PS3 subjected to harsh enviromental operating tests.

With Xbox360s being reportedly to be at 30% failure rates (based on warranty reports by retailers in US), some US Xbox360 repair contractors are refusing to accept repair works on the Xbox360s.

In view of this, the fellas at PS3Vault have came up with a stress test for the PS3. They ran the PS3 continuously for 108 hours with no interruption in three conditions. The PS3s are used to play games (Motorstorm, Resistance and Enchanted Arms) and blu-ray movie discs (Casino Royale, The Departed, Pirates of the Carribbean, Terminator 2, etc.) in a continuous loop till the 108th hour is up. Finally the PS3s are played in the following conditions.

1) In typical room temperature of 22degrees Celsius. Obviously the Americans take 22degrees C as typical, as typical as if you switched on the air-con here in Malaysia. Still this is as close to real living room conditions as you can get. No issues was recorded at this environment.

2) In the back of a freezer van, with starting temperature of 10degrees C and gradually lowered to -17degrees C, to simulate extreme cold environments. Slight sluggish display was detected when temperature hit -17degrees C, but this was detected to the fault of the display cable, not the PS3.

3) In a heat sauna, with temperature of 37degrees C and increased to 48.8degrees C for the last 24 hours. Except for some burnt smell, nothing major happened to the PS3s.

For environments (2) and (3), the only the console was placed in the freezer and the sauna. The screen and the controllers were placed outside, as no one was willing to tolerate the extreme cold or heat.

In the end, the PS3 survived the extreme tests, and is still working after the tests. As Sony's executives are heaping praises for the PS3 hardware in their own blogs, this test could well be a big blow to Xbox360.

U can get the full test conditions and results here.