I recently bought a working PS3 from ebay. It was a CECHA model PS3 and I got a really good price on it. It worked for all but about 2 hours. After that, it started to have major overheating issues and the console would turn itself off due to it. After 3-4 times of letting it cool and restarting it, it stopped starting up. I took it apart and performed a thorough cleaning along with a reflow of the motherboard using a heatgun and arctic silver thermal compound. Put it back together with everything correctly installed. Powered up fine but I get no picture. Accepts Blu-Ray discs as well. I tried doing the hardware reset power button 3 beep method to reset the video output but that didn't work. I tried using component, A/V and HDMI cable inputs and still no display. I tried removing the hard drive and changing out to a different hard drive and still nothing. Running out of options to what the problem could be. Bad reflow? Video settings improper? Fried motherboard or components? Please help if possible with any possible conclusions.
Before you performed the reflow, was the console exhibiting the classic "YLOD" symptons? Green for a split second, then split second yellow, then blinking red? If it was and now it is no longer doing exactly that, but something different after your reflow than it can only be one of 2 things. Try opening it up again and make sure.....DOUBLE SURE....everything is plugged in, especially into the mother board. If you are 100% sure nothing is unplugged, then yes most likely either the reflow damaged the motherboard or it was on it's way out to begin with.
The good news is if this is a recent purchase from ebay, you are covered. Even if the seller is ignoring you, send repeated emails THROUGH the ebay system (to get them on record) and if he will not accept a return, file a paypal chargeback. Even if the seller tries to pull the old "all sales are final" BS, you paid via paypal and also most likely through a credit card and that means a certain amount of coverage regardless of what the seller says.
An ebay PS3 for a good price...... looks like you got swindled. Was it sold to you AS IS? If so your stuck with it, BUT if it was sold to you and the seller stated that it was in working condition file an ebay buyer protection case. You should absolutely NOT have opened this thing up not even to clean it, let alone heatgunning it for that you could be rejected if once the seller gets it back and sees its been opened he may not give you your money back or complain to ebay ect. In all likelyhood it could have been used alot by the previous owner it starts freezing and then he just "dumped it" on you unsuspecting and thinking you got a good deal on this lemon PS3, the overheating thing is classic YLOD about to happen thats why he ditched it for a low price i suppose.
Your attempted reflow may have made it worse, id advise you to lie and say it malfunctioned to ebay and try to get your money back if you paid more than $120 ( which is what Broken PS3 consoles go for on ebay) then you got swindled by this guy. If you paid $125-150 then you got what you paid for.
