Leave Your PlayStation 3 Off or Else, Warns Sony

[javajolt]

It's probably just a 24 hour bug, but you'll want to leave your glitchy PS3s off in the meantime, just in case, says Sony.

In an update posted to the company's international Twitter feeds and official PlayStation blogs at roughly 9:15am PT, Sony wrote that it hopes to resolve an issue preventing gamers from playing games or connecting to its PlayStation Network, but advises that "you do not use your PS3 system, as doing so may result in errors in some functionality."

Those "functionality errors" could include properly recording trophies obtained by completing specific goals in games, as well as "not being able to restore certain data," though it's unclear what Sony means by the latter.

The issue, which manifested as clocks turned from February 28 to March 1, affects older "fat" PS3s only ("slims" are unaffected) and manifests as a time reset to 12/31/99 when you power the system on. Attempting to play certain games offline brings up an error message, as does signing into Sony's PlayStation Network.

Some users have also reported that they can't access streaming videos, such as those downloaded from online video rental service Netflix.

For a more detailed look at the issue, see our info-roundup: Global PlayStation 3 Glitch: What We Know (http://www.pcworld.com/article/190398/global_playstation_3_glitch_what_we_know_so_far.html)

[Jake]

Wish I would have known about this earlier...

Though I can still moderate these forums (not much work to be honest  ), so I guess it isn't all bad.  There better be a fix soon though, I'm missing Assassin's Creed 2.

[javajolt]

Sony Corp. said Tuesday it has repaired a software glitch with its PlayStation 3 that had prevented some users from accessing its PlayStation Network for more than 24 hours.

In a post on its PlayStation blog, Sony said the problem stemmed from the internal clock on some of its older PS3 consoles. The clock on affected models incorrectly recognized 2010 as a leap year, calling into mind the "Y2K" type of calendar change software problems feared at the turn of the century.

Sony was warning customers to stop using their PS3 machines because there were some instances where turning on the console would result in the loss of data such as trophies, or accomplishments, earned through game play.

The problems with the PlayStation Network, which has 40 million-plus registered users and allows online game play as well as access to movies, television shows and other content, come at a time when Sony is trying to model the PSN with an online media platform accessible across a wide range of devices. The software glitch also comes as Sony gears up for the launch of a new game for its PS3, Battlefield: Bad Company 2, later this week.

Sony's electronics and games businesses account for about two-thirds of the company's revenue. Restoring profitability at those two divisions has been at the core of the company's restructuring implemented at the trough of last year's global economic downturn.