Owners Of ‘Phat’ PlayStation 3 Have A Month Left To Claim ‘OtherOS’ Settlement
Anyone who owned one of the original ‘phat’ PS3s has the chance to claim part of the ‘OtherOs’ settlement – so get on it!
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Time is running out for those who can claim their $65 from Sony as part of a settlement involving a breach of their own warranty when they removed the ability to install other kinds of operating system onto the older models of the PlayStation 3.
The “OtherOs” feature was exclusive to the earlier firmware of the older models of the PlayStation 3, most notably the “Phat” model. OtherOs allowed you to create a partition on your internal PlayStation 3 hard drive, which you could then install operating systems like Linux or FreeBSD on so that you could turn your PlayStation 3 into a personal computer.
The OtherOs feature was removed as of the 3.21 firmware update and was totally disabled in the later models of the PlayStation 3. Sony has claimed that the reason for the removal of OtherOs was due to security concerns, which may have been well founded, considering that both the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable were hacked to run pirated software.
The removal of the OtherOs feature led to a class action lawsuit against Sony, as there were many gamers who claimed that they purchased the PlayStation 3 over the Xbox 360 in order to make use of Linux. By removing the OtherOs feature, Sony had breached their own warranty and was accused of false advertising.
The class action lawsuit against Sony spent several years in court, which resulted in Sony offering a settlement to those who could prove that they were affected by the removal of OtherOs.
In order to claim cash from Sony as part of the settlement, you need proof that you directly purchased your PlayStation 3 from an actual retailer and not from the second-hand market. This will likely discount a lot of people straight away, as the system was first released over a decade ago now. You also need to provide the serial number of your PlayStation 3, which provides another hurdle, as most of the older PlayStation 3 systems no longer work due to technical issues with the fan, so there is a good chance most of the people who bought a system at launch no longer have it.
You will then need to claim that you purchased the system for the Linux feature and that the system lost part of its value when the OtherOs feature was removed. This is a lot of hurdles to go through, so you can see why most people never bothered to claim their settlement. As it stands, you still have a few weeks to claim your $65 if you think it is worth it.
Scott has been writing for The Gamer since it launched in 2017 and also regularly contributes to Screen Rant. He has previously written gaming articles for websites like Cracked, Dorkly, Topless Robot, and TopTenz. He has been gaming since the days of the ZX Spectrum, when it used to take 40 minutes to load a game from a tape cassette player to a black and white TV set. Scott thinks Chrono Trigger is the best video game of all time, followed closely by Final Fantasy Tactics and Baldur’s Gate 2. He pretends that sorcerer is his favorite Dungeons & Dragons class in public but he secretly loves bards.
Link Source : https://www.thegamer.com/playstation-3-phat-otheros-lawsuit-claim/