PlayStation 4


 * This page covers the original PlayStation 4 model which released on November 15, 2013. For pages on other models, see PlayStation 4 Slim, PlayStation 4 Pro, or DualShock 4.

There are 3 different models of the original PlayStation 4:
 * 10xxx
 * 11xxx
 * 12xxx

This series is the only one to have a red LED to signify overheating. The later models do not.

'''This series is also the only one to have a daughter-board inside the disc drive, to the exception of the 12xxx, which has the hardware integrated into the main board itself. The daughterboard has a chip made by Renesas that is married to each console and cannot be swapped. Be Careful!'''

The last 3 characters signify locale and hard drive size, so they're not applicable to repair.

There are mainly 8 different kind of faults. Those 8 are Blue light of death (BLOD), Pulsing BLOD (pulsing blue forever), White light of death (WLOD), No light, disk drive issues, hard drive issues, software/firmware issues, and other issues.

Blue Light of Death (BLOD)
The Blue light can tell us many different fault conditions if observed properly. The BLOD is a general term for a blue light upon turning on that shuts off without going to a white light. There can be many sub-manifestations of this. One example is a blue light that does not pulse, that goes off after 6 seconds.

For a BLOD, you will need to time how long the light stays on, any noises, clicks, beeps, and note if the fan does spin or not.

Pulsing Blue Light of Death
A Pulsing BLOD, signifies a hardware failure that is not terminal to the process. A normal BLOD would shut down, because for example, there is a short on the 12v rail. A Pulsing BLOD, however, is still a severe failure but the console is able to stay running. One example of this is RAM amnesia, in which the RAM does not keep information, but still acts normal otherwise.

UART Method

 * For more information, take a look at PS4 UART Guide.

For this, you can use the UART method, to listen to the console, and see what it complains about. The pin is a debug pin coming from the syscon/southbridge, that can be accessed via UART.

Firstly, you'll need to dump the flash using a programmer, then you'll need to use BwE's program to change the flag for UART functionality, reflash it, then you have unencrypted information coming out of the debug pin. If this step is not done, you will see nothing, except for a bunch of spaces in serial monitor.

White Light of Death (WLOD)

 * For more information, take a look at the PlayStation 4 WLOD Repair Guide.

A White light of death, is a console that turns on to a stable white light, but has no output from the HDMI port. Most of the time, this can be attributed to the HDMI circuitry. In some cases, the console can shut down from a white light.

No Light
Some consoles may display no light at all when pressing the power button. Example would be a bad Southbridge causing the console to turn on from controller only, but not the power button.

Disk Drive Issues
Disk drive malfunctions are a general term for a disk drive that is not functioning as intended. Not reading, grinding, no disk feed, and no power are all examples.

Hard Drive Issues
Issues that signify a dead or failing hard drive. Examples are: freezing in home menu, crashing when loading games, games taking very long to load, very long boot up time with black screen after PlayStation logo, very long hard drive check time

Software/Firmware Issues
Anything to do with software, like error codes, problems with update, etc. Example would be a CE-34878-0 error caused by failing RAM modules.

Prefixes:

SU = Software Update

CE = General error

Other
This is for issues that don't fit in the other 8 above.