Oy, what’s really dumb about this is that I had no intention of hacking my PS3 before, but now that there’s a limited window of opportunity I feel compelled to.

Give Sony a couple more years and I’m sure the PS3 won’t even play Blu-Rays anymore. Sigh, this is why I vowed never to buy a PS3, all they do is remove more and more features over time.

Andrew,

There are a growing number of people who refuse to buy anything made by Sony or select other options when they’re available. Sony routinely shits on its customers and has had a history of doing so.

So, yeah, eventually a company can alienate its customer base and hurt themselves in the long run. If you advertise a feature of hardware now and take that feature away later with a software upgrade then why should your customer believe you won’t do the same in the future for some other product you buy from them?

What if Sony decided that your DVD player should no longer be able to view any DVDs but Sony DVDs? They could make the claim that it’s to prevent piracy (and Sony DVDs do routinely include anti-piracy features), but how would you feel about losing the ability to view some of your DVD collection? They picked on Linux geeks this time, so they only alienated a small portion of their customer base, but that eventually adds up if the same practices continue.

As a former psp hacker , sony is doing things all wrong. First they alienated their followers by taking legal action against some devs, They failed to release the gps module which was why I bought the stupid thing any way. The EU releases make the US releases of add ons clearly discriminant.
One of my old posts got about 25 k views , thats 25k users who bought psp. Now no body bothers with it. Personally ive moved on to hardware development. Screw sony.

@andrew

When security flaws are found in other software, developers don’t disable and bury features and call it an upgrade. What Sony is doing with the PS3 is terrible. This is one of the main reasons why I never bought a PS3 even though I wanted one and have a HDTV: because its a Sony product and I’ve been burned by Sony before.

sony what are you doing.

companies need to learn to embrace this sort of thing rather than attempt to fight it because hackers will always win. you’d think sony would clue in given they’ve been trying to stop hackers on the PSP for years and done a great job at not succeeding.

sony has gone so far downhill and will continue to do so, along with most of the other major players in this area.

all this means is that sony acknowledges that geohots hack would actually lead somewhere, and they are trying to stop it before it can be fully exploited. but jon is right. once the ps3 is officially hacked sales would increase. only problem with that is that the ps3 is still sld at a loss. so would in fact cost sony money.(but possibly made up in increased game sales).

I got my PS3 at launch, paying over the price to get it early. The first thing I did was install a bigger harddrive and install Linux. Both being almost encouraged by Sony in their press releases and manual. The Linux system was disappointing because of the lack of RAM and limited framebuffer video, but it was a start. I hoped they would give us a proper 3D driver, particularly as the machines video is supposed to be based on Nvidia who already have a driver for linux. But no, it was to never happen.

The PS3 had the chance to be an excellent media center, but Sony can’t see beyond their awful interface and poor codec support. Sometimes m2ts files would play, an update later they wouldn’t. DTS support went AWOL for a number of “updates” too. The US PS3 won’t play region free PAL DVDs yet The Euro one can handle NTSC, and the Divx official support turned out to be worse than the unofficial support on the 360. Again, a minor step in the right direction, but then nothing.

They removed SACD, something they surely own, so how can the lose money by supporting it.

Sony needs friends, they’re going down the pan year on year. They’ve got the hardware, no doubt about that, but the corporate attitude stinks. Just open it up and let the fans and market make of it what they will. A open system will sell.

I shall not being doing the update, that means no online purchases from me anymore, no testing games via demos, and I guess at some point new games and blu-rays will stop working on it, requiring a > 3.15 FW. That’ll be the end of my PS3 game purchases when it does. blu-ray players are dirt cheap these days, so buying another or hooking up my laptop isn’t going to be the end of the world.

Meanwhile, I’ll get the usual candidates like MW3 or whatever for our 360 instead. I prefer the PS3 controller, but Sony have decided they’ll annoy people like me, I’m happy to let another company take my money instead.

I feel sorry for those that have missed all this downgrade news and will let their consoles update as if it’s another update, only to find they’ve lost their Linux system the next time they try to use it.

As to the security excuse, hardly, even season modders have nothing to work with. Hasn’t anyone else noticed how hypocritical this is coming from the company that brought you rootkit music CDs.

You abuse it you lose it. Sony has every right to do this. They were nice and let people have their 3rd party OSes, and then when people started breaking the EULA they put the hard foot down and said no.

It’s called discipline, you may not like it, but hey, maybe you shouldn’t have started hacking their shit then, huh?

I’ll just figure out another way to load my custom stuff…

To everyone who points out that Sony is removing this feature because of Geohot and his antics, it’s important to know that the Slim was released WITHOUT the ability to install another OS months before Geohot’s exploit was made known.

Not that I don’t think their assholes for removing the third os.

“I’m with stupid -> SON”

The Y has been cut off, at least on my screen.

I wonder if there are any grounds for a class action lawsuit here…

@Unouhu maybe if you type loud enough Sony will hear and realize that clearly you are smarter than them and they should do what you want.

I really don’t understand why anyone would want to run linux on a ps3 anyway. I wouldn’t want to run windows on my xbox. (And before anyone goes and says “open source dev” this and “open source dev” that, guess what, I can dev for my xbox, and I can choose for my product to be open source or not.)

If you want to do computery things, get a computer. If you want to play games, get a console. The end.

There are Laws in many countries the World over that disallow companies to remove features from a product after it has been sold. Canada, the USA, UK, Japan, Austraialia. Hmmm a trend I see, the Major Market shares for Sony are the ones that will Highly be affected. Heck Sony did this with the psp many times, but Homebrew always Prevailed. WHo out there has ever used MapThis!?

How are they suckering people into making this “upgrade”? Are they offering something else to hide these “added features”. I’m not a console gamer so I don’t know..just curious.

@Mike D.
they’re required to connect online with the console

To be fair, I don’t think that they make any cash off of hardware sales (literally). They’re probably trying to get people either buying games for it or get off of it. They aren’t making money if you’re simply using it for free.

This just made me think: if they made a PS4, they could just brick all the PS3s with an update, and make people buy a PS4. lol…

<_<

I already talked to my lawyer, and accordingly to EU laws they can’t to that to the Playstation 3.I will update, all of them and my next step is too sue sony. they will regret this.

I am disapointed with the way the industry is going. when i started in the business around the 70′s company’s cared more about the clients even they didn’t say so.

Any “risk” to SONY’s profit by keeping a feature that they sold is speculative, and the evidence doesn’t back any claim that Geohot’s actions jeopardised any profits, since as previously mentioned, XBOX and Wii both have piracy issues, but both outsell the PS3 in game sales and attach rate.

And furthermore, its simple immoral and illegal, and just another step towards we peons never owning anything, and only getting to use what we “buy” if our feudal lords deem us worthy. That was the kind of system countries shrugged off a few centuries ago.. and you want to return to it?

@Mikey
“If you want to do computery things, get a computer. If you want to play games, get a console. The end”

What the hell are you doing on this site then. Clearly you haven’t read the name hackaday. The vast amount of people who’s here do not use the product they buy for it’s intended purposes. You should even use the internet anymore because soon it’s intended purpose is for advertising only, just as television have evolve to be.

I’d expect some of these comments on digg or some shit but why in gods name are these assholes visiting hackaday?

The fact of the matter is, regardless of whether YOU are actively using linux on your ps3 or not, the console was marketed with this feature and as such should not be disabled for no apparent reason.

All the piracy talk is bullshit. How about they disable your blueray drive so you cant play any of your retail games? That would stop piracy, wouldn’t it? It’s the exact same logic, there’s no piracy to stop and they’re only effecting the legit user.

Better yet, let me remove the ability to make a call from your cellphone or permanently remote disable the engine of your car for “security” reasons.

I see this as pointless and unnecessary. Fair enough to remove it from the slim to cut costs, but you dont’ downgrade a product.

Sony, you’re an idiot.

Goodbye Sony. I don’t want to see you anymore. You had your brilliant days but now they are only gray and cloudy.

You offered us freedom, and then you take it from us; therefore, I will follow the example of Mahatma Gandhi and stop using or buying your products.

It is time for a new kind of revolution, a next new revolution for freedom.

I don’t know you folk, but I am tired to have my freedoms being taken little by little.

For now one, companies that focus on restrain their users, take advantages of them, or abuse them, are not going to get a penny from me(at least not directly but thought my taxes).

In New Zealand at least, it would seem to be of dubious legality too, and qualify people for a full refund under our Consumer Guarantees Act as a product that does not perform as stated. Unfortunately this guarantee applies to retailer, not the supplier. IANAL etc of course.

HA HA HA This why you should use PC for games and work, fast gear newer hurt + freedom

I love my PS3, but sony just keep screwing up. Without wanting to feed the old “which console is better” fire, the PS3 could be the market leader but Sony are what seems like too scared to let it happen because if it gets too popular, it will get more interst from DEV groups who want to release copy protection beating devices (i.e. modchip style addons) and take $$$ away from Sony et al.
Next they’ll remove the AVI/DIVX playback from the machine and mine will be in the bin.
Sony should have taken advantages of other platforms downfalls but one has to wonder what ties they have to other hardware developers and their motives for keeping the PS3 down. Something that no doubt cost millions (billions?) to develop and produce.

@Therian

See MacroHards post above yours for one explanation of why using a PS3 can be better than a general purpose computer for so called computer stuff.

I wonder if one can purchase Cell chips separately, this might spur someone to produce a low cost generic computer with several Cell processors built in. Perhaps they could corner the scientific market that Sony just shafted?

Great move SONY… NOW I DON’T WANNA TO BUY PS3 ! :D

@ Anon – nah, the other os feature won’t be back. Look at what they did to PS2 emulation, at first it was available with hardware support, then they crippled it by running in software only, and then they removed it altogether. And heck, the PS2 emulation worked with genuine discs only so “piracy” isn’t a reason to have removed it, but “greed” is.

Although this is a bad thing I have a feeling all the people crying that the sky is falling in have no idea what they’re whining about. The other OS option is a novelty for most people and I doubt there are more than 50 or so people using PS3′s as a Cell dev environment at home (Those people probably just won’t upgrade their machines).

The other OS option has gone in the slim and that was before Geohot managed to unlock the hypervisor.. Very limited amount of users + potential backdoor == Good candidate for removal.

For those that are bitching that “It’s my hardware, I’ll do what I want with it?!?!?!111″.. You can do what you like with your hardware Sony isn’t stopping you from doing that; If anything laws like the DMCA would be your major blocker not Sony. You have to keep in mind however that Sony didn’t sell you a devkit so they don’t have to support you in running your own code on that hardware. There’s nothing to stop you hacking the PS3 and do what you like with it as Geohot has done.. alas most of the people shouting their heads of would be hard pushed to get hello world working in basic.

I must admit that loading another OS and also trying to keep the default XMB seemed like a pain in the ass, but it was one of the reasons I bought my PS3 (I have an old school PS3 so I still have PS2 compatibilty which I still use for lots of [original] PS2 games and Boot Other OS) I just think its a bad move by Sony. I dont see what Sony have got by removing it? Were firmware updates getting so large they needed the space? Think not.

I “WAS” a sony fan. I have 2 LCD TV sets, a 360 and other smaller stuff. When my car radio went south, I replaced it with a sony.

If this is true, I will never purchase a Sony product again. This includes their music and movies.

They just roasted the golden goose…

guys, use the workaround: http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv=FM0EyX1rZkc

see video description for a detailed howto.

I’m waiting for GeoHot. God Speed to him

I’ve said it for years, Sony will only let you have the fun they want you to have, legal or not. I won’t be getting this update…If I end up with a dusty(more so), bulky, black box of uselessness than so be it. For the amount of money I was raped for several years ago, I fail to see how that doesn’t entitle me to keep the features that came, and initially were hyped-up with. Yes, I’m pretty sure that could fall into the bait and switch category.

Wow, there are a lot of Sony reps commenting on this post. Get back to work and tell your bosses I said thanks but no thanks. I seriously hate Sony.

To the people who say “You hacked it, you deserve it to be taken away” and things of that nature, F U. FCKN losers.. I didn’t hack anything, ever, I just used my PlayStation, and that’s all. I bought and paid for this feature, what they are doing is a crime, it is consumer fraud, and it violates our rights as American citizens. The fact that they would like to punish everyone for things that a couple of people did is ridiculous as well, the part that gets me the worst is that they are unwilling to offer anything, anything at all, to make up for it. I called sony support, and they treated me like sht, basically told me I was SOL, and all 3 people I talked to were rude as hell, when they go out of business I will laugh, because I’ve always been the biggest PS supporter, and this is what I get in return for being a loyal customer. Never bought an xbox, or a wii, or anything else, I had PS1, 2, and 3, and I was gonna get the next one whenever it comes out, but screw that. I’m currently looking into a class action lawsuit, but am debating on whether to just sue alone, class action will hurt sony bad but won’t really benefit any of the people in it. A 10 dollar settlement doesn’t make up for the loss of at least half, if not more, of my systems functionality. Again, I can not say enough, this is completely, 100% illegal, and its also 100% BS. F U SONY!

I am sorry for the people this affects.

Luckily it shouldn’t affect those running PS3 clusters, just don’t connect the machines directly to the Internet and you won’t have to install the upgrade, or am I missing something?

To anyone saying no one uses Linux on the PS3 and other similar things, I’d just like to say I’m currently working away from home and have been using Ubuntu on the PS3 practically every day for about a month now, and will continue to do so for quite a while yet. This is my only PC at the moment as it was the only real option other than buying a laptop/netbook specifically for only a few month’s usage which would just be money down the drain.

Anyway, I imagine my opinion on this should be pretty obvious. Especially considering I DO use it for both games and Linux, and probably about a 50/50 split in usage times really.

I can’t afford to update because I need my PS3 set up like this right now, yet there are some games coming out soon that I want to play, but I don’t think I’ll be able to now. Maybe if they had updated the browser so it wasn’t shit and added a messenger client then I could get by, but as it is this update screws me over. Thanks a lot Sony.

*Posted from Firefox on Ubuntu on a PS3*

@andrew
Yes Sony is hurting themselves they don’t seem to be able to reach a balance between fair use and protecting their IP which will harm them in the end.
This is not the first time Sony has screwed up royally as with the rootkit CDs.
This is indeed a downgrade I’ll go as far as saying it’s breaking the consoles.
As for no one uses it Linux provides an infinitely superior media player and browser compared to what Sony provides.
They break my console I’ll never buy another Sony product again.
@Mikey you sir are just a troll

OMG make sure you disconnect it from the mains before you use it or YOU COULD DIE!

@Mikey Yeah, I’m just going to have to wait until my situation changes until I update so I can play new games. I really shouldn’t have to though. And when I do update, I’ll not have the backup of PS3 Linux “just in case” anymore, which while not being the reason I bought the console, was really handy to have.

It just pisses me off that I’ve been singing Sony’s praises for the past month because their console has served me far better than any other, and I didn’t even have to hack it. It never bothered me when Nintendo removed the Homebrew Channel etc, because it was never supposed to be there in the first place, but this is just a slap in the face for relying in officially supported features.

If you are like me and have a ps3 with linux on it and use it to game also, do like me and change your dns setting under network setting’s to primary dns 67.202.81.137 this way you can still play ur games,play online,buy from the store and do everything else the ps3 is meant to do. Ive been doing this since yesterday and it working fine for me i just got done playing MAG all night and had no problems.

Sony really blew it all up. Like someone alread stated, the PS3 could have been the most widely used console, as a hardware project, it has huge potential and (talking about the CECHA01 model) could be one of the most COMPLETE devices ever, IF Sony could see beyond their damn noses. They even screwed up the launch versions (some good, the CECHA01 perfect, some worse). It would be revolutionary, a machine that could be a a HD media center, a computer, a game station for all PS (1,2 &3) games ever published, even form clusters, supported by open source devs (means that Sony would have itself even less to develop)
practically unlimited potential! And what do we finally have? A restricted, region-locked (that you don’t even have the choice of choosing a region different from the one the device was intended to be sold) and relatively useless fart :P. Imagine what improvement would be possible if one could use all the hardware power of a good PS3, e.g. with the Emotion Engine as an supporting processor for small jobs and many other better ideas etc.
And how much all users would appreciate the company for giving us such a device. Even with a slightly higher cost, one would know that it ould be worth the money…
But they decided to block the linux feature (which I used although running on the restricted proccessors and memory, with no 3d support is slow and painful :P ) because there is an exploit (which btw can be activated by probably less than 100 people globally… read and learn you trolls)
that it was not even thought for being used for piracy!!
Well, you are on my shit-list as well, and I hope GeoHot &co. will give you a good lesson, for not showing RESPECT to your customers!
Cheers

PS. Mikey, get a life man…

What annoys me, is the amount of rabid people on GeoHot’s blog. 99% of the comments there are usually “goohot ur ded u c****** i hop u die wile sucking c** in hell!!!!!!!!” or “GOEHOT THIS HACK IS FAKE U JST GLITCHED MEMORY THATS NOT HACK GIVE US ISOLOADER”.

Sony was planning this for a while. The hypervisor was just too big and expensive to maintain. I think Geohot’s actions were a “convenient” excuse to put the final nail in the coffin.

And I’m sure it’ll only be a matter of time before someone makes an installable proxy that will modify auth packets to say that it’s running the latest firmware when it’s really not.

In the meantime, I hope the people over at Geohot’s PS3 blog cut the crap in the comments. It’s insanely childish to call someone a fake when the instructions, code and proof have been posted on several blogs and websites.

OMG, you people are so stupid. To the people complaining about Linux, did you buy the PS3 for the PS3 or for Linux. Seriously this is retarded, “OH SONY I AM GOING TO SUE YOU”, “SONY I WON”T BUY A PS3 NOW”, “SONY, YOU CAN”T REMOVE THIS”… “SONY” “SONY”.. Shut up and use the PS3 for gaming,watching movies,and music. Don’t like it, oh well it is not like Sony will change their mind. Now if it was to remove .VOB, .DIVX. .MP3. then I would be upset, but its Linux, this is not a computer it is a gaming console, use it to game.

END OF STORY

@cole after reading your comment all your insults seem to be aimed at yourself now be quite white boy. people that use the ps3 for clusters have no need to update. and im sure if anyone talked to a lawyer and then showed them a copy of the eula they would laugh at you if you said you want to sue sony.

This is becoming a big bitch fest, to be honest Hackaday should lock further comments to be posted.

@Cole,
First off I did not say I didn’t like Linux (I don’t know where you got that from), second when I watched previews and looked at adds for the PS3, I did not see them launching Linux on the PS3, nor did I see articles says “Install Linux on your PS3″. No they marked the console side of the machine hence Gaming.

Now if you want to bicker back and forth saying they can’t do it. Well let you know this, I am sure Sony looked into all legal actions that would arise with the new update (if you think a company so big like Sony would look past this, then your a ra-tard).

I for one don’t care about the update, as I never used/nor was going to use Linux on the PS3, I am too busy playing the games on the PS3 rather than running Linux. If I wanted Linux I would just install it on my PC.