Chosen Solution
One of my clients has a PS3 which freezes during playback of movies or games. Suddenly it just freezes and after 30 or so seconds it goes to black screen. The model is the CECHG04. My best guess is that the bluray drive is defective? Now - if I am indeed right - the million dollar question for me is: can i install a new bluray drive of a newer make (fx a KES-410ACA) instead of the KES-400AAA which is supposedly installed in the CECHG?
As long as you switch out the blu ray boards as they are tied to the motherboard you could use a newer drive. But i had this problem with my phat before it went YLOD. Things i noticed were that the fan never increased in tempo - just sat being quiet and it used to change speed quite a lot when playing blu ray movies. Is it possible that the fan is not doing its job? Could be an overheating issue. As it is a 40GB Model there is a fan test built in : Power off at rear switch - press and hold eject - then power on switch. See if the fan test completes successfully. If it does then focus on the blu ray drive - and if you are planning on using a new laser it may not fit on the rails but an entire drive is inter changeable (swap the blue ray boards though)
