chips.
it also does not help the air circulation when it's necessary to enclose the display output chips in a RF shield. i like the quiet, but the console needs a cooling fan or a different pattern of vent openings or both. academic now, of course in terms of new production
.

[piranha wiper]

you could buy a small battery hand fan and place it somewhere close to the vents, i was thinking of doing this a few years ago when i had mine placed under my tv that was sat on top of my stereo speakers so it was in a box shape, it didnt help that it was all placed right in front of a radiator then my tv blew up because of this :cry: so i changed everything around somewhere cooler,

i agree with the quiet console its nice that you can only hear the sound of the game and not the console, but after a while of using a ps2 the fan noise becomes unoticable

[Lance]

.
the quietness only happens in winter. on hot days, i have a 16 inch fan cooling me and the PSX
.