After getting it on the midnight release, and playing often to get up to level 33 and having a great time, my PS3 finally bit the dust. I was wandering around in the world and all of a sudden the unit just turned off, and was blinking red lights. It would turn back on, but turn off again before 5 minutes or so. It would keep doing that with any game, and even if it was just let to sit there. Until finally, it wouldn't turn on at all anymore. I did a backup just before I got Skyrim, but since the release date I have not.

Bummer.

Big bummer. Especially since my Skyrim disc is still in there and it won't stay on long enough to eject!

I'm hoping it's just the hard drive, and I don't have to replace the whole unit (I still have a fat PS3 from yesteryears).

Man...I feel for you.

Easy fix to get out disc...turn off power and when turning on, hold eject at same time until loud fan kicks on....then press eject again....Should spit out your disc. It is a failsafe to prevent losing discs....

I've read up on about 12 different superstitious tricks to get the disc to eject, I've tried them all, and none of them have worked thus far. The one that you mention I believe is the official Sony one, but it doesn't work for me. Unit won't stay on long enough. As soon as the fan starts to kick on it turns off immediately. On the other hand, some people online have had some really funny ways of getting their discs out of their dead PS3s!!

But seriously, does anybody know if the PS3 will power on if I remove the hard drive? Should it at least power on and just hang on some kind of bios screen, or without a hard drive will it simply not power on at all? I'll test when I get back home, but I'd like to know if there's a way to determine if it is hard drive (rare chance I know) or the motherboard. If it's the hard drive, it's a super easy fix obviously... but I don't trust myself with a $150 motherboard reballing kit for the PS3. I think I'd just do another $150 worth of damage lol