Amazing Aaron

This busted PS3 has been setting here on my desk since I purchased the wrong replacement laser for it last week, and realized that the laser that this older system needs is quite a bit more expensive than the one I purchased at first.

After looking around I couldn't find a replacement laser for under $40.00, but was able to find a used (but working) drive for $60.00 including shipping. So I've decided to just spend the extra money and buy the whole drive.

Buying the whole drive will make fixing this old PS3 a very easy task. It will just require removing a few screws to replace the control board from the new drive with the control board on my old drive. You have to do this because the control boards are locked to the systems motherboard, but after that it just entails connecting a few cables and putting the case back on.

So I'm sending back the laser I bought last week (should have done this already) and hopefully will receive the new drive in soon!

Okay so I bought a PS3 at a yard Sale about a week ago. I got it for $15.00 because the Blu-ray drive does not work. The system works fine just as long as you do not need to use a Blu-ray, DVD or CD, which pretty much makes the system worthless.

Soon after buying it I tore into it and did some research. Turns out that the laser lens is at fault, so I went on ebay and bought a replacement lens. I just received the lens yesterday, unfortunately it was the wrong type. I ordered a KES-410A which has two lenses in it. One for reading Blu-rays and the other for DVDs/CDs. Turns out the system I bought uses an older model laser lens that works with just one lens providing both functions. The only problem is that the older lens cost more to replace (they don't make them anymore), and they are not as reliable as the new dual lens (hence the reason they don't make them anymore).

I hope to exchange this new lens in for the type I need (+ some extra cash), and hopefully have a working PS3 for less than it would have cost to go buy a new slim model or even buy a used one. Plus I'm learning a lot, and thats worth something!

I've been playing on a new site called, Tweak Today. Its basically a site, that gives you a fun task, to complete each day. Todays task is "Take a picture of something you never thought you would own, but now you do". You can post a video, picture, or text, and there are know real rules, on how you complete the task. In fact the site encourages creativity in your submissions. Theres a new mission everyday, and its fun to see what people are going to post. I've been on Tweak Today for about a week now. I have not only been completing task, but also suggesting new task. Something everyone is encouraged to do. You get to vote on everyone's submissions, and the winner becomes the new mission, the next day. The only thing that is kinda annoying, is that no one wins. I think it would be cool, if they picked the most creative submission each day, as the winner, and displayed the entry, in a special area of the site, for bragging rights. Bragging rights, would be a cool enough prize, in itself! No need for any real prize, although that would be cool! Maybe they will do something like this in the future. The site is still very new! I have noticed, a little down time, along with a few bugs, but its still very fun, and usable. So check it out, and take a look at my submisions. I'm AmazingAaron over there!

Okay, so as some of you may know, there was a team meeting for the Xbox Live team, on the 6th of this month. During the meeting they had screens set up, and you could send in feedback about Xbox Live, and features you would like to see on Xbox Live. The tweets had to be hashtagged with #heyxboxlive to show up, and be seen by the XBL team members. Well it seems that something may have come out of this. One of the most asked for features, was a way to rate XBL games. If you head over to the Creators Club website, and check out the latest post, you will notice its entitled “Where to Find Reviews of Xbox LIVE Community Games”. basically its just a post with links to sites that review Community Channel games, but if you take a close look, you will see the following in the opening sentence.

Team XNA knows that user reviews of games on the Xbox 360 Console would be fantastic, but they don't exist, yet.

As you can see I've made bold the main word in that sentence! While I don’t think this post is talking about XBL games in general, but rather the home brewed Community Channel Games, everyone who has been following the Community Channel developments knows, its a feature that is really needed, and if they bring it to the the Community Channel, it might be on its way to XBL games as a whole! There's no way to know (unless they just come out and say it) if this was the user feedback, or just a feature they had planed all along. I do think its cool that the Xbox Live team seems to be become more open with the community, and I hope the team continues to listen to us all, and they get that new rating system up soon!

The U.S launch of the Nintendo DSi, is in a few hours, at 12:01 am on April 5. I will be going to pick mine up at the local GameStop. I will be making a video of me unboxing it, and playing around with the menus, and settings. I don't know if I'm going to buy any games right now, or not. I will be downloading a game off the DS channel. I don't know which one yet. You get 10,000 points to buy something in the DS Store, if you purchase a DSi now until Oct. I should have my video uploaded to youtube in a few hours, be sure and watch it. ...Oh by the way im getting the black one.

Update: Heres the video.