PS3 Status and Japan Society

Hello, all!

Happy New Year 2011!! I hope everyone had a great Christmas and are enjoying or at least planning a fantastic agenda for the new year.

Anyway, a few things I wanted to bring you up-to-date on.

Yesterday I had a pretty fulfilling day. A friend and I went to the Japan Society in lower Manhattan and registered ourselves for their spring semester Japanese course. We even signed up to become members, so we could enjoy the discounts to all their events and classes.

I had been planning to enroll at the Japan Society for some time, but never really committed to it or I didn't have the money for it. So, it was a big deal for me once I finally went there and enrolled. I'm excited to say the least! One thing is for sure; my hands are gong to be quite full during the next five months. My schedule and live will be divided between my part-time job, teaching martial arts, grad school and now Japanese classes.

My plate is pretty full!

On the good side, I have a year left of grad school before I'm finished with my MFA! This semester I will handle the infamous third semester project. I have a couple ideas of what I want to do, but I'm still a little nervous about it. I sure that during the residency I'll get a chance to speak to several potential mentors and get a better idea of what I will work on.

Also, my martial arts teaching schedule is going to shift a bit, and that will allow for flexibility. Yeah, I'll find my middle ground to balance the work load that will hit me during the next few months.

On another note, I finally put my PS3 back into working order. A few posts before I had mentioned several hiccups that I ran into during my PS3 upgrade project. Luckily, all those bumps are past me and I completed the upgrade flawlessly.

Out with the old! I backed up the hard drive to my portable storage device before removing the old 60 gig HDD.

I never was able to remove the tray, so I bought an extra tray. Funny, out with the old, entirely!

Originally, I was going to replace the 60 gig with a 320 gig. In the end, I settled for a 500 gig.

Afterward, I uploaded the backed up data onto the new hard drive. I was surprised when I realized that everything was transferred over. The entire process took about two and a half hours. An hour to back up the data, and another hour to upload it again, with twenty minutes in-between to swap the HDD.

I spent several hours afterward downloading game updates, synchronizing my trophies and installing games on the new hard drive.

Like I said, a pretty eventful day!

Well, that's it for this post. Until next post!!

PS3 Update! (Sort of)

Hey, all or some,

Well a few posts back I reported that my PS3 needed eye surgery. Now, I believe I reported on this already, but that went well and my system is back in fine working order. (For the time being)

Anyway, I had been planning a major hard drive upgrade for some time now.

I bought a new internal hard drive, a Western Digital 500gb notebook drive, and I'm ready to begin with that process. I read and viewed many videos on the back up and swap procedures and I'm confident that it will go well.

Wouldn't you know it! I ran into another problem. I've said it before, it seems that the game gods are against me when it comes to my gadgets. I removed the old 60gb HDD out of the PS3, and of all the things to give me the worst trouble, the screws which hold the hard drive to the tray won't come out. After a few hours, a few different screw drivers I only managed to wear down or round off the screws. AARRGGHH!!

I am so pissed right now. Then again maybe not. I'm just disappointed that it's taking this long to do something so simple. On top of that, why does something so simple end up becoming such a headache.

I did the next logical thing. I emailed Sony and asked them if they could send me a replacement tray and screws. I read that they supplied them for free at one point, so it didn't hurt to ask. Hopefully they still do, and even if they charge it shouldn't be that expensive. My only other option is to shop around for a replacement on ebay or at the game shop that handles repairs.

My goodness, its been one set back after another for my old PS3. It's a trooper though!The upgrade will also give me some much needed room to move, and I need that!

And, let me tell you that this HDD upgrade is also coming with its share is issues concerning game saves. Some will transfer over while others not. But, I'll talk about those in my full upgrade post and my after thoughts on the whole process.

That's all on this for now.

Later gators!